KSCE Journal of Civil Engineering (2014) 18(4):1097-1104 Structural Engineering

Copyright 2014 Korean Society of Civil Engineers

DOI 10.1007/s12205-014-0153-7 pISSN 1226-7988, eISSN 1976-3808
www.springer.com/12205
TECHNICAL NOTE

Seismic Behaviour of Isolated Fluid Storage Tanks: A-state-of-the-art Review

V. R. Panchal* and D. P. Soni**
Received March 24, 2012/Revised August 3, 2012/Accepted June 22, 2013

Abstract

An updated state-of-the-art-review of the behaviour of the isolated fluid storage tanks to seismic excitation is presented. The main
objective of review is to provide assistance to current research and engineering practice on base isolated fluid storage tanks. The
review includes the literature on theoretical aspects of seismic isolation, parametric behaviour of isolated fluid storage tanks and
experimental studies to verify some of the theoretical findings. Aspects for future research in the area of isolation of fluid storage
tanks are also presented.
Keywords: base isolation, seismic excitation, ground-supported fluid storage tank, elevated fluid storage tank

1. Introduction between the foundation and the superstructure. A practical base

Liquid storage tanks are lifeline structures and strategically
very important, since they have vital use in industries and
nuclear power plants. Unlike most structures (such as buildings
or bridges), the weight of storage tanks varies in time because of
variable liquid storage level, and they may contain low-
temperature (e.g., Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG)) or corrosive
substances. Recent years have seen a number of occurrences of
catastrophic failures of fluid storage tanks due to severe,
impulsive, seismic events such as the 1994 Northridge earthquake
in California, the 1995 Kobe earthquake in Japan and the 1999
Chi-Chi earthquake in Taiwan. Such failures have been due to
number of causes with the most common being buckling of tank
wall due to excessive development of compressive stresses in the
wall, failure of piping system and uplift of the anchorage system.
Failures of storage tanks not only instantly disrupts essential
infrastructure but can also cause fires or environmental
contamination when flammable materials or hazardous chemicals
leak. Consequently, protection of fluid storage tanks against severe
seismic events has become crucial. For over three decades,
seismic isolation technology has been recognized as one of the
promising alternatives for protecting fluid storage tanks against
severe earthquakes. In recent years, this technology has matured
to highly dependable and reliable level. Academic research on
this technology is well advanced, and its practical application is
becoming widespread throughout the world (Deb, 2004).
Seismic isolation is an idea proposing the decoupling of a
structure from damaging effects of ground motions. This is
achieved by introducing specially designed base isolation system
isolation system typically consists of three basic elements
(Buckle, 1986): (i) a flexible mounting so that the fundamental
period of the total system is lengthened sufficiently to reduce the
acceleration response; (ii) a supplemental damper or energy-
dissipation device so that the relative displacement across the
isolation interface can be controlled to a desirable level; and (iii)
a means of providing rigidity under low load levels such as wind
and minor earthquakes. The concept of isolating structures from
the damaging effects of earthquakes is not new. The detailed
review of earlier and recent works on base isolation systems and
their applications to buildings and bridges had been widely
reported by Kelly (1986), Buckle and Mayes (1990), Jangid and
Datta (1995) and Kunde and Jangid (2003). However, in recent
past, a large number of theoretical and experimental studies have
been also made on isolated fluid storage tanks with different base
isolation properties in addition to buildings and bridges.
In view of this, an updated state-of-the-art-review on isolated
fluid storage tanks against earthquake excitation is presented.
The review covers the overview of early and modern base
isolation devices as such, but puts most emphasis on the
analytical and experimental studies conducted on fluid storage
tanks. The specific objectives of the this review are as follows:
(i) to summarize the investigation on the effectiveness of base
isolation in reducing the earthquake motion to be transferred to
the fluid storage tanks, (ii) to enhance the understanding of the
parametric behaviour of fluid storage tanks with an indication of
their range of applicability and some assessment of their
development as backed by the research and (iii) to provide
assistance to current research and engineering practice on base

*Associate Professor, Dept. of Civil Engineering, Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel Institute of Technology, Vasad 388 306, Gujarat, India (Corresponding Author,
E-mail: soni_svit@yahoo.com)
**Professor, Dept. of Civil Engineering, Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel Institute of Technology, Vasad 388 306, Gujarat, India (E-mail: vijay_svit@yahoo.co.in)

