The load carrying capacity (hereafter capacity, for convenience) of dapped-end beams may be insufficient for reasons such as design errors, code changes, increases in loads, or structural damage. One option to increase the capacity of the dapped-end regions is to use fiber-reinforced polymers (FRP) using the externally bonded reinforcement (EBR) technique. FRPs are viable solutions for strengthening or retrofitting reinforced concrete (RC) elements, and several guidelines for strengthening RC structures with FRPs have been published recently [10-12]. However, these guidelines do not refer specifically to FRP strengthening of dapped-end beams, partly because the variations in geometry, material and loading conditions at their dapped ends hinder the establishment of clear criteria for robustly classified strengthening configurations.In a series of tests, Huang and Nanni [13] verified that FRPs can increase the capacity of dapped-end beams with "mild steel and no mild reinforcement" [13], and proposed a method for strengthening dapped-end beams with FRPs that was found to be "satisfactory and conservative" [13]. They too showed that dapped-end reinforcement

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The paper presents significant aspects regarding the concept and details of constructive solutions used to design and implement an energy efficient school building in Romania. Although the site is in a moderate seismic zone, the structural needs of the building impose specific insulation solutions for making the passive house concept applicable. Renewable energy sources are also applied to optimize the maintenance cost and to reduce the payback period to a feasible level. In order to prove the benefits of the solutions, to justify the higher initial investment, to improve the real-time energy consumption of the building, as well as to keep track of the internal climate parameters, a complex monitoring system was planned and implemented. Details and correlation between specific details and temperature sensors distribution are also presented.

The paper presents the results of experimental investigations and numerical analyses performed on reinforced concrete flat slabs. Two tests were carried out on two flat slab specimens designed without specific shear reinforcement. The present paper deals only with the experimental behaviour and numerical modelling of such slabs, this representing the initial part of a larger study which aims to evaluate the shear capacity of such deficient slabs resulted from faulty design or execution and to identify viable and efficient strengthening solutions. ATENA finite element software package was used to numerically model the behaviour of the specimens. A very good agreement was achieved between the results of experimental investigations and numerical modelling with deviations of 0.2% in terms of maximum load carrying capacity and of 7% in terms of corresponding displacement. The specimens were able to carry loads of more than 950kN, larger than those evaluated using designated Eurocodes, displaying a safety factor of 2.72.

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