A statistics based fire risk assessment methodology to support decisions in building life-cycle management

The digitalization process is changing the Architecture, Engineering and Construction (AEC) industry through the introduction of new methodologies such as the Building Life-cycle Management (BLM). This methodology aims to improve the information exchange among stakeholders by providing an integrated IT environment to manage the building life-cycle [1]. The current state of the art, however, focuses on deploying BLM for applications limited to the optimization of building design and construction phases. As a repository of information and a communication facilitator, the BLM digital model can support decisions in risk management, but this potential is still untapped. Fire Risk Assessment (FRA) plays an important role in performance-based fire design as it affects decisions regarding building and occupant safety. This work attempts to integrate a statistics-based FRA methodology into the BLM environment, in order to provide fire engineers and decision makers with a semi-automatic tool for the quantitative estimation of fire risk during the whole building life-cycle.