The SCEC Broadband Platform: Open-Source Software for Strong Ground Motion Simulation and Validation

Fabio Silva, Philip J. Maechling, Christine A. Goulet, & Yehuda Ben-Zion

Published August 13, 2020, SCEC Contribution #10479, 2020 SCEC Annual Meeting Poster #202 (PDF)

The Southern California Earthquake Center (SCEC) Broadband Platform (BBP) is a collection of open-source scientific software modules that can simulate broadband (0-20+ Hz) ground motions for earthquakes at regional scales, compare simulation results between methods, and validate simulation results against observations. BBP software modules include kinematic rupture generators, low- and high-frequency seismogram synthesis methods that model the propagation of seismic waves through 1D layered velocity structures, site-effects modules, ground motion intensity measure calculations, and ground motion goodness-of-fit tools. Advanced scientific codes on these topics have been integrated into a software system that provides user-defined, repeatable calculation of ground-motion seismograms, using alternative simulation methods, and software utilities to generate tables, plots, and maps. The BBP has been developed over the last ten years as a collaborative project involving geoscientists, earthquake engineers, including graduate students, researchers and practitioners, and the SCEC research computing group.

The Broadband Platform is distributed as open-source software that can be compiled and run on recent Linux systems with GNU compilers. The BBP distribution includes seven simulation methods, ten simulation regions covering California, Japan, Central Italy, Central and Eastern North America, and the ability to compare simulation results against empirical ground motion models. Recent improvements to the BBP include the ability to simulate multi-segment ruptures using most simulation methods, and the addition of a site effects module that models site-specific non-linear response to strong ground motions. There are also significant improvements to several simulation methods, a new Vs30 goodness-of-fit plot, and the addition of two new simulation regions covering Central Italy and the Southern Walker Lane region, where the Ridgecrest 2019 earthquake sequence was located.

Key Words
Ground Motions, Simulation, High-Performance Computing

Citation
Silva, F., Maechling, P. J., Goulet, C. A., & Ben-Zion, Y. (2020, 08). The SCEC Broadband Platform: Open-Source Software for Strong Ground Motion Simulation and Validation. Poster Presentation at 2020 SCEC Annual Meeting.

Related Projects & Working Groups
Ground Motions