Performance-Based Analytics-Driven Seismic Design of Steel Moment Frame Buildings

With the embrace of the performance-based seismic design as the state-of-the-art design method, recent emphasis has been placed on eliminating its drawbacks and facilitating its application in practice. This study aims to propose an alternative design method: performance-based analytics-driven seismic design, which is applied to steel moment resisting frame buildings. First, the seismic performance of self-centering (with post-tensioned connections) and conventional moment resisting frames (with reduced-beam section connection) is comparatively assessed. The comparison indicates that the economic benefit for adopting the post-tensioned connection is not significant. Then, an end-to-end computational platform, which automates the seismic design, nonlinear structural model construction, and response simulation (static and dynamic) of steel moment resisting frames is developed. Using this platform, a comprehensive database is developed, which includes 621 special steel moment resisting frames designed in accordance with modern codes and standards and their corresponding nonlinear structural models and seismic responses (i.e., peak story drifts, peak floor accelerations, and residual story drifts). Using this database, the efficacy of mechanics-based, data-driven, and hybrid (combination of mechanics-based and data driven) approaches to estimating the seismic drift demand are evaluated. The evaluation results reveal that the hybrid approach has the best performance whereas the mechanics-based model has the lowest performance. Next, a set of non-parametric and parametric surrogate models are developed for estimating the engineering demand parameter distributions. A comparative assessment of the proposed surrogate models and the simplified analysis method proposed by FEMA P-58 is conducted to demonstrate the superior predictive performance of the former. Finally, the effect of various design variables on the collapse performance of steel moment resisting frames are evaluated. The research findings presented in this study helps to facilitate the application of 2nd performance-based earthquake engineering framework in practice and thus better help to create earthquake-resilient communities.