How Peer Review Can Help Move the Structural Engineering Industry Forward – Ep 082

In this episode, we talk to James (Jim) O. Malley, S.E., about what peer review is and how it can help move the structural engineering industry forward. He also talks about the building code requirements for seismic design and how these codes allow for the implementation of new concepts and technologies. Engineering Quotes: Here Are Some of the Questions We Ask James: What is peer review, why is it important, and who does the review? What projects are reviewed and when are the projects reviewed? What are the building code requirements for seismic design? How do these codes allow for the implementation of new concepts, configurations, or technologies? What process is followed to ensure that new and innovative concepts will provide at least equivalent performance? Can you provide us with examples of projects that have implemented this process? How can peer review move the design/construction industry forward? Do you have any advice for young engineers starting in their careers? Here Are Some of the Key Points Discussed About How Peer Review Can Help Move the Structural Engineering Industry Forward: A peer review is a small group of engineers who have expertise in the project that is proposed to a major city and assist the city with the review and approval of that project. The team of engineers can include a practicing structural engineer, a professor or researcher, and an expert in ground motion development. Projects that need a peer review are generally tall buildings because the building code has limitations on different structural systems based on their height. Large projects that include base isolation, like stadiums, also need a peer review team. The best time for a peer review to be implemented in a project is at the beginning of schematic and conceptual design so it can have a higher impact on the design and reduce the redoing of work. Seismic design provisions take the entire system of a structure into account and not the individual parts. It results in a prescriptive code that is very detailed in what is needed. The building code has a general building structure and some of it does not apply to high buildings, so a peer review team is needed for any parts of a high building project that might conflict with the building code. The ASCE 7 Standard has a clause stating that all the standards in the code must be met, but if the engineer can demonstrate the equivalent performance to the intent of the standard to the authorities having jurisdiction, then they should be allowed to do that. When engineers want to use performance-based design, they will have some extra steps to follow to meet the prescriptive provisions. New technologies are usually incremental changes to what has been previously done. Many new technologies come from industry or government research and multiple peer review researchers will be working on getting the information about the new technologies. The information is then given to the practicing engineers for deliberation. FEMA P-695 provides a roadmap for testing and analysis of entirely new technologies. When it is completed and reviewed by a group across the entire industry successfully, it will be added to the building code with all the restrictions and parameters for the new technology. The structural engineer of record and the peer review team communicate back and forth for the duration of the project. The projects get preliminary analysis followed by nonlinear response history analysis. All the nonlinear assumptions are reviewed multiple times to ensure correctness. The Wrapper Tower project has a unique, never seen before system. It is close to the Newport Inglewood Fault in Southern California. It was originally designed as a fixed base design but was changed to ...