High Frequency Ground Motion Simulation for Seismic Hazard Analysis

PI: Thomas Jordan, Southern California Earthquake Center

 

Economic exposure to earthquake devastation in seismically active regions has increased significantly over the last few decades because of massive growth of urban areas. To understand risk and improve resilience, we need to quantify earthquake hazards at higher levels of fidelity. Physics-based modeling and simulation provide a path to a more accurate representation of earthquake systems—from the rupture at the fault to the response of the built environment. This approach relies on numerical simulation of rupture dynamics and seismic wave propagation in realistic three-dimensional models of the crust’s heterogeneous structure to represent the ground motion during strong earthquakes.

 

In this map, orange, yellow, and white colors of California reveal regions where strong ground shaking would occur during a possible magnitude-8 earthquake on the San Andreas Fault. The seismograms shown on the map indicate peak velocity ground motions for selected California cities. SCEC is using ALCF Mira to produce detailed 3D seismic velocity models for use in scenario earthquake simulations like this one, which shows where strong ground shaking would produce significant hazards to people and infrastructure for individual earthquakes. SCEC’s CyberShake hazard model calculates long-term seismic hazard estimates by simulating all plausible future earthquakes in a region of interest, which are then combined to produce estimates of peak ground motions expected at sites of interest over the next 50 years.

 

Image credit: Geoffrey Ely, Argonne National Laboratory

 

Scientific discipline: Earth Science: Geological Sciences

 

This research used resources of the Argonne Leadership Computing Facility at Argonne National Laboratory.