@inproceedings{SykoraDiamantidisHolickyetal., author = {S{\´y}kora, Miroslav and Diamantidis, Dimitris and Holick{\´y}, Milan and Markova, Jana and Charters Morais, Eduardo}, title = {Compressive Strength of Historic Masonry based on Destructive and Non-Destructive Test Results}, series = {Proceedings of the 3rd International Conference on Protection of Historical Constructions (PROHITECH'17), July 12-15, 2017, Lisbon, Portugal}, booktitle = {Proceedings of the 3rd International Conference on Protection of Historical Constructions (PROHITECH'17), July 12-15, 2017, Lisbon, Portugal}, language = {en} } @incollection{SykoraDiamantidisHolickyetal., author = {S{\´y}kora, Miroslav and Diamantidis, Dimitris and Holick{\´y}, Milan and Jung, Karel}, title = {Target reliability for new and existing railway civil engineering structures}, series = {Handbook of RAMS in Railway Systems : theory and practice}, booktitle = {Handbook of RAMS in Railway Systems : theory and practice}, publisher = {CRC Press}, isbn = {9781315269351}, doi = {10.1201/b21983-20}, pages = {26}, abstract = {The specification of target reliability levels and risk acceptance criteria is one of the key issues of design and reliability assessment of existing railway stru ctures including bridges, tunnels or secondary struc-ures like noise barriers. Target reliability levels obtained by optimisation of the total cost, related to a required working life of the structure, are critically compared with human safety criteria based on group risks, intended to avoid accidents with a large number of fatalitie s. Practical applications of the theoretical principles are demonstrated by the examples of a railway bridge, railway tunnel and road bridge over an important railway line. The examples illustrate on how probabilistic reliability analysis and risk optimisation can support decisions about alternative strategies to achieve the optimal designs complying with the requirements on human safety. The contribution reveals that target relia bility levels for civil engineering structures recommended in various normative documents are inconsistent in terms of the values and the criteria according to which the appropriate values are to be specified. The optimal target reliabilities from economic point of view primarily depend on failure consequences and costs of safety measures.}, language = {en} } @article{DiamantidisHolickySykora, author = {Diamantidis, Dimitris and Holicky, Milan and S{\´y}kora, Miroslav}, title = {Reliability and Risk Acceptance Criteria for Civil Engineering Structures}, series = {Transactions of the VSB - Technical University of Ostrava, Civil Engineering Series}, volume = {16}, journal = {Transactions of the VSB - Technical University of Ostrava, Civil Engineering Series}, number = {2}, publisher = {De Gruyter}, pages = {1 -- 10}, abstract = {The specification of risk and reliability acceptance criteria is a key issue of reliability verifications of new and existing structures. Current target reliability levels in standards appear to have considerable scatter. Critical review of risk acceptance approaches to societal, economic and environmental risk indicates that an optimal design strategy is mostly dominated by economic aspects while human safety aspects need to be verified only in special cases. It is recommended to specify the target levels considering economic optimisation and the marginal life-saving costs principle, as both these approaches take into account the failure consequences and costs of safety measures.}, language = {en} } @book{HolickyDiamantidisSykoraetal., author = {Holick{\´y}, Milan and Diamantidis, Dimitris and S{\´y}kora, Miroslav and Markov{\´a}, Jana and Vrouwenfelder, Ton and Tanner, Peter and Arteaga, Angel and Lara Sarache, Carlos and Croce, Pietro and Toprak, Selcuk and Senel, Sevket Murat and Inel, Mehmet}, title = {Methods for the risk assessment and risk-based management of aging infrastructure}, publisher = {Czech Technical University in Prague, Klokner Institute}, address = {Prague}, isbn = {978-80-01-05611-0}, abstract = {The Leonardo da Vinci Project, "Innovation Transfer in Risk Assessment and Management of Aging Infrastructures", CZ/13/LLP-LdV/TOI/134014, addresses the urgent need to train students, young engineers and professionals in the assessment of existing infrastructures. The future of the construction industry lies in moving from new constructions towards the maintenance, repair and rehabilitation of existing structures, particularly of aging infrastructures. Risk management consisting of risk assessment and risk control of existing structure therefore plays thereby an important role. The assessment of existing infrastructures is an imperative issue of great economic significance in most countries around the world, as more than 50 \% of all construction activities concerns existing buildings, bridges and other civil engineering works. At present, the Eurocodes which will be used in all CEN Member countries are primarily focused on the design of new structures. Additional operational rules for existing structures are still missing. The international standard ISO 13822 provides only general principles for the assessment of existing structures which should be further developed for their effective operational use in practice. The overall procedure of risk management of aging infrastructures is therefore an urgent issue of great economic significance in most countries around the