Title: Designing and Rehabilitating Concrete StructuresProbabilistic Approach

Author(s): C. Edvardsen and L. Mohr

Publication: Symposium Paper

Volume: 192

Issue:

Appears on pages(s): 1192-1208

Keywords: chlorides; durability; safety factor; serviceability

DOI: 10.14359/5809

Date: 4/1/2000

Abstract:
Based on the recently developed DuraCrete Report, that is a manual for designing and rehabilitating concrete structures by a probability-based approach, four examples dealing with corrosion of steel reinforcement in concrete due to chloride ingress are given in the present paper using the above approach. The first example illustrates the difference in the required concrete cover for different environments (I.e. different temperature). The second example concerns the update of the service lifetime of the Great Belt Link in Denmark on the basis of the measurements made five years after construction. The third example deals with the design of the Western Scheldt Tunnel in the Netherlands, and finally, an example is given concerning a column being designed with regard to initiation of corrosion both by the means of a partial safety factor method and by a probabilistic analysis. When designing a new structure, most often the concrete cover and the diffusion coefficient of the concrete are to be determined while the service life of the structure is given by the owner or the investigator together with the acceptable reliability level. On the other hand, when rehabilitating an existing structure, geometrical and material quantities are known, and an analysis may give the answer to an estimate of the remaining lifetime or the reliability level. The above examples are discussed in order to show, in a practical way, the methods of the probabilistic approach and the type of input used in the DuraCrete design approach.