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 V. R. Panchal and D. P. Soni

isolation and isolated fluid storage tanks.
2. Base Isolation System
Base isolation has now become a matured technology having
variety of isolation systems in service across the globe. Many
new isolation systems are proposed and patented each year and
many of these new systems will prove to be impractical and
some might actually be lethal, but the number continues to
increase year by year. The isolation systems may be classified
into: (i) Elastomeric bearings (ii) Rolling bearing and (iii) Sliding
bearing.
The elastomeric bearings are made from natural rubber or
neoprene with alternate steel shims. A variety of elastomeric
bearings have been developed widely both in theory and
practice. The elastomeric bearings (with and without lead core),
such as Laminated Rubber Bearing (LRB), High Damping
Rubber Bearing (HDRB), Lead-rubber bearing (NZ System) and
Fiber-reinforced bearing, provide the most straightforward
method of seismic isolation.
Several rolling isolation system have also been developed and
experimentally tested to study their effectiveness. The main
advantage of rolling system is its low value of rolling friction
coefficient, which, as a result, allows a very low earthquake force
to be transmitted to the superstructure.
The sliding systems perform very well under a variety of
severe earthquake loading and are very effective in reducing the
large levels of the superstructure acceleration. These isolators are
characterized by insensitivity to the frequency content of
earthquake excitation. This is due to tendency of sliding system
to reduce and spread the earthquake energy over a wide range of
frequencies. In contrast to electrometric bearings, a structure
supported entirely by sliding bearings experiences forces at the
sliding interface that are always bounded by the frictional force,
regardless of the intensity and frequency content of the ground
excitation.
3. Analytical Studies
There had been several analytical studies in the past to
demonstrate the effectiveness of seismic isolation for earthquake-
resistant design of fluid storage tank. A brief summary of analytical
work on seismic isolation of fluid storage tank is presented in
Table 1.
Bo and Jia-xiang (1994) presented the effects of lead-rubber
bearings on the seismic response of flexible liquid storage tanks.

Table 1. Summary oF Literature Review on Isolated Tanks

Tank Shape Material
Sr. No. Researchers type of tank Fluid of tank Isolation system Ground motion Remarks

1 Bo and Jia-xiang Ground Cylindrical Water Steel N-Z system Uni-directional ---
(1994) supported
Malhotra Ground Ring of vertically soft Uni-directional,
2 Cylindrical Water Steel rubber bearing, Ring of ---
(1997a, 1997b) supported Bi-directional
horizontally flexible bearing
3 Shenton III and Elevated Cylindrical Water Steel LRB Uni-directional ---
Hampton (1999)
Pool-type Uni-directional, Considering Fluid-
4 Park et al. Ground rectangular Nuclear spent fuel Concrete HDRB Random ground structure interaction
(2000, 2004) supported assemblies
tanks motion effects
Wang et al. Ground Density =
5 Cylindrical --- FPS Uni-directional ---
(2001) supported 800 kg/m3
Horizontal and vertical
stiffness 3.3105 kg/m and
3116.66105 kg/m, Considering
Kim et al. Ground Density = Density =
6 Cylindrical Uni-directional Soil-structure-fluid
(2002) supported 1005 kg/m3 2548 kg/m3 respectively, Horizontal and
interaction effects
vertical damping = 8% and
5%, respectively
Shrimali and
Jangid (2002a,
Ground- LRB, N-Z system,
2002b, 2002c, Uni-directional,
7 2002d, 2003a, supported, Cylindrical Water Steel P-F system, FPS, Bi-directional ---
Elevated R-FBI, EDF system
2003b, 2003c,
2004)
Considering
Cho et al. Ground-
8 Cylindrical Water Steel N-Z system Uni-directional Soil-structure-fluid
(2004) supported
interaction effects
Jadhav and Ground- LRB, N-Z system, FPS,
9 Jangid Cylindrical Water Steel Uni-directional ---
supported R-FBI, EDF system
(2004, 2006)
Gregoriou et al. Ground- Steel and Artificial accelero-
10 Cylindrical LNG HDRB and N-Z system ---
(2005) supported Concrete gram
Akkse et al. Ground-
11 Cylindrical Water Steel FPS and DCFP Uni-directional ---
(2007) supported
Panchal and Ground-
12 Cylindrical Water Steel FPS and VFPS Uni-directional ---
Jangid (2008) supported

