Safety concepts in structural glass engineering: towards an integrated approach

This dissertation proposes the Integrated Approach to Structural Glass Safety, based on four clearly defined element safety properties, damage sensitivity, relative resistance, redundancy, and fracture mode. The Element Safety Diagram (ESD) is introduced to provide an easy-to-read graphical representation of these properties. The safety performance of a large number of glass beam designs has been compared through experimental testing based on the proposed approach. The effects of a wide range of safety enhancing design measures on each element safety property is extensively discussed. Elastic strain energy release is identified as a, hitherto underexposed, parameter with major influence on redundancy – the most important safety property. Finally, the Integrated Approach is applied to re-evaluate the safety of two full-scale case-study projects which started this study.