@article {bnh-8012, title = {Heatwave and building codes in New South Wales: issues and prospects}, number = {611}, year = {2021}, month = {05/2021}, institution = {Bushfire and Natural Hazards CRC}, address = {Melbourne}, abstract = {

This report reviews key literature and considers the overall comprehensiveness of the NSW building codes in terms of their contributions to selected elements of heatwave resilience. It identifies success, opportunities and issues relating to the contribution of building codes to natural hazard resilience. Overall, this report suggests that there is no effective acknowledgement of heatwave in the National Construction Code, and that there is limited integration between building and other key systems such as land use planning, health services and emergency preparedness and response. A range of areas are proposed for attention.

}, keywords = {building, codes, heatwave, issues, nsw, prospects}, issn = {611}, author = {Alan March and Crystal Legacy and Georgia Warren-Myers and Leonardo Nogueira de Moraes} } @article {bnh-8013, title = {A method for assessing building codes for natural hazard resilience}, number = {612}, year = {2021}, month = {05/2021}, institution = {Bushfire and Natural Hazards CRC}, address = {Melbourne}, abstract = {

Building codes regulate the design and materials of structures in the built environment, often in parallel with related processes such as land use planning. Building codes establish a standard of certainty that structures achieve pre-established levels of safety and health. In parallel, building codes are potentially able to contribute to natural hazard resilience, although ongoing improvements are needed to account for a variety of emerging challenges and insights from new research.

This summary outlines a generalised method to assess building codes, their application in New South Wales, and related mechanisms in terms of their contribution to natural hazard resilience, identifying areas for improvement and further research. It ensures that methods used and findings are reported in language and formats easily accessible by a wider audience of emergency management, land use planning and design practitioners.

}, keywords = {assessing, building, codes, method, natural hazard, nsw, resilience}, issn = {612}, author = {Alan March and Crystal Legacy and Georgia Warren-Myers and Leonardo Nogueira de Moraes} } @article {bnh-8037, title = {Building capacity in north Australian remote communities - utilisation project report}, number = {672}, year = {2020}, month = {11/2020}, institution = {Bushfire and Natural Hazards CRC}, address = {MELBOURNE}, abstract = {

The utilisation workshop was built on preliminary discussions between the research team and agency end users, the Red Cross, community stakeholders and research partners regarding the development of better communication between remote Indigenous communities and fire and emergency services agencies, to reduce risk and build resilience by taking advantage of local knowledge and skills. The workshop addressed topics relating to volunteer models, and specifically the inapplicability, of the classical model, to people living in remote Indigenous communities.

Outputs of the workshop will shape the form of utilisation product/s that participants considered useful for addressing their specific and collective needs regarding volunteering.

This report is a summary of the workshop in Darwin, 11-12th November 2020, and provides summary documents addressing volunteer models adopting narrative formats (e.g. case studies, storytelling, etc); refers to videos addressing key issues for wider community distribution.

The CRC and CDU and our partners will work on the development and delivery of a second utilisation phase 2021. The in-kind support for this workshop, from supporting agencies and stakeholders, will ensure appropriate development of utilisation products during the second phase. This utilisation workshop was funded by the Bushfire and Natural Hazards CRC in direction linkage to the Building Remote Community Resilience to Natural Hazards Core Research project.

}, keywords = {building, capacity, communities, north australia, remote, utilisation, workshops}, issn = {672}, author = {Jeremy Russell-Smith and Kamaljit Sangha and Andrew C. Edwards} } @article {bnh-7378, title = {Cost-effective mitigation strategy development for building related earthquake risk: annual report 2019-2020}, number = {614}, year = {2020}, month = {09/2020}, institution = {Bushfire and Natural Hazards CRC}, address = {MELBOURNE}, abstract = {

This annual report contains a summary of research undertaken by 4 partner institutions towards the development of cost-effective seismic retrofit methods for vulnerable Australian buildings in the 12-month period from July 2019 through June 2020.

Progress has been made in 4 complementary fronts to:

  1. understand the seismic vulnerabilities of existing unreinforced masonry (URM) and limited ductile reinforced concrete (LDRC) buildings and methods to address them through seismic retrofit
  2. risk assessment of the building stock through development of an economic loss model
  3. advance an end-user focused research utilization project in the area of community risk reduction. This is done through an Earthquake Mitigation Case Study of the historic town of York in Western Australia
  4. commencement of an End-User Utilisation Project with York Shire Council and the WA Department of Fire and Emergency Services through a Natural Disaster Resilience Program funded grant.

