EARTHQUAKE RESISTANT DESIGN OF RETAINING STRUCTURES

PREAMBLE AND BACKGROUND

Design of retaining walls under seismic condition is very important in earthquake prone areas to reduce the devastating effect of earthquake Evaluation of earth pressure under seismic condition is important Estimation of passive pressure under both static and seismic conditions are very important for the design of retaining walls, anchors, foundations etc Research on static passive earth pressure is plenty whereas the same under seismic condition is still lacking

RETAINING STRUCTURES
A retaining wall is a structure designed and constructed to resist the lateral pressure of soil when there is a desired change in ground elevation that exceeds the angle of repose of the soil

TYPES OF RETAINING WALLS

Gravity Retaining Wall Provides stability by virtue of its own weight Massive in size Built in stone masonry and plain concrete Thickness of the wall is governed by the need to limit the resulting tensile stress to its permissible limit Plain concrete gravity walls are not used for heights exceeding about 3 m, for economic reasons

Retained Earth

Toe

Heel

TYPES OF RETAINING WALLS

Cantilever Wall Most common type of retaining structure Economical for heights up to about 8 m Consists of a vertical stem and a base slab, made up of two distinct regions, a heel slab and a toe slab
Toe

Retained Earth

Heel

TYPES OF RETAINING WALLS

Cantilever Wall All three components behave as one-way cantilever slabs: The 'stem acts as a vertical cantilever under the lateral earth pressure The 'heel slab' acts as a horizontal cantilever under the action of the weight of the retained earth The 'toe slab' also acts as a cantilever under the action of the resulting soil pressure (acting upward). The stability of the wall is maintained essentially by the weight of the earth on the heel slab plus the self weight of the structure.

TYPES OF RETAINING WALLS

Counterfort wall For large heights, in a cantilever retaining wall, the bending moments developed become very large Bending moments can be reduced by introducing transverse supports, called counterforts
Stem
Earth retained on this side

Heel Slab

Counterfort

TYPES OF RETAINING WALLS

Counterfort wall Counterforts interconnect the stem with the heel slab The counterforts are concealed within the retained earth Such a retaining wall structure is called the counterfort wall Economical for heights above 7 m Behave essentially as vertical cantilever beams of T-section and varying depth The counterforts subdivide the vertical slab (stem) into rectangular panels

TYPES OF RETAINING WALLS

Buttress Wall The transverse stem supports, called buttress are located in the front side, interconnecting the stem with the toe slab Buttresses are structurally more efficient (and more economical) than counterforts The counterfort wall is generally preferred to the buttress wall as it provides free usable space (and better aesthetics) in front of the wall.
Stem Earth retained on this side

Heel Slab
Buttress

OTHER TYPES OF RETAINING STRUCTURE

Exterior walls in the basement of a building
Floor Slab
Wall Retained Earth

Toe

Heel

Approach Pavement

Wall-type bridge abutments

Bridge Deck Wall Abutment

Retained Earth

Toe

Heel

LATERAL EARTH PRESSURE

Types of lateral earth pressure Active pressure due to earth fill Passive pressure due to earth fill

Active Pressure Due to Uniform Surcharge

Passive Pressure Due to Uniform Surcharge

ACTIVE PRESSURE DUE TO EARTH FILL

The active pressure exerted against the wall shall be: Pa = wh2Ca where Pa - active earth pressure in kg/m length of wall w - unit weight of soil in kg/m3 h - height of wall in m Ca = (1 v) cos2 (--) cos cos2 cos (++) 1 1 sin (+) sin (--i) cos (i) cos (++)
1

The maximum of the two being the value for design

ACTIVE PRESSURE DUE TO EARTH FILL

where v - vertical seismic coefficient - its direction being taken consistent throughout the stability analysis of wall and equal to () h - angle of internal friction of soil - tan-1 h / (1 v) - angle which earth face of the wall makes with the vertical i - slope of earth fill - angle of friction between the wall and earth fill h - horizontal seismic coefficient