1098 KSCE Journal of Civil Engineering

 Seismic Behaviour of Isolated Fluid Storage Tanks: A-state-of-the-art Review
The coupling effects among liquid sloshing, shell vibration and
isolator motion were included. The liquid was assumed to follow
the velocity potential theory, and the shell was modelled by the
finite element method. The investigation of the seismic calamity
of the storage tank showed that the yielding instability had a
close relationship with the liquid sloshing. The results showed
that the isolator could greatly reduce the hydrodynamic pressure,
shell and liquid sloshing amplitudes.
Malhotra (1997a) proposed a new method for seismic base
isolation of ground supported vertical cylindrical liquid storage
tanks. The base plate of the model was directly supported on soil
and tank wall supported on a ring of vertically soft rubber
bearings. The isolated system derives its flexibility from rocking
and uplifting of the base, and derives its energy-dissipation
capacity from base-plate yielding, soil damping and hysteretic
rubber damping. The numerical results of the isolated tanks
demonstrated that the effectiveness of the method in reducing
significantly the overturning base moments transferred to the
foundation and the axial compressive stresses generated in the
tank wall.
Another method for seismic base isolation of ground supported
cylindrical liquid storage steel tanks was proposed by Malhotra
(1997b). The wall of the tank disconnected from the base plate
and supported on a ring of horizontally flexible bearings, while
the base plate supported directly on the ground. The author
observed that there was considerable reduction in hydrodynamic
base shears, overturning moments and the axial compressive
stresses in the tank without a significant increase in the free
surface sloshing.
Shenton III and Hampton (1999) investigated the seismic
response of isolated elevated water tanks. The authors considered
the tank model with three-degrees-of-freedom system. These
degrees of freedom considered were associated with displacement
of convective fluid, isolation system and tower structure. The
influence of liquid height on response of the isolated tanks was
carried out. Further, the authors observed that single mode
solution provided fairly accurate result for large capacity tanks
with low height to diameter ratio. In addition to this, the authors
found that the seismic isolation increased the convective fluid
displacement relative to the fixed-base elevated tank.
The investigation, results and discussions on the seismic
design considerations of pool-type tanks isolated by the high
damping rubber-bearing for the storage of nuclear spent fuel
assemblies was presented by Park et al. (2000). A three-dimensional
boundary element-finite element method was presented for the
analysis of the fluid-structure-isolator systems in time domain. It
was shown that careful selection of mechanical properties of the
isolators with a certain lower limit on the effective frequency
could guarantee the reduction of the dynamic responses of the
storage tanks and the enhancement of the stability of stored spent
fuel assemblies against earthquake excitations.
Wang et al. (2001) investigated the seismic performance of liquid
storage tank isolated by FPS under uni-directional earthquake
excitation. The authors observed that isolation was effective to
Vol. 18, No. 4 / May 2014
reduce the seismic response of liquid storage tanks. Further, the
results showed that isolation was mainly effective in reducing the
impulsive component of the response while convective component
was slightly increased which did not significantly influenced the
over all performance of the isolation system.
A three-dimensional soil-structure-liquid interaction problem
was simulated by Kim et al. (2002) numerically in order to
analyze the dynamic behaviour of a base-isolated liquid storage
tank subjected to seismic ground motion. A dynamic analysis of
a liquid storage tank was carried out using a hybrid formulation,
which combines the finite shell elements for structures and the
boundary elements for liquid and soil. Finally, above two parts
were connected with the base isolation system to solve the
systems behaviour. Numerical examples were presented to
demonstrate the accuracy of the developed method, and an
earthquake response analysis was carried out to demonstrate the
applicability of the developed technique.
Shrimali and Jangid (2002a) carried out a comparative study of
performance of various isolation systems for liquid storage tanks
under real earthquake ground motions. The continuous liquid
mass was lumped as convective mass, impulsive mass and rigid
mass. The authors observed that the isolation systems were quite
effective in attenuating the earthquake acceleration transmitted to
the tank, which reduces the design seismic forces significantly.
Further, it was found that the sliding type isolation systems were
more effective in controlling the response of liquid storage tanks
in comparison to the elastomeric bearings. Among the various
sliding systems, the R-FBI was found to be most effective for
seismic isolation of the tanks.
The earthquake response of liquid storage tanks isolated by the
sliding systems under bi-directional earthquake motion was
investigated by Shrimali and Jangid (2002b, 2003a). The earthquake
