The seismic design of steep reinforced earth.

The seismic design of reinforced earth should be arranged in the frame of both serviceability and ultimate limit states, in agreement with the suggestions outlined in the European and the Italian codes (EUROCODE 8 2005, AGI 2005, NTC 2008). The reason may be found in the fact that it is more realistic to accept different levels of damage in relation to a given return period of the design earthquake (perfor-mance-based design approach). However, even though much work has been done in this field to concrete and geotechnical structures, very little consideration has been devoted to composite and mixed works such as reinforced earth with geosynthetics. The paper deals with the different design methods for steep reinforced earth provided of geosynthetic reinforcements in relation to the possible limit states. Restrictions, capabilities and improvements of the design procedures are highlighted, with the aim of making easier the performance-based design of these structures.