world. This is primarily caused due to the fact that many infrastructures are affected by action effects, fatigue and environmental influences, and inevitably deteriorate. Moreover, available resources for the maintenance, repair or possible replacement of infrastructures are always limited. Typical questions and problems which must be solved in this context can be summarized as follows: • What is the current state of a particular infrastructure? • What is an acceptable level of the relevant risk? • Which aspects are critical to sustainable performance? • What is the optimum life-cycle cost? • What is the best long-term funding strategy? The proposed project highlights the above problems and focusses also on vocational training in risk management and assessment of aging infrastructure in the partner countries (CZ, DE, ES, IT and TR). The current project addresses the urgent need for practical implementation of principles of the management and risk assessment of existing infrastructures in all the partner countries. The project is supported by the Czech Chamber of Chartered Engineers (ČKAIT). The project consortium, under the leadership of the Klokner Institute of the Czech Technical University in Prague (KI CTU), consists of five other partners, including research institutions and universities from three EU Member States (DE, ES, IT) as well as one associated country (TR), and also the Secondary Technical School of Civil Engineering in Ceske Budejovice (CZ). All researchers within the partnership are involved in research projects dealing with reliability assessment of existing structures. They participate in the national and international standardization activities within the international organizations CEN (European Committee for Standardisation) and ISO (International Standardization Organisation). The project outcomes consist of vocational training materials based on international research and relevant standard committee's activities, and on the significant experience gained from case studies, and on selected results obtained from the previous projects of the Leonardo da Vinci programme. In particular, the experience gained by the partners of the present consortium from the completed project on vocational training related to assessment of existing structures is utilized. Available innovations are transferred to undergraduate and graduate students, practising engineers and local government representatives. The developed training materials are of practical use in offering illustrative examples and several case studies. All the project outcomes are based on documents of the international research organization, Joint Committee on Structural Safety JCSS and international research projects, selected outcomes of the previous project of the Leonardo da Vinci programme (developed by five partners of the present consortium in 2013-2015) and also on background documents to the new European and international standards. Particular outcomes of the proposed project include practical handbooks, software tools, web-sites, e-learning, courses and seminars organized in the partners´ home countries. The project outcomes will also be offered to other European countries through code committees work, lectures and the project web-sites. It is foreseen that the outcomes being used by engineers, designers, technicians, and representatives of public authorities involved in planning and management will have an impact on the risk-based management of infrastructures. One of the important project outcomes is the present Handbook 1 "Methods for the Risk Assessment and Risk-Based Management of Aging Infrastructure", which is focussed on general procedures of risk-management and assessment of aging infrastructures. The methodologies provided are independent of the type of structure and material, and are compatible with the background methodologies used in the Eurocodes. Operational techniques for the assessment of aging infrastructures supplemented by illustrative case studies are presented in Handbook 2 and Handbook 3, which also result from the mentioned project. Handbook 1 consists of ten chapters and one annex. Chapter 1 gives a brief overview of the basic concepts used in the management and risk assessment of existing structures, supplemented by the basic definitions and terminology. Chapter 2 summarizes current applicable standards, codes and recommendations related to actions and environmental influences on existing structures. Chapter 3 reviews the most important degradation models due to environmental influences. Fatigue effects are treated separately in Chapter 4. The following Chapters, 5, 6, 7 and 8, are devoted step by step to the entire procedure of risk management, including probabilistic reliability analysis, consequence analysis, risk evaluation and risk assessment based on risk acceptance criteria, and consequently provide important information supporting decisions concerning the safety of the structure. The last two Chapters, 9 and 10, illustrate instructive case studies concerning risk management and risk assessment of road tunnels. Annex A presents basic statistical methods and techniques used in the evaluation and updating of available data required for probability and consequence analysis. It is believed that the material of this handbook is presented in an understandable way, illustrated by several realistic examples. A number of references mentioned in each chapter provide additional