Title: Evaluation of Seismic Levee Deformation Potential by Destructive Cyclic Field Testing (NEES-2008-0644)

Year Of Curation: 2013

Description: The Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta levees are critical components of California's water distribution system. The Delta supplies fresh water to 22 million people in southern and central California as well as eastern portions of the bay area and directly supports California's $400 billion/year economy. The "islands" circumscribed by the network of levees are commonly 3 to 5 meters below sea level, and are protected by only about 1 to 1.5 meters of freeboard at high tide. A breach in a levee causes water from the channel to flow into the island thereby inundating farmland and wildlife habitat, and drawing saline water from the San Francisco Bay into the Delta, potentially degrading the quality of water delivered to central and southern California to the point that delivery would be halted. Delta risk assessment has recently gained a significantly enhanced priority in the wake of (1) an unexplained breach of Jones Tract in the Delta in 2004, causing nearly $100 million in losses and (2) the catastrophic levee failures in New Orleans following hurricane Katrina. The risk posed to the Delta by a strong earthquake is particularly onerous due to the potential for widespread simultaneous levee failures that would overwhelm a disaster recover system that often struggles to rapidly repair a single breached levee. The influence of earthquake shaking on the behavior of the levees is uncertain because the cyclic deformation potential of the underlying peaty organic soils not well understood, and there is an urgent need to investigate the behavior of these materials.

Award: http://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=0830081

PIs & CoPIs: Scott Brandenberg, Jonathan Stewart

Dates: October 01, 2008 - August 31, 2012

Organizations: University of California, Los Angeles, CA, United States

Facilities: University of California, Los Angeles, CA, United States

Sponsor: NSF - 0830081

Keywords: Seismic Levee Deformation,Destructive Cyclic Field Testing,Peat,Cyclic Deformation,Cyclic Pore Pressure Generation

Publications: Robb Moss  "Data Report Final Draft" 

• Scott Brandenberg, Jonathan Stewart (2017), "Evaluation of Seismic Levee Deformation Potential by Destructive Cyclic Field Testing (NEES-2008-0644)," https://datacenterhub.org/deedsdv/publications/view/373.