The first of the above components is being researched in the Universities of Adelaide, Melbourne, and Swinburne. This work includes investigation of existing building seismic capacities and development of retrofit techniques. The second area is being studied by Geoscience and the work includes estimating direct and indirect losses associated with building damage and benefits from seismic retrofit. The third component is being conducted utilizing the research findings in the two other areas in collaboration with the Western Australia Department of Fire and Emergency Services, York Shire Council and its residents. The last component only started at the end of 2019 but is extremely exciting. To date, the project team has identified several URM buildings in the York Shire to act as {\textquoteleft}exemplars{\textquoteright} for seismic retrofit. The first of these, the York Residency Museum building, has been seismically assessed, retrofit solutions recommended, local consultants (engineering and building contractors) have submitted a report and estimated costings for the rehabilitation work and Council is now in discussions with the contractor.

Finally, using the new damage loss models and costings for seismically retrofitting buildings, recommendations are made for the development of seismic retrofit guidelines and policy based on the strong evidence base being developed by this CRC project team.

}, keywords = {building, earthquake, mitigation, risk, strategy}, issn = {614}, author = {Michael Griffith} } @conference {bnh-6388, title = {How Safe is Safe Enough? Melbourne Case Study}, booktitle = {Australian Earthquake Engineering Society 2019 Conference}, year = {2019}, month = {12/2019}, address = {Newcastle}, abstract = {

Residual risk exists in our buildings even if they were designed in conformance with modern codes of practice. The risk of being killed by earthquakes in Melbourne was discussed in the AEES 2018 Conference (Tsang et al. 2018a). This follow-up paper attempts to address a fundamental question in seismic design: {\textquotedblleft}How Safe is Safe Enough?{\textquotedblright} Various approaches have been implemented or proposed in the last decade for setting risk-targeted performance requirements for seismic design. A target collapse risk limit for a single building may be considered very low by some; however, the aggregated risk for society could become significant, especially for a metropolitan city like Melbourne. This paper introduces an approach proposed by the authors (refer Tsang et al. 2019for full details and discussion)for evaluating the adequacy of existing code level for collapse prevention and life safety by comparing societal risk functions based on regional earthquake loss modelling with a proposed regulatory requirement that aims to limit the earthquake mortality rate to {\textquotedblleft}as low as reasonably practicable (ALARP){\textquotedblright}. The proposed approach is then applied to Melbourne in a case study. The results show that the earthquake fatality risk for society appears to be unacceptable.

}, keywords = {building, Collapse, earthquake, Earthquake fatality, F-N function, Societal risk}, url = {https://aees.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/66-Hing-Ho-Tsang.pdf}, author = {Hing-Ho Tsang and James Daniell and Friedemann Wenzel and John Wilson} } @conference {bnh-6026, title = {Analytical Model for Seismic Retrofit of Concrete Beam-Column Joint using Diagonal Metallic Haunch}, booktitle = {World Congress on Advances in Structural Engineering and Mechanics}, year = {2017}, month = {01/09/2017}, publisher = {Swinburne University of Technology}, organization = {Swinburne University of Technology}, address = {Korea}, abstract = {

Exterior beam-column joint is typically the weakest link in a limited-ductile concrete frame structure. The use of diagonal haunch element has been considered as a desirable seismic retrofit option for reducing the seismic demand at the joint. Previous research globally has focused on implementing double haunches, whilst the performance of using single haunch element as a less-invasive and more architecturally favourable retrofit option has not been investigated. In this study, the feasibility of using a single haunch system for retrofitting RC exterior beam-column joint is explored. This paper presents the key formulations and illustrates its effectiveness by investigating the changes in the shear demand at the joint through a case study.

}, keywords = {building, building disaster proof, construction, Emergency management, engineering, hazards, risk management}, author = {Hing-Ho Tsang and Zabihi, Alireza and Emad F Gad and John Wilson} } @conference {bnh-6028, title = {Analytical development of seismic retrofit technique for RC beam-column joint using single diagonal haunch}, booktitle = {24th Australian Conference on the Mechanics of Structures and Materials}, year = {2016}, month = {12/2016}, publisher = {Swinburne University of Technology}, organization = {Swinburne University of Technology}, address = {Perth, Australia}, abstract = {

Exterior beam-column joint is typically the weakest link in a limited-ductile RC frame structure. The use of diagonal haunch element has been considered as a desirable seismic retrofit option for preventing brittle failure of the joint. Previous research has been focused on implementing double haunches, whilst the performance of using single haunch element as a less-invasive and more architecturally favourable retrofit option has not been investigated. Hence, the feasibility of using single haunch system for retrofitting RC beam-column joint is explored in this study. This paper presents the analytical development of the technique and illustrates its effectiveness by showing the changes in the shear demand at the joint.

}, keywords = {building, construction, earthquake, engineering, retrofitting, risk management}, author = {Zabihi, Alireza and Hing-Ho Tsang and Emad F Gad and John Wilson} }