Service Life Prediction for Buildings Exposed to Severe Weather

This paper presents a specific case study for estimating the service life of public buildings in the harsh weather of Kuwait using the factor method. Estimating the service life helps enhance the sustainability of these buildings and controls some economic aspects. The case in consideration was applied to the data collected for a project to assess the structural behavior of twenty-six buildings that belong to Kuwait University. The assessed buildings were located in two regions. The first region is 100 - 400m from the coast and the second region is about 5 km away from the coast. The buildings were assessed by visual inspection, material testing, and structural analysis. The findings of these investigations guided the working team to assign the values of the different factors used in the prediction process. The factors were predicted in a probabilistic approach to consider the inherent variability in the construction components and the surrounding effects. The results of the service life prediction provide a perspective for the expected life span of buildings in similar conditions.