Finite element modeling of the dynamic response and permanent deformations of concrete structures is the subject of this book chapter. The author describes this work as a personal view of recent advances in constitutive modeling and far-field treatment. His presentation is rather diffuse, directed at those who are well acquainted with the problems of the field. Regrettably, it is marred in various places by spelling errors and defects in sentence structure.

The first of the sections is an exposition of an isotropic plasticity model for concrete. It is pointed out that current techniques rest on the idea of an equivalent continuum to model the discontinuous local processes of crack growth, pore collapse, and sliding. This kind of approximation is used because present-day computer capacity is insufficient to deal in detail with the cracking process. Results are shown for various simulations in the form of remarkably realistic illustrations. The need for testing calculated results against experimental observation is mentioned, but very little by way of comparison is presented. Instead, there is a brief discussion of new test facilities at Sheffield University, where the author is based.

The next section describes non-linear fluid-soil structure interactions, using a scaled boundary finite element method. Specific finite element techniques are directly described. Application is made to the calculation of dynamic response soil to seismic motion by structures that are embedded in flexible soil, rather than rigid rock. Results are illustrated by photograph-like displays of wave processes over various finite element meshes. Effects are briefly discussed for the examples of a water-filled and an empty reinforced concrete tank embedded in soft elastic soil, and the modeling of an aircraft striking a nuclear containment vessel.

The last section before the authors summary surveys the development of instability indicators for finite element calculations to identify and control the causes for code crashing induced by non-convergence. The search for such indicators is ongoing, and the author suggests that measures of impending collapse may be obtained by monitoring the diagonal terms in the element stiffness matrices.