Alam, Shahria (The University of British Columbia)

Purpose

Insurance Bureau of Canada estimated the overall loss after a 9.0-magnitude earthquake in British Columbia at almost $75B, which reflects the vulnerability of Canadian civil infrastructure. Harsh winter is another critical factor for deterioration of Canadian infrastructure where de-icing salt causes accelerated corrosion to steel. Fibre-reinforced polymer (FRP) bars were introduced as reinforcement in concrete structures to prevent corrosion. However, FRP is a brittle material without inelastic branch. Thus, FRP reinforced concrete (RC) structures exhibit poor ductility with low energy dissipation capacity leading to a major problem in seismic design. This issue can be addressed by introducing hybrid reinforcement where FRP bars can be used along with a ductile material, e.g. steel, or shape memory alloy (SMA) rebar to introduce ductility. FRP rebar cage can be placed in the exterior cage to provide corrosion resistance whereas steel can be used in the inner cage to provide ductility. Since SMA is also good against corrosion but costly, it can be placed at the plastic hinge region, and spliced with other rebar type in the outer cage of RC elements. Little research has been directed towards hybrid reinforcement where FRP rebar is used along with another ductile material and using spliced connections. This study will determine the seismic behavior of concrete bridge piers having hybrid reinforcement, and compare its performance to that of a regular steel RC bridge piers in terms of