Applied Technology Council A Nonprofit Corporation Advancing Engineering Applications for Hazard Mitigation California - Washington, DC Area

ATC-58 Project

In September 2001 the Applied Technology Council (ATC) was awarded a contract by the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) to conduct a long-term project to prepare next-generation Performance-Based Seismic Design Guidelines for new and existing buildings (ATC-58 Project). The project is to consider and build on the FEMA 349 report, Action Plan for Performance-Based Seismic Design (EERI, 2000), which provides an action plan of research and development activities to produce and implement design guidelines that specify how to design buildings having a predictable performance for specified levels of seismic hazard. Ultimately FEMA envisions that the end product from this overall project will be design criteria for performance-based seismic design that could be incorporated into existing established seismic design resource documents, such as the FEMA 368 NEHRP Recommended Provisions for Seismic Regulations for New Buildings and Other Structures (BSSC, 2001), the FEMA 273 NEHRP Guidelines for the Seismic Rehabilitation of Buildings (ATC/BSSC, 1997), and its successor document, the FEMA 356 Prestandard and Commentary for the Seismic Rehabilitation of Buildings (ASCE, 2000). It is also intended that the performance-based approaches developed under this project would be applicable to the development of similar design procedures for resistance to other extreme hazards including wind storms, fire and blast.

The project is expected to require up to 10 years or more to complete and is being conducted in several phases, as resources become available. During the initial 5-year phase of the project, ATC conducted two workshops to obtain input on project needs and goals, developed a conceptual performance assessment methodology, completed an initial internal report on performance characterization, researched engineering demand parameters that have been suggested for characterizing response of structural and nonstructural components to earthquake shaking (Task Reports), conducted a mini-workshop to identify nonstructrural components of significance, issued a draft 25% complete document describing the seismic performance assessment methodology, and prepared two reports for publication by FEMA:

• Next-Generation Performance-Based Seismic Design Guidelines: Program Plan for New and Existing Buildings (FEMA 445 Report, 2006); and
• Interim Testing Protocols for Determining the Seismic Performance Characteristics of Structural and Nonstructural Components (FEMA 461, Report, 2007).

The ATC-58 Project Team has prepared the 35% complete draft of the Guidelines for Seismic Performance Assessment of Buildings and a companion electronic Performance Assessment Calculation Tool (PACT), which is being developed to estimate direct property losses for three types of assessments (intensity-based, scenario-based, and time-base assessments). Later versions of PACT will provide the capability to estimate casualties and time out of service. Both the Guidelines (35% complete draft) and the PACT Beta version 1.0 software are now posted for review and comment..

Work has also begun on the next 5-year phase of the ATC-58 project, during which ATC will complete the Guidelines for Seismic Performance Assessment of Buildings.

The following project documents can now be downloaded as PDF files:

• ATC-58 Project in Brief, a 3-page overview of the performance-based design concept, its advantages, the current state of practice, the project vision for the next-generation procedures, and the project implementation plan.
• List of Project Participants
• Solicitation for Participants (which will remain active throughout the duration of the project)
• ATC-58-1 Report, Proceedings of FEMA-Sponsored Workshop on Communicating Earthquake Risk, which was held on June 18, 2002 in Chicago, Illinois (file is ~69 Mb)
• ATC 58-2 Report, Preliminary Evaluation of Methods for Defining Performance.
• Task Reports summarizing interim results from various project-related work efforts.
• Technical Papers relating to the project that were presented at recent seminars and conferences
• Proceedings: Mini-Workshop/Invited Meeting on the Identification of Nonstructural Components of Significance (file is ~3.5Mb)
• FEMA 445 Report, Next-Generation Performance-Based Seismic Design Guidelines (file is ~8.7 Mb)
• ATC-58 35% Draft Guidelines for Seismic Performance Assessment of Buildings
• ATC-58 PACT Beta version 1.0 Software Download
• ATC-58 PACT Beta version 1.0 Patch, 6/20/07
• ATC-58 PACT Beta version 1.0 User Guide
• ATC-58 35% Draft Guidelines  and PACT Software - Response Form (Microsoft Word document)
• FEMA 461 Report, Interim Testing Protocols for Determining the Seismic Performance Characteristics of Structural and Nonstructural Components (file is ~ 7Mb)

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