response of isolated liquid storage tank obtained by conventional
model was compared with corresponding response obtained by
hysteretic model for the isolation system. A parametric study
was conducted to study the effects of aspect ratio of the tank on
the effectiveness of seismic isolation of the liquid storage tanks.
The authors found that the sliding systems were quite effective in
reducing the earthquake response of liquid storage tanks.
Shrimali and Jangid (2002c, 2003c) investigated the seismic
response of the liquid storage tanks isolated by lead-rubber
bearings for bi-directional earthquake excitation. The seismic
responses of two types of the isolated tanks, slender and broad
tanks, were investigated under several recorded earthquake
ground to study the effects of bi-directional interaction. The
important parameters considered were the period of isolation, the
damping of isolation bearings and the yield strength level of the
bearings. The response of the isolated tank was found to be
insensitive to interaction effect of the bearing forces. Further,
there was an optimum value of isolation damping for which the
base shear in the tank attains the minimum value.
The response of liquid storage tank with sliding isolation
systems under two horizontal components of real earthquake
ground motion was studied by Shrimali and Jangid (2002d). The
1099
 V. R. Panchal and D. P. Soni
frictional forces mobilized at the interface of the sliding system
were assumed to be velocity dependent and their interaction in
two horizontal directions was duly considered. The authors
observed that the bi-directional interaction of frictional forces
had noticeable effects and if these effects are ignored then the
sliding base displacements will be underestimated. Further, the
dependence of the friction coefficient on relative velocity of the
sliding bearings had no significant effects on the peak response
of the isolated liquid storage tanks.
Shrimali and Jangid (2003b) investigated earthquake response
of elevated liquid storage steel tanks isolated by the linear
elastomeric bearing under real earthquake ground motion. Two
types of isolated tank models were considered in which the
bearings are placed at the base and top of the steel tower
structure. In addition, a simplified analysis was also presented to
evaluate the response of the elevated steel tanks using two-
degree-of-freedom (2DOF) model and two SDOF models. The
authors observed that the proposed analysis predicts the seismic
response of elevated steel tanks accurately with significantly less
computational efforts.
A method for evaluating cost-effectiveness of seismically
isolated pool structures was introduced by Park et al. (2004)
taking account of fluid-structure interaction effects. Input ground
motions were represented by a power spectral density function
compatible with site-dependent response spectrums. The interaction
effects between flexible walls and contained fluid were considered
in the form of the added mass matrix. The thickness of wall and
the stiffness of isolator were considered two key design variables
in achieving a design with minimum life-cycle cost. The
numerical examples showed that seismically isolated pool tanks
were highly cost-effective in low-to-moderate seismic regions.
Cho et al. (2004) examined the seismic response analysis of a
base-isolated liquid storage tank on a half-space using a coupling
method combining the finite elements and boundary elements.
The coupled dynamic system that considers the base isolation
system and soil-structure interaction effect was formulated in
time domain to evaluate accurately the seismic response of a
liquid storage tank. Some numerical examples were presented to
demonstrate accuracy and applicability of the developed method.
Finally, a general numerical algorithm that can analyze the dynamic
response of base-isolated liquid storage tanks on homogeneous
half-space was developed.
Three analytical studies for the seismic response of base-
isolated ground supported cylindrical liquid storage tanks under
recorded earthquake ground motion were presented by Shrimali
and Jangid (2004). Firstly, the seismic response of isolated tanks
was obtained using the modal superposition technique and
compared with the exact response to study the effects of non-
classical damping. The second investigation involves the analysis
of base-isolated liquid storage tanks using the response spectrum
method. Finally, the closed-form expressions for the modal
parameters of the base-isolated liquid storage tanks were derived
and compared with the exact values. A simplified approximate
method was also proposed to evaluate the seismic response of
1100
isolated tanks. The response obtained from the above approximate
method was found to be in good agreement with the exact
response.
Jadhav and Jangid (2004) studied seismic response of liquid
storage tanks isolated by elastomeric bearings and sliding system
under real earthquake ground motions in order to investigate the
comparative effectiveness of various isolation systems. The
authors observed that both elastomeric and sliding systems were
found to be effective in reducing the earthquake forces of the
liquid storage tanks. However, the elastomeric bearing with lead
core was found to perform better in comparison to other systems.