background materials, further guidance and information useful for particular practical applications. Prague and Regensburg, 2014}, language = {en} } @article{SykoraHolickyJungetal., author = {S{\´y}kora, Miroslav and Holicky, Milan and Jung, Karel and Diamantidis, Dimitris}, title = {Human safety criteria for risk-based structural design}, series = {International Journal of Safety and Security Engineering}, volume = {8}, journal = {International Journal of Safety and Security Engineering}, number = {2}, publisher = {WIT Press}, doi = {10.2495/SAFE-V8-N2-287-298}, pages = {287 -- 298}, abstract = {Risk and reliability criteria are well established in many industrial sectors such as the offshore, chemi- cal or nuclear industries. Comparative risk thresholds have been specified to allow a responsible organization or regulator to identify activities, which impose an acceptable level of risk concerning the participating individuals, or society as a whole. The scope of this contribution is to present target reliability criteria based on acceptable human safety levels. Application of theoretical principles is illustrated by examples of railway engineering structures. Initially it is shown how civil engineering structures for which human safety criteria play a role are classified according to Eurocodes. Examples include bridges, tunnels or station buildings. The general concepts for risk acceptance are then briefly reviewed, particularly in their relation to the target reliability criteria. The distinction between the two types of criteria is made: group risk and the acceptance criterion based on the Life Quality Index LQI approach introduced by ISO 2394:2015. The differences between the criteria for new and existing structures are discussed. The application is illustrated by an example of a bridge crossing an important railway line. It appears that while benefits and costs of a private stakeholder or public authority are reflected by economic optimisation, the society should define the limits for human safety to achieve uniform risks for various daily-life activities and across different industrial sectors. Keywords: group risk, human safety, individual risk, Life Quality Index, railway, risk acceptance, structure, target reliability}, language = {en} } @article{HolickySykoraDiamantidis, author = {Holicky, Milan and S{\´y}kora, Miroslav and Diamantidis, Dimitris}, title = {Reliability levels related to different reference periods and consequence classes}, series = {Beton- und Stahlbetonbau}, volume = {113}, journal = {Beton- und Stahlbetonbau}, number = {S2, Supplement: 16th International Probabilistic Workshop}, publisher = {Ernst \& Sohn, a Wiley Brand}, doi = {10.1002/best.201800039}, pages = {22 -- 26}, abstract = {The target reliability levels recommended in various national and international documents for new and existing structures are quite different and vaguely related to types of structures and consequences of failure. The optimum reliability levels can be obtained by considering the total expected cost of the structure over the design working life. Indicative values of reliability indexes are given in EN 1990 (2002) for two reference periods, 1 year and 50 years. The annual target reliability levels βt1 are presently indicated in the recent draft of EN 1990 (2017) without any explicit link to different reference period or design working life. When determining the target reliability index for the reference period of n years that generally differs from the design working life, correlation of failure events in subsequent years should be taken into account. Considering the annual reliability index β1 an approximate formula is proposed for the reliability index βnk related to the reference period of n years and independence interval of k years. The independence interval k ≤ n corresponds to the mean time period in years for which the failures in subsequent periods of k years are assumed to be mutually independent. The operational use of the proposed formula is clarified by practical tools. The reliability differentiation reflected in consequence classes is also discussed in this contribution.}, language = {en} } @article{SteenbergenRaphaelDJMSykoraDiamantidisetal., author = {Steenbergen, Raphael D. J. M., and S{\´y}kora, Miroslav and Diamantidis, Dimitris and Holicky, Milan and Vrouwenvelder, Ton}, title = {Economic and human safety reliability levels for existing structures}, series = {Structural concrete}, volume = {16}, journal = {Structural concrete}, number = {3}, publisher = {Ernst \& Sohn, a Wiley brand}, doi = {10.1002/suco.201500022}, pages = {323 -- 332}, abstract = {Specifying the target reliability levels is one of the key issues in the assessment of existing structures. For a majority of existing buildings and infrastructures, the design life has been reached or will be reached in the near future. These structures need to be reassessed in order to verify their safety. Eurocodes provide a general basis primarily intended for the design of new structures, but the basic principles can be used for assessing existing buildings, too. Reliability levels are generally based on both economic optimization and criteria for human safety. In this study, both methods are elaborated for existing structures. It appears that the requirement for the same target reliability for existing and new structures is uneconomical. Further, cost optimization seems to yield rather low reliability levels and human safety criteria often become the critical factor. The study concludes with practical guidelines for establishing reliability indices for existing structures linked to Eurocode principles.