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DECivil-IST, Technical University of Lisbon, Av. Rovisco Pais, 1049-001 Lisbon, Portugal
ESTBarreiro, Polytechnic Institute of Setbal, R. Amrico da Silva Marinho, 2839-001 Lavradio, Portugal
c
Department of Civil Engineering and Architecture, Section of Construction, IST, Technical University of Lisbon, Av. Rovisco Pais, 1049-001 Lisbon, Portugal
b
h i g h l i g h t s
" Carbonation model calibrated with long term results.
" Deterioration model considering only initiation stage.
" Safety factors determined using Monte Carlo simulations.
" Comparative study with model code for service life design semi-probabilistic approach.
a r t i c l e
i n f o
Article history:
Received 20 March 2012
Received in revised form 22 May 2012
Accepted 4 June 2012
Available online 10 July 2012
Keywords:
Concrete
Carbonation
Corrosion
Service life
Performance-based design
a b s t r a c t
This work aims to provide a simple semi-probabilistic approach to the service life design of reinforced
concrete structures with respect to reinforcement corrosion induced by concrete carbonation.
This paper presents an analytical model for the initiation period, calibrated with long-term carbonation
results, which uses the accelerated carbonation resistance and the environmental class as input parameters. The issue of dening a limit for deterioration is discussed and a maximum accepted level of deterioration and reliability indexes are dened. The corresponding partial safety factors are derived from a
full probabilistic approach. The performance of the proposed method is compared with that proposed on
the b Model Code for Service Life Design.
2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
1. Introduction
The service life design of reinforced concrete structures is an
important subject that has led to extensive research worldwide.
That research has given us the performance-based design methods
in use today [16,26,14]. These methods are founded on prediction
models and reliability concepts and, unlike the deemed-to-satisfy
approach, allow lifecycle cost analyses [31,37]. To encourage the
widespread use of the performance-based design its methods must
be as simple (user-friendly) and accurate as possible.
Reinforcing steel corrosion is the most common deterioration
mechanism in reinforced concrete structures [13,19,29]. Steel corrodes when in contact with humidity and oxygen but when it is inside concrete an oxide lm builds up that makes steel passive and
protects it against corrosion. This lm is stable in an alkaline envi Corresponding author at: Department of Civil Engineering and Architecture,
Section of Construction, IST, Technical University of Lisbon, Av. Rovisco Pais, 1049001 Lisbon, Portugal. Tel.: +351 21 8419709; fax: +351 21 8497650.
E-mail addresses: rui.neves@estbarreiro.ips.pt (R. Neves), fbranco@civil.ist.utl.pt
(F.A. Branco), jb@civil.ist.utl.pt (J. de Brito).
0950-0618/$ - see front matter 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.conbuildmat.2012.06.028
586
Deterioration
Z RS
pf pR 6 S
b U1 pf
pf;T pZ 6 0
pf;T pL 6 T
Cracking
45%<RHc<65%
65%<RHc<85%
RHc>85%
Time
Service life
587
p
xK t
where x is the carbonation depth (mm); K the carbonation coefcient (mm/year1/2); and t is the exposure time to CO2 (year).
In Eq. (6), K is a parameter that takes into account all factors
affecting carbonation. Separating those factors into environmental
and concrete intrinsic factors, K may be dened as:
ka
ke
R, S
Adequate modelling of carbonation is a delicate issue since several factors must be taken into account and users expect research
to deliver simple and user-friendly models. Factors affecting car-
S(t)
pf,T
Time
fL(t)
588
4. Design criteria
Fig. 3. Measured vs. predicted carbonation depths for environmental class XC3.
ka p
t
ke
Rc
where x is the carbonation depth (mm); ka the resistance to accelerated carbonation (mm/year1/2); ke the environmental parameter,
being 9.9 for environmental class XC3 and 15.0 for environmental
class XC4; and t is the exposure time to CO2 (year).
Resistance to carbonation in accelerated conditions (ka) is quantied by means of K in Eq. (1), i.e. an accelerated carbonation coefcient, which has proven to be suitable for simulating carbonation
in accelerated conditions [20,32,3,6], using the following test
conditions:
Preconditioning: 3 weeks at 20 3 C and 65 5% RH.
Testing age: from 5 weeks.
Accelerated carbonation conditions: 20 3 C, 65 5% RH and
5 0.1% CO2 concentration.
The performance of the model is illustrated in Figs. 3 and 4, for
environmental classes XC3 and XC4, respectively, using the results
from Neves et al. [33]. According to these authors, when using
different CO2 concentrations in accelerated testing for carbonation
resistance, a correction factor, ka, given by the square root of the
accelerated testing concentrations ratio may be used if CO2 concentrations are still near 5%.
Fig. 4. Measured vs. predicted carbonation depths for environmental class XC4.
cR
cS Sc > 0
cd cnom Dc
10
of the depassivation limit state, this value for the safety factor
means a failure probability of 0.50. This failure probability corresponds to a reliability index b = 0, which is within the range of
reliability indexes for XC3 class quoted by Lay and Schiessl [23].
with the model codes partial safety factor approach. The corresponding limit state equation, in its most simplied form, with
partial safety factors already included, is:
cd P
0:5psr ToW0:446
q
0:0767
1:13 3:05 1011 RH5c 2:5 kc;d 3:08 103 R1
ACC 0:52t SL
tSL
5. Proposed method
12
ka
c d ke
p
cS tSL
589
11
R1
ACC
x2
Cs t
13
ka
q
2 C s R1
ACC
14
590
Table 1
Scenarios for the comparative analysis.
Scenario
Environmental class
A
B
C
D
25
25
30
30
50
100
50
100
XC3
XC3
XC4
XC4
Table 2
Parameters for Eq. (12).
Scenario
cd (mm)
RHc (%)
kc,d
tSL (year)
psr
ToW
A
B
C
D
25
25
30
30
70
70
80
80
1
1
1
1
50
100
50
100
0
0
0.05
0.05
0.21
0.21
A semi-probabilistic approach that uses a safety factor in association with a reliability index was adopted.
The impact of not considering an acceptable level of deterioration where corrosion is allowed was analysed. For situations where
the relative weight of the propagation stage was high (environmental class XC3), the period was considered as an additional
safety margin, as reected in the allowance of a lower reliability
index.
A practical method was proposed, whose main features are:
Table 3
Required accelerated carbonation resistances (ka in mm/year1/2).
Scenario
Model code
New method
A
B
C
D
24
16
47
35
35
24
50
36
7. Conclusions
One of the processes responsible for the reinforcement corrosion problems in reinforced concrete structures is the natural carbonation of concrete, which depends on both the materials
characteristics and the surrounding environment.
Although a structures durability can generally be assured by
means of a deemed-to-satisfy approach, performance-based design
is preferable as it allows a more rational use of the available resources and a lifecycle cost analysis.
The aim of this study was to provide a simple performancebased design method to prevent carbonation-induced corrosion.
The issue of acceptable degradation level was discussed, and a
depassivation limit state which requires only one prediction model
was adopted.
A model to predict carbonation depth based on Ficks rst law
and that was calibrated with long term natural exposure conditions carbonation assessments was considered.
Zuverlssigkeitsbetrachtungen
zur
wirksamen
vermeidung
von
bewehrungskorrosion (in German), German Committee for Structural
Concrete (DafStb). Berlin: Germany; 2000.
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environments. Abingdon, UK: Taylor and Francis; 2009.
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