complique 8 EARTHQUAKE RESPONSE OF ARCH DAMS 889 2.0 9.8 13.0 11.1 4.1 2.6 5.9 3.1 2.7 2.8 2.2 3.2 8 10 12 14 16 18 20 -20 -10 0 10 20 Time, sec Acceleration, cm/s2 SM05 SM08 SM04 SM03 SM02 SM01 SM07 SM06 SM11 SM10 SM09 SM0F Located 600 m downstream Figure 2. Recorded motions in stream direction; accelerations are in cm/s2; peak values are noted. the crest; accelerographs SM06–SM08 are located at mid-height; and accelerographs SM09–SM11 are located at the base elevation. Installed in tunnels, accelerographs SM09 and SM11 are located essentially vertically below SM01 and SM05, respectively; SM10 is located at the base of the dam. Accelerographs SM01, SM06, SM08, and SM05 are located at the dam–foundation rock interface; SM01 and SM06 are located on the left side of the canyon (viewed from upstream); and SM05 and SM08 on the right side of the canyon. An accelerograph SM0F is located in the free field 600 m downstream of the dam at El. 1840, i.e. 114 m above the dam base on the left side of the canyon. Motions of Mauvoisin Dam during the Valpelline earthquake of 31 March 1996 of magnitude 4.6, centered 13 km away from the dam, were recorded by the accelerograph array. At the time of the earthquake, the water level was at El. 1864, i.e. 112 m below the crest of the dam. The stream components of motions recorded at the accelerograph locations are shown in Figure 2; for brevity, similar figures for the cross-stream and vertical components are not included, but are available in Reference [7]. Although the motions are very weak, these records provide a useful set of data about the spatial variations of ground motions around the canyon along the dam–foundation rock interface, thus providing an opportunity to investigate the influence of spatial variations in ground motion on response of the dam. System analyzed Figure 3 presents a finite element model of the dam that includes 145 8-node thick shell elements 892 A. K. CHOPRA AND J.-T. WANG Displacement, mm 8 Computed Recorded SM03: vertical SM03: cross-stream -0.4 -0.2 0.0 0.2 -0.4 -0.2 0.0 0.2 -0.4 -0.2 0.0 0.2 0.4 SM03: stream Time, sec 10 12 14 16 18 20 Figure 4. Comparison of recorded and computed displacements—stream, cross-stream, and vertical components—at crest center (SM03); computed responses are for node 54 (near SM03). EARTHQUAKE ENGINEERING AND STRUCTURAL DYNAMICS Earthquake Engng Struct. Dyn. 2010; 39:887–906 Published online 9 November 2009 in Wiley InterScience (www.interscience.wiley.com). DOI: 10.1002/eqe.974 Earthquake response of arch dams to spatially varying ground motion Anil K. Chopra1,∗,† and Jin-Ting Wang1,2,‡ 1University of California, Berkeley, U.S.A. 2Tsinghua University, Beijing, China SUMMARY The response of two arch dams to spatially varying ground motions recorded during earthquakes is computed by a recently developed linear analysis procedure, which includes dam–water–foundation rock interaction effects and recognizes the semi-unbounded extent of the rock and impounded water domains. By comparing the computed and recorded responses, several issues that arise in analysis of arch dams are investigated. It is also demonstrated that spatial variations in ground motion, typically ignored in engineering practice, can have profound influence on the earthquake-induced stresses in the dam. This influence obviously depends on the degree to which ground motion varies spatially along the dam–rock interface. Thus, for the same dam, this influence could differ from one earthquake to the next, depending on the epicenter location and the focal depth of the earthquake relative to the dam site. Copyright 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Received 20 April 2009; Revised 31 August 2009; Accepted 1 September 2009 KEY WORDS: arch dams; earthquakes; spatial variations; Mauvoisin Dam; Pacoima Dam INTRODUCTION Ground motions recorded at arch dams exhibit spatial variation (or non-uniformity) along the dam–foundation rock interface. Such data include records obtained at two dams: (1) Pacoima Dam (California, U.S.A.) during the earthquake on 13 January 2001 of magnitude 4.3, and the Northridge earthquake on 17 January 1994 of magnitude 6.9 [1, 2]; and (2) Mauvoisin Dam (Switzerland) during the Valpelline earthquake on 31 March 1996 of magnitude 4.6 [3]. Rarely are these spatial variations in ground motion considered in earthquake analysis of arch dams, and when they are included, dam–water interaction is usually oversimplified. Water barrage de Mauvoisin (Suisse)