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Published on: September 10, 2018
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On the Relationship between Safety and Decision Significance.
Emanuele Borgonovo1, Alessandra Cillo2, Curtis L Smith3
1Department of Decision Sciences, Bocconi University, Milan, Italy.
Summary
This study introduces a new measure to identify critical safety components (SSCs) that influence project decisions. It ensures safety-significant systems remain important even after a project
Area of Science:
- Risk Analysis and Management
- Probabilistic Safety Assessment
- Systems Engineering
Background:
- Risk analysts identify critical safety drivers, known as systems, structures, and components (SSCs), for safety assessment.
- Current importance measures are applied in both design and implementation phases.
- A gap exists in assessing whether SSCs significantly alter project decisions during the design phase.
Purpose of the Study:
- To determine conditions where safety-significant SSCs are also decision-significant.
- To introduce and analyze a novel measure, θ-importance, for assessing SSC significance.
- To ensure consistent SSC ranking across design and implementation phases.
Main Methods:
- Development and theoretical analysis of the θ-importance measure.
- Detailed study of relationships among various risk importance measures.
- Application to a NASA-developed probabilistic safety assessment model.
Main Results:
- Identified conditions under which safety significance aligns with decision significance for SSCs.
- Established properties of importance measures that maintain SSC ranking stability.
- Demonstrated practical risk management implications through a NASA case study.
Conclusions:
- The θ-importance measure provides a robust method for evaluating SSCs in early design phases.
- Understanding the interplay between safety and decision significance enhances risk management.
- The findings are crucial for optimizing safety investments and project viability assessments.
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