Ground motions selection and scaling for nonlinear dynamic analysis of structures located in Eastern North America.

This paper presents the effectiveness of seven ground motion scaling methods and two spectral matching methods to achieve compatibility with the Canadian National Building Code (CNBC) 2005 uniform hazard spectrum for Montreal to perform nonlinear seismic analysis. Databases of 30 historical records and 30 Eastern North America simulated records have been selected to compute the reference mean seismic demand and its dispersion. The characteristics and destructive capacity of ground motions have been studied using a large number of indices computed from ( i) the records themselves, ( ii) a series of single degree of freedom structures, as well as ( iii) a four-story steel frame. Record scaling methods to the target spectrum using ( i) spectral intensity, ( ii) reducing the mean square error, ( iii) and minimizing dispersion as well as time domain spectral matching generated coherent seismic demand and dispersion in agreement with the reference values. Spectral matching to a specified elastic design spectrum does not reduce the dispersion of the nonlinear response. Therefore close spectral matching cannot be used to reduce the number of records to minimize the resources allocated in seismic safety assessment. At least seven records, as recommended in current CNBC and FEMA (2012) guidelines to compute an average response, should be used to characterize the nonlinear behaviour of structural systems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]