}, language = {en} } @inproceedings{DiamantidisHolickySykora, author = {Diamantidis, Dimitris and Holick{\´y}, Milan and S{\´y}kora, Miroslav}, title = {Target Reliability Levels Based on Societal, Economic and Environmental Consequences of Structural Failure}, series = {Proceedings of the 12th International Conference on Structural Safety \& Reliability (ICOSSAR 2017), 6-10 August 2017, Vienna, Austria}, booktitle = {Proceedings of the 12th International Conference on Structural Safety \& Reliability (ICOSSAR 2017), 6-10 August 2017, Vienna, Austria}, abstract = {Target reliability levels are derived by optimizing initial structural costs and considering three major types of potential consequences of structural failure: a) direct and indirect economic losses, b) societal consequences resulting from fatalities and injuries, and c) environmental impacts. The guidance on how to e stimate and combine these consequences is provided; societal consequences are expressed using the Life Quality Index (LQI) concept. The case study focused on a generic load-bearing member reveals that target reliability levels for structural design are commonly dominated by economic criteria.}, language = {en} } @inproceedings{HolickyDiamantidisSykora, author = {Holick{\´y}, Milan and Diamantidis, Dimitris and S{\´y}kora, Miroslav}, title = {Effects of Quality Control on Reliability of Reinforced Concrete Structures according to Eurocodes}, series = {fib Symposium 2016 : Performance-Based Approaches for Concrete Structures, 14, 2016, Cape town}, booktitle = {fib Symposium 2016 : Performance-Based Approaches for Concrete Structures, 14, 2016, Cape town}, abstract = {The effect of quality control on structural reliability represents an increasingly important concern of designers and thus is investigated in this contribution, focusing on reinforced concrete structures. Recent European documents for structural design - Eurocodes, fib Model Code 2010 and ISO 2394:2015 for general principles on structural reliability indicate that the partial factors may be adjusted to available information on the quality control of structures. In particular, the partial factors for concrete and steel strength may be significantly reduced taking into account actual execution quality and related available data. Using probabilistic methods of structural reliability, effects for execution quality are investigated in this contribution considering two fundamental reinforced concrete members: a beam (or slab) exposed to bending and a short column exposed to compression. It is shown that the reliability of reinforced concrete members may vary with the load ratio of variable and permanent actions. It appears also that the structural members of a basic quality, designed using unreduced partial factors, have a greater reliability level than the members of an increased quality, designed using the partial factors reduced according to EN 1992 1 1. This provides the basis for recommendations for further code developments.}, language = {en} } @inproceedings{SykoraHolickyDiamantidis, author = {S{\´y}kora, Miroslav and Holicky, Milan and Diamantidis, Dimitris}, title = {Target Reliability for Existing Civil Engineering Systems}, series = {2016 Second International Symposium on Stochastic Models in Reliability Engineering, Life Science and Operations Management (SMRLO), 15-18 Feb. 2016, Beer Sheva, Israel}, booktitle = {2016 Second International Symposium on Stochastic Models in Reliability Engineering, Life Science and Operations Management (SMRLO), 15-18 Feb. 2016, Beer Sheva, Israel}, publisher = {IEEE}, doi = {10.1109/SMRLO.2016.28}, pages = {109 -- 114}, abstract = {Specification of the target reliability levels is one of the key issues of the assessment of existing systems. ISO 2394:2015 indicate procedures for specification of the target reliability levels by optimisation of the total cost related to an assumed remaining working life of a structural system. These approaches are critically compared with human safety criteria and with recommendations of present standards. It appears that the requirement on the same target reliability levels for existing civil engineering systems as for newly designed is uneconomical. Decisions in the assessment can result in the acceptance of the actual state or in upgrade of the existing structure, two reliability levels are thus needed - the minimum level below which the structure is unreliable and should be upgraded, and the target level indicating an optimum upgrade strategy. When reliability of a system or its key component is verified (as compared to design of a common component), the target reliability index should be increased by about 0.5.}, language = {en} } @inproceedings{HolickyDiamantidisSykora, author = {Holicky, Milan and Diamantidis, Dimitris and S{\´y}kora, Miroslav}, title = {Economically optimum structural design}, series = {High Performance and Optimum Design of Structures and Materials III (HPSM/OPTI 2018) ; Ljubljana, Slovenia 11.07.2018 - 13.07.2018}, booktitle = {High Performance and Optimum Design of Structures and Materials III (HPSM/OPTI 2018) ; Ljubljana, Slovenia 11.07.2018 - 13.07.2018}, editor = {de Wilde, W. P. and Hern{\´a}ndez, S. and Kravanja, S.