Seismic performance evaluation of free-standing intake tower using incremental dynamic analysis

Intake towers form the entrance to the reservoir spillway or diversion system and thus play a key role in the seismic resistance of the whole system. safety and proper functioning of the intake towers in the event of a major earthquake is very important, since the release controlled by the reservoir can help to prevent the failure of the dam after an earthquake by reducing the water pressure. In addition, the current seismic assessment based on linear elastic constitutive model cannot adequately describe the seismic capacity of intake towers. Thus, to investigate the proper functioning of intake towers in the event a earthquake, it is necessary to introduce IDA that takes into fully assess the seismic performance of intake towers based on nonlinear dynamic analysis. In this paper by modeling the intake tower of the Briones dam, intake tower in three conditions of the intake tower, the intake tower-reservoir (outside water) and the tower-reservoir-inside water, under the influence of 12 earthquake records, each of which has a magnitude of seven in the earthquake intensity scale, has been investigated. The displacement at the top of the intake tower, damage of the intake tower body and the maximum tensile stress of the rebar in the intake tower were studied in all the three condition are considered as damage measure (DM), and the results were reported in the form of IDA curves. Then based on the results, the function and different limit-states (key points) of the intake tower structure are determined.