IRMA platform for the calculation of damages and risks of Italian residential buildings

Abstract

Italian Risk MAps (IRMA) is an innovative IT platform developed by European centre for training and research in earthquake engineering (Eucentre) with funds of the Italian Civil Protection Department, and addressed to the scientific community. IRMA allows data sharing, methods and models aimed to evaluate the seismic risk of Italian residential buildings, in order to comply with the requirements of the “Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015–2030” (Sendai Framework). IRMA uses OpenQuake, a calculation engine developed as part of the Global Earthquake Model, to evaluate earthquake loss estimation. The user can create and upload different exposure/vulnerability databases as well as different sets of fragility curves on the platform. The hazard used in the platform is the MPS04 hazard model, developed by National Institute of Geophysics and Volcanology that is actually the reference hazard map for the Italian code regulation. IRMA is extremely flexible: by combining the different exposure databases with all the possible sets of fragility curves, the user can produce maps of conditional damage (i.e. the return period is selected) or unconditional damage (i.e. an observation time window is selected). Damage scenarios can also be performed by using shakemaps of seismic events as input. The shakemaps, preloaded in the platform, are those referred to the recent seismic events in Italy. The article describes the context in which IRMA was developed, its features and architecture. IRMA was used in 2018 by DPC to produce the National Risk Assessment, in agreement with EU decision 1313/2013.