History

The ideas of performance-based engineering are not new. Performance objectives began with the Seismology Committee of the Structural Engineer’s Association of California (SEAOC), which began publishing recommended seismic criteria 1959 in its Recommended Lateral Force Requirements and Commentary, colloquially known as the Blue Book. The blue book formed the basis of the seismic provisions of the Uniform Building Code until the discontinuation of the UBC in 1997. The 1959 edition of the blue book included damage control objectives for various levels of earthquake intensity. 

However, engineers did not have the knowledge at that point to develop rigorous quantitative criteria to define these goals beyond the generic.

Building codes continued to incorporate PBEE concepts at the most basic level. Generally, it is assumed in building code design that strength-based provisions combined with maximum allowable drift and deflection will result in a structure that will meet the following performance guidelines:

In 1995, SEAOC published a document titled Performance Based Seismic Engineering of Buildings, also called Vision 2000, which was the first document explicitly dedicated to “… develop the framework for procedures that yield structures of predictable seismic performance.” This report detailed a comprehensive set of recommendations for design, from choosing a site through to quality of construction and inspection. The development of guidelines for performance-based engineering has continued since 2000. Current documents are listed in the references section.