Seismic performance of ductile circular RC bridge columns confined according to Eurocode 8

Three circular columns are designed for different q-value, and confined with the minimum confining reinforcement according to EC8 [1]. Their actual ductility levels are evaluated using moment-curvature analysis. Nonlinear time history analysis is used to investigate the seismic performance of the three columns. Results show that the columns all have achieved rather high ductility levels, and suffered very low damage under the excitation of El Centro earthquake even when its PGA is twice the design PGA. The following conclusions can be drawn: (a) the minimum amount of confinement for ductile circular column specified in EC8 can assure enough ductility capacity, (b) very low damage is observed in the three columns under the excitation of El Centro earthquake whose PGA is twice the design PGA, and (c) EC8 provisions are conservative in the terms of the maximum q-value and the minimum confinement.