Decision support tool on investments in life safety based on sampling theory. Issue 8 (2nd August 2016)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Van Coile, Ruben; Caspeele, Robby; Taerwe, Luc
• Is Part Of: Structure and infrastructure engineering. Volume 12:Issue 8(2016)
• Page Start: 861
• Page End: 873
• Publication Date: 2016-08-02
• Subjects: Decision-making -- Life safety -- Cost optimisation -- Structural reliability -- Reinforced concrete -- Fire; Structural analysis (Engineering) -- Periodicals; Structural engineering -- Periodicals; Buildings -- Performance -- Periodicals; 620.005
• DOI: 10.1080/15732479.2015.1052981
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1573-2479

Abstract

Abstract: For decisions related to investments in societal safety and health, it is often difficult to balance the discretionary competence of decision-makers with theoretical optimum levels of investment. While removing day-to-day decisions about risk from the political arena would arguably result in better decisions, a full depoliticisation is not desirable since public and private risk preferences cannot simply be neglected without negatively affecting the perception of risk and inducing a democratic deficit. Therefore, a decision-making tool has been developed which allows for narrowing the scope of possible decisions for the decision-maker, based on predetermined maximum acceptable deviations from the theoretic optimum investment level. These maximum acceptable deviations should be established upfront on a general basis and may subsequently be applied on a case-by-case basis. In this paper, the basic calculation concepts are explained and a detailed example study is presented in which limits for the target safety level of concrete slabs are determined under some specific considerations.