Conferences, Lectures, & Seminars
Events for December
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Bayesian Network for Seismic Risk Assessment and Management Infrastructure Systems
Wed, Dec 02, 2009 @ 02:00 PM - 03:00 PM
Sonny Astani Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering
Conferences, Lectures, & Seminars
Speaker: Armen Der Kiureghian, Taisei Professor of Civil Engineering,University of California, BerkeleyABSTRACT:A Bayesian network (BN) is a directed acyclic probabilistic graph encoding the interdependence between a set of random variables. In application to seismic risk assessment of infrastructure systems, the variables may represent uncertain demands or capacities, or the states of the system and its components. Upon entering evidence (observations) on one or more variables, this information propagates throughout the BN, thus providing an up-to-date probabilistic characterization of the system state as the available information evolves. The BN can be augmented with utility and decision nodes to provide a tool for optimal decision making under uncertain and evolving information. This talk will demonstrate the usefulness of the BN methodology for risk assessment and management of infrastructure systems that are subject to earthquake hazard. An application to the proposed California High Speed Rail system will be presented.
Location: Kaprielian Hall (KAP) - rielian Hall 209
Audiences: Everyone Is Invited
Contact: Evangeline Reyes
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TMDL Development and Trash TMDLs
Fri, Dec 04, 2009 @ 12:45 PM - 01:45 PM
Sonny Astani Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering
Conferences, Lectures, & Seminars
Speaker: Eric Wu, Ph.D., P.E., Unit Chief, Total Maximum Daily Load (TMDL) Unit,
Los Angeles Regional Water Quality Control BoardAbstract:The Clean Water Act (CWA) requires USEPA and States to identify waters that do not meet water quality standards, and to develop total maximum daily loads (TMDLs) for each impaired waterbody. The development of a TMDL is a regulatory procedure to amend the Los Angeles Region Water Quality Control Plan (Basin Plan). The required documents include a Staff Report, Resolution, Basin Plan Amendment, and a Substitute Environmental Document (SED). A TMDL becomes effective after the USEPA approves it. Up to date, approximately 35 TMDLs were developed to address pollutants such as bacteria, metals, pesticides, nutrients, toxicity and trash in multiple watersheds.Location: Kaprielian Hall (KAP) - 209
Audiences: Everyone Is Invited
Contact: Evangeline Reyes
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21st Century Port Development : An Industrial Case Study on the ..
Thu, Dec 10, 2009 @ 02:00 PM - 03:00 PM
Sonny Astani Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering
Conferences, Lectures, & Seminars
..Balancing Act Between Capital Development with Environmental Protection.Speaker: Dr. Geraldine Knatz, Executive Director, The Port of Los Angeles.Women in Science & Engineering Seminar Speaker in Celebration of the WiSE 10th AnniversaryAbstract:From its early beginning as a merchant port serving the needs of Spanish traders, to what it is now America's premier gateway for goods and services the Port of Los Angeles has changed in many ways. Certainly, one of the major challenges is the precarious balancing act between expansion and environment. As the Port grew over the decades, so did its pollution. Lawsuits ensued, regulations changed and -- coupled with California's every-stringent criteria regarding coastal development of any kind -- the Port of Los Angeles was at an impasse between profits and pollution.Which would ultimately win? Under the leadership of Executive Director Dr. Geraldine Knatz, the answer is both. With her background in biology and environmental studies, coupled with a pragmatic view of how the world works financially, Dr. Knatz is leading the way to create a new era in major port operations where the needs of commerce go hand-in-hand with the needs of the environment. The result is a series of operational breakthroughs that are not only improving the regional environment, but are setting new standards for port operators the world over. Dr. Knatz will discuss these "green growth" challenges first hand and detail the specific initiatives that are making the Port of Los Angeles a true success story.
Location: Kaprielian Hall (KAP) - rielian Hall, 146 - On Webex. Call department for more info
Audiences: Everyone Is Invited
Contact: Evangeline Reyes
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Development of Regional Earthquake Early Warning...
Fri, Dec 11, 2009 @ 02:00 PM - 03:00 PM
Sonny Astani Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering
Conferences, Lectures, & Seminars
...Structural Health Monitoring System and Real-Time Ground Motion Prediction using Front-Site Waveform DataSpeaker: Professor Masato Motosaka, Earthquake Disaster Research Laboratory and Director, Disaster Control Research Center; Graduate School of Engineering, Tohoku University, Sendai 980-8579, Japan; URL:http://www.disaster.archi.tohoku.ac.jpAbstract:
The author presents firstly, the development of an integrated regional earthquake early warning (EEW) system having on-line structural health monitoring (SHM) function, in Miyagi prefecture, Japan [1]. The system makes it possible to provide more accurate, reliable and immediate earthquake information for society by combining the national (JMA/NIED) EEW system, based on advanced real-time communication technology. The system has been implemented in two buildings; one is in Sendai, a million city, and the other in Oshika, a front site on the Pacific Ocean coast for the approaching Miyagi-ken Oki earthquake. The building in Sendai is a 9-story SRC building completed in 1969 and experienced 1978 Miyagi-ken Oki earthquake and retrofit work was performed in 2000. The building in Oshika is a public building which adjoins one of the K-NET sites. The utilization of the integrated EEW/SHM system is addressed together with future perspectives. The obtained data are also described including the amplitude depending dynamic characteristics of the building in Sendai before, during, and after the 2008/6/14 Iwate-Miyagi Nairiku Earthquake [2], together with the historical change of dynamic characteristics for 40 years [3].
Secondary, the author presents an advanced methodology based on Artificial Neural Network (ANN) for forward forecasting of ground motion parameters, not only PGA, PGV, but also Spectral information before S-wave arrival using initial part of P-waveform at a front site [4]. The estimated ground motion information can be used as warning alarm for earthquake damage reduction. The Fourier Amplitude Spectra (FAS) estimated before strong shaking with high accuracy can be used for advanced engineering applications, e.g. feed-forward structural control of a building of interest. The validity and applicability of the method have been verified by using observation data sets of the K-NET sites of 39 earthquakes occurred in Miyagi Oki area [5].Location: Kaprielian Hall (KAP) - 209 - On Webex. Call departmnet formore information.
Audiences: Everyone Is Invited
Contact: Evangeline Reyes