}, publisher = {WIT}, doi = {10.2495/hpsm180151}, pages = {143 -- 153}, abstract = {Codes of practice aim to assure structures have acceptable risks to the public and the minimum total costs over the working life of a design. However, current codified criteria for structural design correspond to a broad range of reliability levels, specified for dissimilar reference periods even though their recalculation for different periods is uncertain due to unknown dependence of failure events in time. In this contribution, target reliability levels are specified on the basis of probabilistic risk optimization considering the objective function as a sum of various costs including effects of time to failure and discounting. A case study presents probabilistic optimization of the roof of a stadium for 4,000 spectators and illustrates the effect of the considered input parameters. Failure consequences and relative cost of safety measure are shown to be major factors affecting the optimum reliability level. Less important factors are the discount rate and working life. Large uncertainty in failure cost estimates seems to have only a marginal effect on derived optimum reliability levels.}, language = {en} } @article{SykoraDiamantidisHolickyetal., author = {S{\´y}kora, Miroslav and Diamantidis, Dimitris and Holick{\´y}, Milan and Markov{\´a}, Jana and R{\´o}zs{\´a}s, {\´A}rp{\´a}d}, title = {Assessment of compressive strength of historic masonry using non-destructive and destructive techniques}, series = {Construction and Building Materials}, volume = {193}, journal = {Construction and Building Materials}, number = {December}, publisher = {Elsevier}, doi = {10.1016/j.conbuildmat.2018.10.180}, pages = {196 -- 210}, abstract = {Masonry structures were built by various techniques using different materials, the properties of which exhibit a considerable scatter dependent on periods of construction and region-specific conditions. For historic structures with a heritage value, various non- or minor-destructive tests (NDTs) are commonly applied, while the application of destructive tests (DTs) is minimized. The contribution is based on investigations of 15 historic stone and clay brick masonry structures, for which NDT strengths of masonry units are verified by DTs. The proposed operational approach makes it possible to account for statistical uncertainty due to a limited number of DTs used to calibrate NDTs.}, language = {en} } @article{SykoraDiamantidisHolickyetal., author = {S{\´y}kora, Miroslav and Diamantidis, Dimitris and Holicky, Milan and Jung, Karel}, title = {Target reliability for existing structures considering economic and societal aspects}, series = {Structure and infrastructure engineering}, volume = {13}, journal = {Structure and infrastructure engineering}, number = {1}, publisher = {Taylor\&Francis}, doi = {10.1080/15732479.2016.1198394}, pages = {181 -- 194}, abstract = {Specification of target reliability levels is one of the key issues of the assessment of existing structures. ISO 13822:2010 and ISO 2394:2015 indicate procedures for specification of target reliability levels by optimisation of the total cost related to an assumed remaining working life of a structure. These approaches are critically compared with human safety criteria, with target levels based on a marginal life-saving costs principle, and with recommendations of present standards. Optimal target reliability levels are then derived in the representative case study for an existing structural member. It appears that the requirement to reach the same target reliability levels for existing and new structures is uneconomical. Decisions made in the assessment can result in the acceptance of the actual state or in the upgrade of an existing structure. Two reliability levels are thus needed - the minimum level below which the structure is unreliable and should be upgraded, and the target level indicating an optimum upgrade strategy. It is recommended that these levels be established using economic optimisation and the marginal life-saving costs principle, as both the approaches take into account the costs of safety measures and the failure consequences.}, language = {en} } @article{SykoraHolickyDiamantidis, author = {S{\´y}kora, Miroslav and Holick{\´y}, Milan and Diamantidis, Dimitris}, title = {Probabilistic updating in the reliability assessment of industrial heritage structures}, series = {Heron}, volume = {59}, journal = {Heron}, number = {2/3}, publisher = {Stevin-Laboratorium, TU Delft}, address = {Delft}, issn = {0046-7316}, abstract = {Assessment of existing structures should be based on the actual as-built conditions concerning geometry, material properties, loading and environmental conditions. A crucial step of the assessment consists in updating of prior information by newly obtained measurements which may be conducted by Bayesian approach. Updating of probabilistic distributions of basic variables or direct updating of failure probability can be effectively used. Application of theoretical principles is illustrated by a case study of a historic factory built in 1900s. The paper is a tribute to Ton Vrouwenvelder for his essential contributions to developments of theory and promotion of practical applications of probabilistic assessment of existing structures.}, language = {en} } @article{SteenbergenSykoraDiamantidisetal., author = {Steenbergen, R.D.J.M. and S{\´y}kora, Miroslav and Diamantidis, Dimitris and Holick{\´y}, Milan and Vrouwenvelder, A.C.W.M.