Further, an approximate model was proposed for evaluation of
seismic response of base-isolated liquid storage tanks. The
proposed approximate analysis provided satisfactory response
estimates of the base-isolated liquid storage tanks under earthquake
excitation.
Gregoriou et al. (2005) investigated the time domain seismic
response of a representative LNG tank isolated at its base level
by rubber bearings. The problem was solved numerically by
means of a detailed finite element model, taking into account
fluid-structure interaction effects. Two types of bearings were
investigated: high damping rubber bearings and lead core rubber
bearings. The seismic excitation considered was an artificial
accelerogram compatible with the Eurocode 8 (Eurocode 8,
2002) provisions. Results concerning base shear force, sloshing
vertical displacement and deflection of the inner steel container
were presented.
The seismic response of the liquid storage tanks isolated by the
elastomeric bearings and sliding systems under near-fault
earthquake motions was studied by Jadhav and Jangid (2006). A
comparative performance of five isolation systems for liquid
storage tanks was studied under normal component of near-fault
motion and found that the EDF type isolation system may be a
better choice for design of isolated tank in near-fault locations.
The authors observed that the satisfactory response could be
obtained by analysing the base-isolated tanks under simple
cycloidal pulse instead of complete acceleration history. An
optimum value of isolation damping for which the base shear in
the tank attains the minimum value under near-fault motion was
also shown.
Akkse et al. (2007) investigated the effectiveness of the Double
Concave Friction Pendulum (DCFP) bearings for liquid storage
tanks subjected to near and far-fault earthquake ground motions.
Seismic response of the tanks isolated by the DCFP bearings was
compared with that isolated by Single Concave Friction Pendulum
(SCFP) bearings in order to highlight the efficacy of the DCFP
bearings on the tanks. The results from the liquid storage tank
isolated by the DCFP bearings were compared with those
isolated by the SCFP bearings. It was found that the DCFP
bearings had noticeable effects on the selected liquid storage
tank to near-fault earthquake ground motions with respect to the
SCFP bearings.
The earthquake response of liquid storage steel tanks isolated
with VFPS under normal component of six recorded near-fault
KSCE Journal of Civil Engineering
 Seismic Behaviour of Isolated Fluid Storage Tanks: A-state-of-the-art Review
Fig. 1. Mathematical Model of Liquid Storage Tank Isolated with
VFPS
ground motions were presented by Panchal and Jangid (2008).
The model considered for the base-isolated cylindrical liquid
storage tanks is shown in Fig. 1 in which the VFPS is installed
between base and foundation of the tank. Thus, the base-isolated
tank system has three degrees of freedom under uni-directional
earthquake excitation. These degrees of freedom are denoted by
uc, ui and ub which denote the absolute displacement of sloshing,
impulsive and rigid masses, respectively. The response quantities
of interest of liquid storage tank are base shear, Fb and relative
displacements of sloshing mass, xc, impulsive mass, xi, and
isolation system, xb. The base shear is expressed in terms of total
effective weight of the isolated liquid storage tank, W. Two types
of friction base isolators i.e. FPS (Isolation period, Tb = 2.5 sec
and Friction coefficient, = 0.05) and VFPS (Isolation time
period, Tb = 2.5 sec, Initial time period, Ti = 1.5 sec and Peak
friction coefficient, max = 0.15) are considered for comparison of
the seismic response. The time variation of the base shear, the
sloshing displacement, the impulsive displacement and the
isolator displacement of slender tank under Imperial Valley, 1979
earthquake ground motion (recorded at El Centro Array #5
station) is shown in Fig. 2. The response of the corresponding
non-isolated slender tank is also shown in Fig. 2 in order to show
the effectiveness of isolators. The results of the study shows that
(a) there is significant reduction in the base shear, sloshing
displacement and isolator displacement of the slender tank
isolated with VFPS as compared to slender tank isolated with
FPS, (b) with the installation of VFPS in liquid storage tanks, the
base shear, sloshing displacement, isolator displacement during
the near-fault ground motions can be controlled without much
alteration in the impulsive displacement.
Soni et al. (2011) studied the behaviour of liquid storage
slender and broad tanks isolated by the DVFPI. The governing
equations of motion and energy balance equation of the tank-
isolation system subjected to bilateral ground excitation were
Vol. 18, No. 4 / May 2014
Fig. 2. Time Variation of Base Shear, Sloshing Displacement, Impul-
sive Displacement and Isolator Displacement of Slender
Tank Isolated with the FPS (Tb = 2.5 sec and = 0.05) and
VFPS (Tb = 2.5 sec, Ti = 1.5 sec and max = 0.15) Under Impe-
rial Valley, 1979 (El Centro Array #5) Earthquake Ground
Motion
derived and solved in the incremental form. In order to investigate
the behaviour of the DVFPI, the response was obtained under
different parametric variations for a set of twenty far-field
