Anti-Seismic Retrofitting Techniques for Vernacular Adobe Buildings in Colombia: A Proposed Framework for Developing and Assessing Sustainable and Appropriate Interventions

Although globally used as construction material in earthquake zones, adobes’ low tensile and flexural strength produce brittle behavior and low ductility of structures under seismic loads. Adobe buildings are widespread in Colombian rural and urban areas: as monumental buildings or informal housing, they represents an immeasurable architectural and cultural heritage. Albeit high Colombian seismic risk, national building regulations do not include earthen architecture references. The paper analyzes the most frequent seismic subsidence mechanisms of earthen architecture, adobe building retrofitting and its seismic behavior improvement via specific interventions. The main goal is to associate possible causes—due to common local adobe building practices—with failure mechanisms, to deduce which retrofitting strategies could reduce seismic effects into adobe structures. The research innovation lies in the effec- tiveness and feasibility evaluation of the retrofitting strategies through “sustainability” indicators, based on literature quantitative and qualitative data, and strictly related to rural Colombian conditions.