NHR3 Awarded Major Research Project on Seismic Risk Assessment of Distributed Water Infrastructure Crossing Earthquake Faults in Southern California

The Los Angeles Department of Water and Power (LADWP) recently awarded a contract to UCLA’s Natural Hazards Risk and Resiliency Research Center (NHR3) to research Seismic Risk Assessment of Distributed Water Infrastructure Crossing Earthquake Faults in Southern California.

For this project, NHR3 researchers will investigate seismic hazard characterization and risk quantification of distributed water systems crossing earthquake faults. NHR3 is a multidisciplinary and multi-campus research center with headquarters at the B. John Garrick Institute for the Risk Sciences (GIRS), UCLA Samueli School of Engineering.

“Los Angeles County is heavily dependent on water transmission from outside. As such, the County is susceptible to disruption of water supply in case of natural hazards, particularly earthquakes. It is important to quantify the seismic risk of the water infrastructure,” states Prof. Yousef Bozorgnia, Director of NHR3 and Principal Investigator of this research project. “The issue is compounded when the water transmission system crosses a major earthquake fault, which is the subject of this research project.”

“While this project focuses on fault-crossing hazards, it will also serve as a springboard for investigating the broader seismic resilience of water distribution systems in Southern California,” states Prof. Ertugrul Taciroglu, Chairperson of the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at UCLA and Co-Principal Investigator of this research project. “This is an important collaborative initiative among NHR3, UCLA, and LADWP.”