Assessing chloride induced deterioration in condition and safety of concrete structures in marine environments

Prediction of the present and future state of Reinforced Concrete (RC) structures suffering from chloride-induced corrosion is important if proper planning for inspection and maintenance is to be made. The majority of research studies have thus far focused on the diffusion process of chloride ions through the concrete cover, the time to corrosion initiation and on the prediction of the surface condition of the structure. However; practical evidence and theoretical analysis suggests that many structures can tolerate considerable corrosion damage without serious reduction to their load carrying capacity. Therefore, visual impression-based maintenance is not an optimum solution particularly when financial resources are limited. To support this notion, accurate models are needed to predict the deterioration rate of the structural load carrying capacity over time. This paper uses existing empirical RC deterioration models to predict the loss in the load carrying capacity of a typical RC T-beam using a reliability based approach. The approach takes into consideration the spatial variability of the deterioration parameters, thereby demonstrating the importance of its inclusion in any such analysis.