Comparative evaluation of seismic performance and environmental impact of traditional and dissipation-based retrofitting solutions for precast structures

Seismic rehabilitation is crucial to extend the nominal service life and help reduce the seismic losses of reinforced concrete precast industrial buildings. Along with traditional retrofitting techniques, the latest decades are witnessing a growing use of innovative solutions, the latter including devices that can dissipate the ingoing seismic energy and are characterised by the replaceability after a seismic event. The goal of this work is to compare two retrofitting solutions, respectively of traditional and innovative type, in terms of structural performance enhancement and their own life cycle environmental impact. A case study single-storey precast industrial building was retrofitted firstly adopting a traditional solution with concrete jacketing of columns, and then using two innovative energy dissipation devices, namely a friction rotation damper for beam-to-column connections and a bracing system with dissipative sacrificial elements. A comparative analysis of the seismic response of the structure in its as-built and post-retrofit configurations was undertaken, subjecting three 3D numerical models created in OpenSees to nonlinear static and dynamic analyses in both the main directions. Subsequently, two environmental impact metrics were adopted to compare the life cycle environmental impact of both the traditional and innovative retrofitting solutions, confirming that the one encompassing the dissipation-based devices is expected to be more environment-friendly, under a life cycle perspective, than the traditional concrete jacketing.