}, title = {Economic and human safety reliability levels for existing structures}, series = {Structural Concrete. JOurnal of the fib}, volume = {16}, journal = {Structural Concrete. JOurnal of the fib}, publisher = {Wiley}, doi = {10.1002/suco.201500022}, pages = {323 -- 332}, abstract = {Specifying the target reliability levels is one of the key issues in the assessment of existing structures. For a majority of existing buildings and infrastructures, the design life has been reached or will be reached in the near future. These structures need to be reassessed in order to verify their safety. Eurocodes provide a general basis primarily intended for the design of new structures, but the basic principles can be used for assessing existing buildings, too. Reliability levels are generally based on both economic optimization and criteria for human safety. In this study, both methods are elaborated for existing structures. It appears that the requirement for the same target reliability for existing and new structures is uneconomical. Further, cost optimization seems to yield rather low reliability levels and human safety criteria often become the critical factor. The study concludes with practical guidelines for establishing reliability indices for existing structures linked to Eurocode principles.}, language = {en} } @book{TannerdeDiegoLaraSaracheetal., author = {Tanner, Peter and de Diego, Ana and Lara Sarache, Carlos and Prieto, Miguel and Hingorani, Ram{\´o}n and Holick{\´y}, Milan and S{\´y}kora, Miroslav and Diamantidis, Dimitris and Men{\´e}ndez Ondina, Antonio and Croce, Pietro and Bartelletti, Raffaello and Beconcini, Maria Luisa and Formichi, Paolo and Marsili, Francesca and Muzzi, Martina and Rosso, Elisa and Toprak, Selcuk and Inel, Mehmet and Koc, Cem and Nacaroglu, Engin and Senel, Sevket Murat}, title = {Operational methods for the assessment and management of aging infrastructure}, publisher = {Tipograf{\´i}a editrice Pisana}, address = {Pisa, Italia}, isbn = {9788882501471}, pages = {186}, abstract = {The Leonardo da Vinci Project, "Innovation Transfer in Risk Assessment and Management of Aging Infrastructures", CZ/13/LLP-LdV/TOI/134014, addresses the urgent need to train students, young engineers and professionals in the assessment of existing infrastructures. The future of the construction industry lies in moving from new constructions towards the maintenance, repair and rehabilitation of existing structures, particularly of aging infrastructures. Risk management consisting of risk assessment and risk control of existing structure therefore plays thereby an important role. The assessment of existing infrastructures is an imperative issue of great economic significance in most countries around the world, as more than 50 \% of all construction activities concerns existing buildings, bridges and other civil engineering works. At present, the Eurocodes which will be used in all CEN Member countries are primarily focused on the design of new structures. Additional operational rules for existing structures are still missing. The international standard ISO 13822 provides only general principles for the assessment of existing structures which should be further developed for their effective operational use in practice. The overall procedure of risk management of aging infrastructures is therefore an urgent issue of great economic significance in most countries around the world. This is primarily caused due to the fact that many infrastructures are affected by action effects, fatigue and environmental influences, and inevitably deteriorate. Moreover, available resources for the maintenance, repair or possible replacement of infrastructures are always limited. Typical questions and problems which must be solved in this context can be summarized as follows: • What is the current state of a particular infrastructure? • What is an acceptable level of the relevant risk? • Which aspects are critical to sustainable performance? • What is the optimum life-cycle cost? • What is the best long-term funding strategy? The proposed project highlights the above problems and focusses also on vocational training in risk management and assessment of aging infrastructure in the partner countries (CZ, DE, ES, IT and TR). The current project addresses the urgent need for practical implementation of principles of the management and risk assessment of existing infrastructures in all the partner countries. The project is supported by the Czech Chamber of Chartered Engineers (ČKAIT). The project consortium, under the leadership of the Klokner Institute of the Czech Technical University in Prague (KI CTU), consists of five other partners, including research institutions and universities from three EU Member States (DE, ES, IT) as well as one associated country (TR), and also the Secondary Technical School of Civil Engineering in Ceske Budejovice (CZ). All researchers within the partnership are involved in research projects dealing with reliability assessment of existing structures. They participate in the national and international standardization activities within the international organizations CEN (European Committee for Standardisation) and ISO (International Standardization Organisation). The project outcomes consist of vocational training materials based on international research and relevant standard committee's activities, and on the significant experience gained from case studies, and on