Earthquake response analysis considering structure-soil-structure interaction

This paper proposes a numerical method of earthquake response analysis considering the structure-soil-structure interaction between two adjacent buildings. In this paper an analytical study is presented in order to show some typical features of coupling effects of two reactor buildings of the BWR-type nuclear power plant. The technical approach is a kind of substructure method, which at first evaluates the compliance properties with the foundation-soil-foundation interaction and then uses the compliance in determining seismic responses of two super-structures during earthquake motions. For this purpose, it is assumed that the soil medium is an elastic half space for modeling and that the rigidity of any type of structures such as piping facilities connecting the adjacent buildings is negligible. The technical approach is mainly based on the following procedures. Supersturcture stiffness is calculated by using the method which has been developed in our laboratory based on the Thin-Wall Beam Theory. Soil stiffness is expressed by a matrix with 12 x 12 elements as a function of frequency, which is calculated using the soil compliance functions proposed in Dr. Tajimi's Theory. These stiffness values may be expressed by complex numbers for modeling the damping mechanism of superstructures. We can solve eigenvalue problems with frequency dependent stiffness and the large-scale matrix using our method which is based on condensing the matrix to the suitable size by Rayleigh-Ritz method. Earthquake responses can be solved in the frequency domain by Fourier Transform. (orig./RW)