Durability of reinforced concrete structures is a
deeply discussed problem recently. Concrete structures in
the external environment are very often affected by
chloride ions from de-icing salt or sea water. Chloride ions
penetrate through the concrete cover layer
of the reinforcement and can cause eventually the
corrosion of the steel. However, when estimating the
durability of the structure, it is not sometimes possible to
express the parameters by constant values; therefore, the
probabilistic methods come in handy. Then, the variability
of inputs and outputs can be expressed by histograms. Two
probabilistic approaches were applied in this task – Monte
Carlo simulation with Simulation-Based Reliability
Assessment method, which is widely used for such type of
problems, and the Direct Optimized Probabilistic
Calculation, which is still relatively new type of approach.
The result is a comparison of mentioned methods in terms
of accuracy on the model of one-dimensional chloride
penetration with time independent diffusion coefficient by
using the Fick’s Second Law of Diffusion
