Structural and economical performance of reinforced concrete frames with Dual-Phase and TempCore® steel rebars in uncorroded and corroded conditions

Abstract

In the last decades, the need to develop new enhanced typologies of steel reinforcement bars with improved ductility and durability performance in presence of aggressive environmental conditions progressively increased due to the negative consequences that corrosion showed on the structural capacity of reinforced concrete (RC) buildings. Within the recently concluded NEWREBAR research project, a new reinforcing steel grade with Dual-Phase (DP) microstructure and selected low-carbon content chemical composition (kept in the range of the actual European production) was developed, produced, and tested even in presence of accelerated induced corrosion. To understand the impact of the adoption of DP rebars in RC structures, case study buildings were designed, modeled, and analyzed using the new grade and compared to traditional buildings using TempCore® rebars. In the present work, the results of a techno-economic analysis performed on both DP and TempCore® RC buildings through the evaluation of the expected annual loss (EAL) index is presented for a residential five-storeys case-study building, assessing the benefit introduced by adopting the proposed new reinforcing grade even in presence of corrosion.