Risk-Based Design Load on Buildings With Predetermined Service Life

Abstract

The possibility that a short-term building meets a rare event is lower than that of an ordinary building. Because strong wind and snow can be predicted relatively accurately, the design load can be reduced provided that preliminary preventive care (PPC) is executed by the building safety manager. When conducting PPC, the safety level should be kept equivalent to that of an ordinary building. The object of this research is to discuss the optimum design load that minimizes the total expected cost. Then, simple formulae to determine the optimum design load are proposed.