For official circulation only IN-HOUSE INTERACTIVE MEET ON SEISMIC MICROZONATION 11-12 October 2006 Lucknow Collection of THEME PAPERS AND ABSTRACTS Geological Survey of India Northern Region 2006Interactive Meot on Seismic Merozonaion, Lucknow, 11-12 Oct. 2006, SEISMIC HAZARD ASSESSMENT AND MICROZONATION: APPROACH FOR GREATER KOLKATA URBAN AGGLOMERATION ‘Sujit Dasgupta and Anshuman Acharyya Geological Survey of India, Kolkata Introduction Natural Hazard lke flood, earthquake, landslide etc. is a subject of study to understand its cause and effects whereas disaster is a horrifying experience. Long-term average of frequency and intensity of natu- ral hazards of any region is more or less uniform but incident of disaster increases with the increase of vulnerability caused by human infringement. This is undesirable but in many cases inevitable frst due to population pressure and then due to lack of aware- ress, Considering that nature will periodically gen- erate hazards and we cannot fight with nature to reduce it, the alternative is to come in terms with nature and develop strategies to minimize the fre- ‘quency and intensity of disaster. Knowledge driven awareness, technology driven mitigation measures and community driven preparedness when integrated ‘with development activity would constitute the ways ‘and means for Disaster Mitigation In seismically active regions any decision-making for urban or regional planning should be based on probable characteristics of earthquakes expected in future, These features are provided by the procedure usually called Seismic Hazard Assessment (SHA) and the primary objective of SHA is to construct seismic zoning maps. For every country, seismic zoning map is prepared to predict various zones of more or less uniform seismic shaking intensity in the event of an earthquake depending on seismic history and seismotectonic set up of the area. Seis- mic zoning map of India is prepared by the Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS) and its latest edition (BIS, 2002) divides the entire country into four seismic ‘zones, II to V where, in zone V severe shaking of MSK intensity IX or above is possible from large earthquake predicted to occur in the area. Building codes with seismic design parameters are available for each seismic zone that should be followed to construct earthquake resistant structures. ‘Such country-wise zoning maps are however the product of gross generalization of facts and figures that do not take into consideration local site condi- tion, propagation effects and seismic source char- acteristics, which are known to have considerable influence on amplification/ de-ampliication of seis- mic wave in different source- path- site scenario. Of these, local site topography, lithology and shallow subsurface structure (basin configuration, fault etc) are known to have considerable influence on seis- micintensity and itis recorded world over how subtle changes in site geology can induce different and contrasting seismic response even at short dis- tances. This is where the concept of seismic microzonation becomes important, a domain be- tween the country scale seismic zoning map at one ‘end and site specific seismic design criteria for cri cal structures at the other end. The aim for this mid- order exercise is primarily to demarcate areas sus- ceptible to amplified ground motion within an other- wise homogeneous seismic zone. Target areas for the preparation of microzonation maps are usually the urban agglomeration within high hazard (zone IV ‘&V) and risk (high population density) zones. De- pending on the time and budget available and the target users of such maps the inputs for seismic microzonation map would vary from complex (source, path and site characteristics) to simple (site char- acteristics) with an expected output showing a seis- mic hazard parameter that could be PGA, funda- mental or resonant frequency with amplification fac- tor or some frequency dependant strong motion pa- rameter. Two constraints in this exercise however need elaboration: iif the target site is geologically homogeneous up to level of shallow subsurface with- out any appreciable variation in physical propertiesIngracive Meet on Slsmic Merozonetion, Luckrow, 11-12 Ot 2006 like seismic velocity and density (¢.9. Shillong with hard rock and Kolkata with very thick soft sediment) the shaking response due to earthquake will be more or less homogeneous except for areas under re- claimed filed land and i) the constraint arising in cases where the predicted scenario earthquake (Ms ~ 7.0) is within 50km radius of the site. The response will be ‘same for the entire site under the intensity of X+. First- level Microzonation Map ‘The first level microzonation map of any site is es- sentially a ‘site condition’ or ‘ground characteriza- tion’ map based on various parameters. These could be under the following themes: i) Macroseismic Intensity: When the site has experienced a previous moderate to strong earth- quake and high-density spot intensity values are recorded they can be plotted on a detailed surface material map; and instead of preparing a normalized isoseismal map individual intensity cluster zones are attempted. The resultant map could show high i tensity cluster within low intensity area and vice versa. This intensity cluster map usually mimics the surface! shallow subsurface geologic condition and isa strong indicator of site effects. This is a simple type of micrazonation map and an example for such map has been prepared for the Jabalpur city with intensity data from the 1997 Jabalpur earthquake. Such intensity data however have to be translated to some quantitative design parameter like peak ac- celeration, velocity, duration etc. ii) _ Site Condition from Shear Wave Veloc- ity: Shear wave velocity is currently used as one of the important factors in site characterization. The shear wave disturbances, as they travel through media, map out dilatational and rotational strains. The harmonic mean of shear wave velocity of upper 30m (V.*) of soil sediment column of a site is con- sidered to represent the strength, density and indu- ration of the sediment that guides seismic shaking response. The basic concept behind this approxi- mation is if losses due to reflection, scattering and aneleastic attenuation are negligible, then amplitude of incoming wave is proportional to 1//pVs where p is the density and Vs is the shear wave velocity Because density is relatively constant within shal- Jow depths, shear es the logi- cal choice for representing site condition. Moreover in near source situations as shear wave amplitude varies inversely with Vs, near surface Vs distribu- tion strongly influence ground motion. Thus near surface Vs is related to peak horizontal ground ve- locity or acceleration generated during strong earth- quakes. Average Vs is correlated inversely with earthquake intensity, hence areas with low Vs are susceptible to ampli \g and ampiification increases with de ‘top 30m. Vs” map when superimposed on ace material map will give relative site respor and Vs mapis equiva lent to Shear modulus (G) [G = p (density) x Vs") map. agen ‘Methodology: Shear Wave forlayered me- dia may be directly obtai ih invasive tech- niques of borehole geophysics (down hole, up hole & cross hole) and methods such as ‘SASW (Spectral Analysis of Surface Waves) & MASW (Multi-channel Analysis of Surface Waves) dispersion, utilizing the relation between Rayleigh & Shear Wave Velocity (V, = 0.9 V,). Method of MASW is powerful, rapid and cost effective tool for constraining shallow wave velocity structures. Usu- ally, 24-channel signal enhancement seismograph “Strata View’ (Geometric, Inc., USA) with drop ham- mer (10-20 kg) as energy source and 14 Hz geo- phones are used for velocity measurements in a pre- determined MASW spread. When these facilities are not available shear wave velocity can be deduced {rom insitu geotechnical parameter N-value from vari- ‘ous empirical relation between Vs and corrected N- value, such as Vs = 97 N°?" Tonouchi et al. 1983), \V, = 5.3N + 134 (Fumal and Tinsley, 1985) etc. ili) Site Response: These studies are aimed to- wards defining the transfer function at any site in terms of frequency dependent amplification. HIV ra- tio (ratio between the Fourier spectra of horizontal and vertical components) of microtremors has been found to reliably estimate site response to S waves as the vertical component of Rayleigh wave motion almost systematically vanishes in the vicinity of the fundamental S-wave resonant frequency. Nakamaura (1989) proposed that HIV ratio provides reliable esti-