Page - 1461 - in Book of Full Papers - Symposium Hydro Engineering

suitable criteria for the reliability analysis. Nevertheless, the following sections in this paper are mostly based on the aforementioned publication [11] for clarification purposes. The main goal of the investigation discussed in this paper is to reduce to amount of needed simulations for the reliability analysis to determine the exceedance probabilities and finding/evaluating suitable assessment criteria. 2. GENERAL INFORMATION The investigations are based on a three-dimensional finite element model, which takes the loads and resistances into account as realistically as possible. The static and transient thermal analyses are carried out by using nonlinear material laws for the dam (masonry) and brittle rock subsoil, considering the seasonal instationary temperature fields and the load-dependent pore water pressures in the dam body. Additionally, the existing sealing and drainage elements as well as the nature of the rock subsoil are considered. The investigation of the dam in [11] dealed with the following topics:  Calibration and verification of the calculation model against measurement results,  Stability assessment using the EC-compliant safety concept presented in [1] on the basis of partial safety factors,  Basic studies on the behavior of the dam,  reliability of the results and main impact factors,  Stochastic investigations to assess the probability of failure The gathered knowledge from these topics are the basis of the ongoing investigations. All simulations are carried out using the finite element program ANSYS®, the elastoplastic material model library multiPlas [10] for ANSYS and the software for stochastic analysis ANSYS optiSLang® [9]. 3. NONLINEAR FINITE ELEMENT MODEL For the nonlinear simulations a 3D model of the dam and the foundation is created. The model has a width of 768 m, a length of 515 m and a height of 218 m. The FE model is shown in Fig. 1. 1461