selected results obtained from the previous projects of the Leonardo da Vinci programme. In particular, the experience gained by the partners of the present consortium from the completed project on vocational training related to assessment of existing structures is utilized. Available innovations are transferred to undergraduate and graduate students, practising engineers and local government representatives. The developed training materials are of practical use in offering illustrative examples and several case studies. All the project outcomes are based on documents of the international research organization, Joint Committee on Structural Safety JCSS and international research projects, selected outcomes of the previous project of the Leonardo da Vinci programme (developed by five partners of the present consortium in 2013-2015) and also on background documents to the new European and international standards. Particular outcomes of the proposed project include practical handbooks, software tools, web-sites, e-learning, courses and seminars organized in the partners´ home countries. The project outcomes will also be offered to other European countries through code committees work, lectures and the project web-sites. It is foreseen that the outcomes being used by engineers, designers, technicians, and representatives of public authorities involved in planning and management will have an impact on the risk-based management of infrastructures. One of the important project outcomes is the present Handbook 2 "Operational Methods for the Assessment and Management of Aging Infrastructure", which is focussed on operational techniques for the assessment of aging infrastructures supplemented by illustrative case studies developed according to ISO 13822 and Eurocodes for different structures and materials. From the mentioned project also result Handbook 1, where general procedures of risk-management and assessment of aging infrastructures are presented, and Handbook 3, where operational techniques for the assessment of aging infrastructures supplemented by illustrative case studies are presented with a more basic approach. Handbook 2 consists of eleven chapters. Chapter 1 gives a brief introduction. Chapter 2 summarizes current applicable standards and codes for existing structures. Chapter 3 reviews survey methods. The remaining chapters are devoted to the illustration of relevant case studies, referring to the assessment of different existing infrastructures. In particular, chapter 4 refers to a commercial building, chapter 5 to a r.c. building damaged by corrosion, chapter 6 to silos, chapter 7 to pipelines and water supply systems, chapter 8 to tanks, chapter 9 to historical aqueducts, chapter 10 to bridges and chapter 11 to dams and flood protection systems. In each case studies the entire procedure of the assessment is illustrated step by step emphasizing references to relevant Codes and in particular to ISO 13822. It is believed that the material of this handbook is presented in an understandable way, referring to several case studies. A number of references mentioned in each chapter provide additional background materials, further guidance and information useful to widen the significance and the field of application of the assessment methods illustrated for each case study. Pisa and Prague, 2015}, language = {en} } @inproceedings{DiamantidisHolicky, author = {Diamantidis, Dimitris and Holick{\´y}, Milan}, title = {Reliability Differentiation in the Eurocodes}, series = {Advances and trends in structural engineering, mechanics and computation (SEMC 2010) : proceedings of the Fourth International Conference on Structural Engineering, Mechanics and Computation, 6 - 8 September 2010, Cape Town, South Africa}, booktitle = {Advances and trends in structural engineering, mechanics and computation (SEMC 2010) : proceedings of the Fourth International Conference on Structural Engineering, Mechanics and Computation, 6 - 8 September 2010, Cape Town, South Africa}, editor = {Zingoni, Alphose}, publisher = {CRC Press/Balkema}, isbn = {978-0-415-58472-2}, abstract = {Structural Eurocodes offer the opportunity of harmonized design standards for the European construction markets and the rest of the world. Eurocodes aim at delivering structures with an appropriate degree of reliability and in an economic way. The reliability requirements of the Eurocodes and the associated background philosophy are discussed in this contribution. The definition and the measure of reliability in standards and especially in the Eurocodes are reviewed. The procedures for selecting target and acceptable re-liability levels are summarized and the reliability differentiation in the Eurocodes is highlighted. Global failure aspects including robustness are briefly discussed. Finally examples from case studies are provided demonstrating the applicability and the benefits from the reliability differentiation approach.