Author(s)

L. Zeynalov, I. Polukhov & M. Gölalmış

Abstract

Azerbaijan, a post-soviet country, has recently become one of the most economically developed countries in the former USSR region. Many unique buildings, as well as high rise buildings, have been designed and constructed by renowned European, USA and Asian companies in the last decade. Seismic levels of Azerbaijan territory which is located in an Alpine folded system at the crossroads of Western Asia and Eastern Europe are very high. Many strong and catastrophic earthquakes have happened there so far. The former USSR seismic code was used in Azerbaijan until the new Azerbaijan seismic design code (AzDTN) was issued in 2009. This paper compares AzDTN with Japanese (BSL), the former USSR (SNIP II-7-81), USA (UBC97/IBC2006) and European (EC8) seismic design codes. Soil classification, building behavior factor and unreduced design elastic spectra are compared, differences and similarities are discussed. Unreduced design elastic spectra drawn as per AzDTN is more or less similar to ones drawn as per other seismic design codes. Two concrete buildings which are 7-story and 16-story with moment resistance structural systems are examined, and their seismic base shear coefficients calculated using equivalent lateral force procedures according to AzDTN and other codes are compared. As behavior factors specified in AzDTN and BSL for concrete buildings are close to each other, the calculated seismic base shear coefficients for the two buildings are resulted in relatively similar but are larger than UBC97/IBC2006, SNIP II-7- 81 and EC8. Keywords: Azerbaijan seismic code, earthquake, seismic codes, shear velocity, unreduced response spectra, base shear.

Keywords

Azerbaijan seismic code, earthquake, seismic codes, shear velocity, unreduced response spectra, base shear