In a long-awaited, historic step toward “real" not cookbook wind engineering, the Structural Engineering Institute of the American Society of Civil Engineers recently issued a recommended alternative to the building code’s prescriptive procedures for the wind design of buildings. Properly implemented, the Prestandard for Performance-Based Wind Design, available free of charge for all structural engineers to use, results in buildings capable of achieving wind performance objectives specified in the ASCE 7 design load standard, and in many cases, superior performance, according to SEI.
“This is significant,” says Don Scott, a senior principal with PCS Structural Solutions and chair of the wind loads subcommittee for ASCE 7’s standard, Minimum Design Loads and Associated Criteria for Buildings and Other Structures. “It allows us to use the reserve capacity in structures,” adds Scott, also the principal investigator for the research project that developed the 127-page prestandard, catalyzed by a $150,000 grant from the Charles Pankow Foundation.