}, language = {en} } @inproceedings{HolickyDiamantidisRetiefetal., author = {Holick{\´y}, Milan and Diamantidis, Dimitris and Retief, Johan Verster and Barnardo-Viljoen, Celeste}, title = {On Standardization of the Reliability Basis of Structural Design}, series = {ICASP12 : 12th International Conference on Applications of Statistics and Probability in Civil Engineering, Vancouver, Canada, July 12-15, 2015}, booktitle = {ICASP12 : 12th International Conference on Applications of Statistics and Probability in Civil Engineering, Vancouver, Canada, July 12-15, 2015}, publisher = {The University of British Columbia}, address = {Vancouver}, doi = {10.14288/1.0076062}, abstract = {The principles of structural reliability are sufficiently advanced to be used extensively to develop design standards even at international level. The concept of limit states is generally accepted and implemented. Present standards are however to a large extent based on past experience, rather than on quantitative reliability modeling. It appears that reliability principles and models can bridge the gap between probabilistic assessment and operational design. Representative theoretical models are presented to indicate how judgment based reliability concepts can be complemented or replaced by the use of such models. The importance of reliability levels, reference period, design working life, specified characteristic values of basic variables and methods to derive their design values from reliability procedures are demonstrated. On this basis a standardized basis of structural design can be formulated to convert the reliability principles (such as provided by ISO 2394) into operational design procedures (such as used by EN 1990 and other standards). It is concluded that reliability principles and models could contribute further to international harmonization of structural design.}, language = {en} } @inproceedings{DiamantidisHolickySykora, author = {Diamantidis, Dimitris and Holick{\´y}, Milan and S{\´y}kora, Miroslav}, title = {Risk and reliability acceptance criteria for civil engineering structures}, series = {Structural Reliability and Modelling in Mechanics Conference, Ostrava, Czech Republic, May 2016}, booktitle = {Structural Reliability and Modelling in Mechanics Conference, Ostrava, Czech Republic, May 2016}, pages = {1 -- 10}, abstract = {The specification of risk and reliability acceptance criteria is a key issue of structural design and verification of existing structures. Current target reliability levels in standards appear to have considerable scatter. Critical review of risk acceptance approaches to societal, economic and environmental risk indicates that an optimal design strategy is mostly dominated by economic aspects while human safety aspects need to be verified only in special cases. It is recommended to specify the target levels considering economic optimisation and the marginal life-saving costs principle, as both these approaches take into account the failure consequences and costs of safety measures.}, language = {en} } @incollection{SykoraHolickyJungetal., author = {S{\´y}kora, Miroslav and Holick{\´y}, Milan and Jung, Karel and Diamantidis, Dimitris}, title = {Target reliability levels for assessment of existing structures considering economic and societal aspects}, series = {Life-Cycle of Structural Systems}, booktitle = {Life-Cycle of Structural Systems}, editor = {Akiyama, Mitsuyoshi and Furuta, Hitoshi and Frangopol, Dan M.}, publisher = {CRC Press}, address = {London}, isbn = {9780429227196}, doi = {10.1201/b17618-121}, pages = {838 -- 845}, abstract = {Specification of the target reliability levels is one of the key issues of the assessment of existing structures. ISO 13822:2010 and ISO 2394:1998 indicate procedures for deriving the target reliability levels by optimisation of the total cost related to an assumed remaining working life of a structure. In the submitted study this approach is applied to estimate the target reliability levels of an existing structural member in conjunction with the human safety criteria. Obtained results are critically compared with the recommendations given in present standards. It appears that the requirement on the same target reliability levels for existing structures as for new structures is uneconomical. Further, the cost optimisation seems to yield rather low reliability levels and human safety criteria become commonly decisive for specification of the target reliabilities of existing structures.}, language = {en} } @article{DiamantidisTannerHolickyetal., author = {Diamantidis, Dimitris and Tanner, Peter and Holicky, Milan and Madsen, Henrik O. and Sykora, Miroslav}, title = {On reliability assessment of existing structures}, series = {Structural Safety}, journal = {Structural Safety}, publisher = {Elsevier}, issn = {0167-4730}, doi = {10.1016/j.strusafe.2024.102452}, pages = {1}, abstract = {This contribution discusses the reliability assessment of existing structures emphasizing on developments within or initiated by the JCSS. After a bibliographical review, the principles of reliability updating, i.e. Bayesian updating of random variables and updating of event probabilities are summarized. Developments in standards and established verification formats—partial factor or load and resistance factor, reliability-based, and risk-informed—are briefly presented and discussed. The impact of JCSS work in recent standards such as ISO 13822, the draft Eurocode prEN1990-2, and the fib Model Code 2020 as well as in national standards is highlighted. Criteria for defining target reliabilities for existing structures including human safety and optimization are critically reviewed. Obstacles for a wider implementation of reliability-based and risk-informed methods in practice are identified and conclusions for future developments are drawn. Finally, Annex A illustrates updating procedures for resistance variables and Annex B presents a case study.}, language = {en} }