ACTIVE PRESSURE DUE TO EARTH FILL

Direction of horizontal earthquake acceleration i

Po

Active earth pressure due to earthquake on retaining wall

ACTIVE PRESSURE DUE TO EARTH FILL

Point of application From the total pressure computed subtract the static active pressure obtained by putting h = v = = 0 in the expression (1) and (2) The remainder is the dynamic increment The static component of the total pressure shall be applied at an elevation h/3 above the base of the wall The point of application of the dynamic increment shall be assumed to be at mid-height of the wall

PASSIVE PRESSURE DUE TO EARTH FILL

The passive pressure against the walls shall be given by 3 Pp = wh2 Cp where Pp - passive earth pressure in kg/m length of wall w - unit weight of soil in kg/m3 h - height of wall in m 2 2 CP = (1 v) cos (-+) 1 2 2 cos cos cos (+-) 1 - sin (+) sin (-+i) cos (i) cos (+-) The minimum of the two being the value for design
4

PASSIVE PRESSURE DUE TO EARTH FILL

Direction of horizontal earthquake acceleration

PP

Passive earth pressure due to earthquake on retaining wall

PASSIVE PRESSURE DUE TO EARTH FILL

Point of application From the total pressure computed subtract the total pressure obtained by putting h = v = = 0 in the expression (1) and (2) The remainder is the dynamic decrement The static component of the total pressure shall be applied at an elevation h/3 above the base of the wall The point of application of the dynamic increment shall be assumed to be at an elevation of 0.66h above the base of the wall

Active Pressure Due to Uniform Surcharge

The active pressure against the wall due to a uniform surcharge of intensity q per unit area of the inclined earth fill surface shall be (Pa)q = qh cos Ca 5 cos ( i) Point of application The dynamic increment in active pressures due to uniform surcharge shall be applied at an elevation of 0.66 h above the base of the wall, while the static component shall be applied at mid-height of the wall

Passive Pressure Due to Uniform Surcharge

The passive pressure against the wall due to a uniform surcharge of intensity q per unit area of the inclined earth fill shall be (Pa)q = qh cos Ca 6 cos ( i) Point of application The dynamic decrement in passive pressures due to uniform surcharge shall be applied at an elevation of 0.66 h above the base of the-walls while the static component shall be applied at mid-height of the wall.

EFFECT OF SATURATION
For saturated earth fill, the saturated unit weight of the soil shall be used For submerged earth fill, the dynamic increment or decrement in active and passive earth pressure during earthquakes shall be found from expressions given in equations 1,2,3 and 4 with the following modifications: The value of shall be taken as the value of for dry backfill Buoyant unit weight shall be adopted From the value of earth pressure found out, subtract the value of earth pressure determined by putting h = v = = 0 but using buoyant unit weight. The remainder shall be dynamic increment.

EFFECT OF SATURATION
The value of shall be taken as follows: = tan-1 ws h ws -1 ( 1 v ) where ws - saturated unit weight of soil in gm/cc h - horizontal seismic coefficient v - vertical seismic coefficient which is h Hydrodynamic pressure on account of water contained in earth fill shall not be considered separately as the effect of acceleration on water has been considered indirectly

PARTIALLY SUBMERGED BACKFILL

The ratio of the lateral dynamic increment in active pressures to the vertical pressures at various depths along the height of wall may be taken The pressure distribution of dynamic increment in active pressures may be obtained by multiplying the vertical effective pressures by the coefficients in fig on next slide at corresponding depths Similar procedure may be utilized for determining the distribution of dynamic decrement in passive pressures

PARTIALLY SUBMERGED BACKFILL

3(Ca - Ka )

3(Ca - Ka )h/h h

where Ca is computed for dry (moist) saturated backfills Ca is computed for submerged backfills. Ka is the value of Ca when h = v = = 0 Ka is the value of Ca when h = v = = 0 h is the height of submergence above the base of the wall. h is the height of the retaining wall. Lateral dynamic increment Vertical effective pressure with

Distribution of the ratio height of the wall

REFERENCE
IS 1893 : 1984 Reinforced concrete design by S Unnikrishna Pillai & Devdas Menon