The Society of Fire Protection Engineers has announced the release of a new engineering guide: SFPE Guide to Fire Risk Assessment, 2^nd edition.

The new edition of the guide provides guidance to qualified practitioners in developing, selecting, and using fire risk assessment methodologies for the design, construction, and operation of buildings, facilities, or processes.

The guide also addresses fire risk acceptability, the role of fire risk assessment and fire risk management in the fire safety design process, and associated communication/monitoring of fire risk. The guide includes a new flow chart that outlines the risk-assessment process, along with new information related to: risk perception, F-N curves, risk communication, residual risk management, risk monitoring and sensitivity analysis

Chris Jelenewicz, PE, FSFPE, Chief Engineer, Society of Fire Protection Engineers, commented: “Understanding the topic of fire risk assessment is essential to gaining insight into and characterizing fire-related risks to better inform the wide range of decisions that should be made concerning a building, facility, or process as part of the design, construction, or operation.

“As a result, implementing a fire risk assessment can lead to a safer, more efficient, and more cost-effective design — especially for fire engineers implementing a performance-based strategy, as it explicitly ad­dresses unique aspects or uses.”

The 160-page guide is available in various formats from SFPE. Institutional licensing options are available to academic, government, and corporate entities from SFPE.