Events Calendar

Astani Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering Seminar

Speaker: Dr. Henry Burton, Englekirk Presidential Chair in Structural Engineering, University of California, Los Angeles

Talk Title: Seismic Risk and Resilience Modeling of Water Distribution Systems

Abstract: Water distribution systems are critical to the well-being of communities since they contribute to the functionality of all other infrastructure. Earthquakes and other natural hazards can cause damage to the components of a water distribution system, causing far-reaching socioeconomic consequences. This presentation will discuss some recent advancements in seismic risk and resilience modeling of water distribution systems. First, an end-to-end simulation framework to evaluate post-earthquake functional loss and restoration of a water system is developed, which encompasses seismic hazard characterization, component damage, hydraulic performance and network restoration modeling. The modeling framework is validated using data from the 2014 South Napa Earthquake and extended to a hypothetical scenario. To deal with the temporal complexities that are embedded in the post-earthquake restoration process, a general dynamic updating framework is developed to reduce uncertainties in the outcomes of post-event recovery forecasts using Bayesian Inferencing, by exploiting real-time data. The specific example of updating post-earthquake functional recovery forecasts is presented and validated on a real pipe network (Napa water system) and event (2014 earthquake and recovery). The end-to-end framework is then extended to enable stochastic event set assessments of the water network using the UCERF2 earthquake rupture forecast model. Given that evaluating a large set of events with end-to-end simulation modeling is computationally expensive, a framework that uses active learning to select a subset of ground motion maps and associated occurrence rates that reasonably estimates the water network risk is also developed.



Biography: Dr. Henry V. Burton is an Associate Professor and the Englekirk Presidential Chair in Structural Engineering in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the University of California, Los Angeles. His research is directed towards understanding and modeling the relationship between the performance of infrastructure systems within the built environment, and the ability of communities to minimize the extent of socioeconomic disruption following extreme events. Dr. Burton is a registered structural engineer in the state of California. Prior to obtaining his PhD in Civil and Environmental Engineering at Stanford University, he spent six years in practice at Degenkolb Engineers, where he worked on numerous projects involving design of new buildings and seismic evaluation and retrofit of existing buildings. He is a recipient of the National Science Foundation Next Generation of Disaster Researchers Fellowship (2014) and the National Science Foundation CAREER Award (2016).




Host: Dr. Bora Gencturk and Dr. Roger Ghanem

Location: Zoom Meeting: https://usc.zoom.us/j/98766114432 Meeting ID#98766114432 Passcode:175729

Audiences: Everyone Is Invited

Contact: Evangeline Reyes