Effect of Climate Change on Factored Climatic Loads Required in Structural Design

Scientific evidence strongly suggests that our climate will be changing significantly over the next century or more. A changing climate leads to changing climatic loads (e.g. windspeed, snow, temperature, etc) on any structure over its design life. The challenge is to suitably revise structural code specified characteristic design loads and load factors so that the past level of structural safety is maintained in the future.;The thesis develops the probability theory required to model the climatic load problem and applies it to a reasonable future climate change scenario. A regression model is presented which allows the required characteristic design load and load factors to be easily calculated given predictions regarding future changes in the mean and standard deviation of the climatic load distribution. The overall methodology leads to a reasonable conceptual approach to incorporating the effects of future climate change into a design code.;In the past, characteristic design loads and load factors were estimated assuming that the climatic load distribution was relatively steady from year to year (i.e. constant mean and variance). Assuming that past "steady" estimates correspond to currently acceptable reliability levels, this work looks at how the characteristic load and load factors should change under a future non-steady climate regime in order to maintain these acceptable reliability levels.