Repair costs of reinforced concrete building components: from actual data analysis to calibrated consequence functions

Abstract

Modern seismic design and the retrofitting of buildings necessarily need to account for expected economic losses. Available refined and simplified procedures implemented in automatic computer tools allow for probabilistic loss assessments. These mostly rely on consequence functions derived by simulating the repair actions needed to restore a component to its pre-earthquake condition. However, due to the lack of data, only a few studies have benchmarked theoretical loss assessments with actual repair costs monitored in the aftermath of earthquake events. This paper analyses the actual repair costs of a database of 120 reinforced concrete residential buildings damaged by the 2009 earthquake in L’Aquila, Italy. The repair cost distributions and the correlation with observed earthquake damage are provided at the building and component levels. The repair costs of drift- and acceleration-sensitive components are also reported. This study outlines that repairing hollow clay brick infills and partitions that are typical of the Mediterranean construction standard constitutes the majority of total repair costs. Reliable consequence functions calibrated on actual cost data are proposed for different damage states.