Comparison of seismic risk assessment based on macroseismic intensity and spectrum approaches using ‘SeisVARA’

A comparative study of risk assessment methodologies based on macroseismic intensity and response spectrum approaches is presented. To facilitate the comparative study, a spreadsheet-based software tool ‘SeisVARA’ is developed for the estimation of earthquake risk, in which the seismic hazard can be specified either in terms of macroseismic intensity, or peak ground acceleration in combination with the spectral shape and soil amplification model of various earthquake building codes, or in terms of inelastic response spectra using the ‘next generation attenuation relationships’. A comparison of these different approaches is conducted for a typical city in northern India. In addition, the effect of different parameters, e.g., level of PGA, spectral shape, source-site parameters, and soil amplification models, is studied. It is observed that not only the different approaches result in widely varying damage and loss estimates, but also the variation of parameters within a given approach can result in considerable differences.