earthquake ground motions. Four different combinations of the
DVFPI design cases having different isolator geometry and
coefficient friction at top and bottom sliding surfaces were
studied and the criterion to optimize its performance was
proposed based on minimum responses and energy quantities. It
was found that the performance of the DVFPI could be
optimized by designing the top sliding surface with high initial
stiffness relative to the bottom one and the coefficient of friction
of both sliding surfaces to be equal for a slender tank whereas
both surfaces should be designed with equal initial stiffness and
coefficient of friction for a broad tank.
4. Experimental Studies
A few numbers of experimental studies have been reported on
the load deformation behaviour of different isolation devices and
response characteristics of response models isolated by different
1101
 V. R. Panchal and D. P. Soni
isolators in the past.
Chalhoub and Kelly (1990) conducted shake table test on fixed
and isolated tanks, and observed that due to isolation there was a
significant reduction in the hydrodynamic forces, while sloshing
displacement slightly increased.
Kim and Lee (1995) carried out experimental studies to evaluate
seismic performance of two types of cylindrical liquid storage
tanks, namely broad and slender tanks, supported on LRB under
earthquake loadings. The authors observed that hydrodynamic
forces generated due to impulsive and convective components
had dominant effect on base shear. The authors also observed
that the base shear was significantly reduced by effect of base
isolation when dominant frequency was in the effective frequency
range of a base isolation system.
Scaled model tests were performed by Park et al. (2000) to
verify the numerical method and to study the dynamic behaviour
of isolated pool-type storage tanks for the storage of nuclear
spent fuel assemblies. Based on the experimental results, some
conclusions and discussions on the design considerations for
isolated storage tanks were presented as discussed in Section 3.
5. Practical Applications
The base isolation systems have been adopted for many fluid
storage tanks across the world. Here, two important isolation
projects are presented. First, Greeces LNG tanks which are the
worlds largest and heaviest seismic isolation project to date and
provide the central storage of the LNG for Greece. The Public
Gas Corporation of Greece has used seismic isolation systems
for the construction of two large LNG storage tanks, each with a
capacity of 65,000 m3, on the island of Revithoussa, near Athens,
in one of Europes highest seismic regions. The inner tank,
consisting of nickel steel, is unanchored and has a diameter of
65.7 m and a height of 22.5 m and the outer tank is made of
prestressed concrete. The tanks are partially buried for reasons of
aesthetics. Each tank is supported on 212 FPSs with a radius of
curvature of 1880 mm and displacement capacity of 300 mm.
Second, the three LNG tanks located in Inchon on the west
coast of Korea each having a capacity of 100,000 m3. The inner
tank height and diameter are 30 m and 68 m, respectively. Due to
poor soil conditions at the site, a pile foundation system is used.
The isolation system consists of LRBs with a diameter of 600
mm and an overall height of 228 mm. The design isolation
period is around 3 sec.
6. Conclusions
An updated state-of-the-art-review of the behaviour of the
isolated fluid storage tanks to seismic excitation is presented. In
most of these study, it is observed that the isolation is mainly
effective in reducing the impulsive component of the response
while convective component is slightly increased which do not
significantly influence the over all performance of the isolation
system. Moreover, the review of literature on the subject reveals
1102
that work in some areas is still inadequate and that these
necessitate further research in future in order to gain more
understanding of the subject and to provide definite guidelines
for the design. These areas are as follows:
1. Study the response of isolated steel tanks with multilayered
liquid (i.e. different layers of liquid, which have different
viscosity and density) under tri-axial earthquake excitation.
2. Analysis and feasibility of semi-active control devices for
aseismic design of fluid storage ground and elevated steel
tanks.
3. Experimental investigation of the response of ground and
elevated fluid storage steel tanks isolated with modern base
isolation devices, such as Fiber reinforced isolator, Double
Variable Frequency Pendulum Isolator (DVFPI), Triple
Friction Pendulum System, etc. considering bi-directional
and tri-axial interaction of bearing forces.
4. Stochastic response of the isolated fluid storage steel tanks
to random earthquake motions specified by power spectral
density functions compatible with site-dependent response
spectrums.
5. Earthquake response of ground and elevated fluid storage
steel tanks isolated with modern base isolation systems tak-
ing into account the fluid-structure-soil interaction effects.
6. Dynamic response of ground and elevated fluid storage
spherical and rectangular steel tanks isolated by modern
base isolation systems under far-fault and near-fault ground
motions.
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