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2025 (Current Year) Faculty Courses School of Environment and Society Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering Graduate major in Urban Design and Built Environment

Fire Risk Assessment of the Built Environment

Academic unit or major
Graduate major in Urban Design and Built Environment
Instructor(s)
Keisuke Himoto
Class Format
Lecture (Face-to-face)
Media-enhanced courses
-
Day of week/Period
(Classrooms)
1-2 Tue (J2-305(J232)) / 1-2 Fri (J2-305(J232))
Class
-
Course Code
UDE.S410
Number of credits
200
Course offered
2025
Offered quarter
3Q
Syllabus updated
Oct 6, 2025
Language
English

Syllabus

Course overview and goals

This course aims to provide students with fundamental knowledge of fire safety engineering for understanding fire phenomena from a physical perspective, and the basics of probabilistic risk assessment for quantitatively evaluating the uncertainty of events. By combining these approaches, the course objectives include acquiring fundamental techniques for quantitatively assessing fire risks in buildings and urban environments.

Course description and aims

Through taking this course, students will acquire the following abilities:
1) Understand the challenges in planning fire-safe buildings and urban environments, and be able to explain necessary countermeasures.
2) Be able to explain the characteristics of fires occurring in buildings and urban environments from a physical perspective.
3) Be able to explain the hazards of fires occurring in buildings and urban environments from a risk perspective.

Keywords

Fire safety engineering, Risk assessment

Competencies

  • Specialist skills
  • Intercultural skills
  • Communication skills
  • Critical thinking skills
  • Practical and/or problem-solving skills

Class flow

The course is primarily lecture-based, supplemented with exercise assignments and report assignments.

Course schedule/Objectives

Course schedule Objectives
Class 1

Fire Incidents in Buildings and Urban Areas and the Need for Risk Assessment Implementation

Through past cases and statistics, this lecture explains fire safety challenges in buildings and urban areas and discusses the necessity of introducing risk assessment.
Class 2

Fundamentals of Fire Safety Engineering ① Combustion in Fires

This lecture explains the combustion characteristics of combustible materials and calculation methods for heat release rate, which is a basic evaluation measure of fire hazards.
Class 3

Fundamentals of Fire Safety Engineering ② Fire Plumes and Fire-Induced Flows

This lecture explains engineering calculation methods for the hazards of fire plumes and fire-induced flows.
Class 4

Fundamentals of Fire Safety Engineering ③ Compartment Fires

This lecture explains engineering calculation methods for the hazards of compartment fires.
Class 5

Fundamentals of Fire Safety Engineering ④ Structural Response

This lecture explains engineering calculation methods for material changes and structural member responses during fires.
Class 6

Fundamentals of Fire Safety Engineering ⑤ Fire Spread Between Buildings

This lecture explains engineering calculation methods for fire spread hazards between buildings.
Class 7

Fundamentals of Fire Safety Engineering ⑥ Human Behavior and Evacuation

This lecture explains human behavioral characteristics during fires and evacuation safety evaluation based on ASET/RSET.
Class 8

Fundamentals of Probabilistic Risk Assessment ① Basic Framework

This lecture organizes basic concepts of risk and explains probabilistic representation methods for external forces.
Class 9

Fundamentals of Probabilistic Risk Assessment ② Vulnerability Analysis

This lecture explains response characteristics of systems and components to external forces.
Class 10

Fundamentals of Probabilistic Risk Assessment ③ Consequence and Loss Analysis

This lecture explains quantification of objects exposed to external forces and methods for developing consequence and loss analysis.
Class 11

Fundamentals of Probabilistic Risk Assessment ④ Risk Integration and Evaluation

This lecture explains risk calculation methods based on external forces, vulnerability, and exposure, and risk curves for visualizing these results.
Class 12

Fundamentals of Probabilistic Risk Assessment ⑤ Logic Models

This lecture explains methods for examining effective risk reduction measures using logic models such as event tree analysis.
Class 13

Fire Risk Assessment Practice ① Fire Risk Assessment for Buildings

This lecture explains methods for incorporating fire risk assessment results into fire protection design of buildings.
Class 14

Fire Risk Assessment Practice ② Fire Risk Assessment for Urban Areas

This lecture explains methods for incorporating fire risk assessment results into fire protection design of urban areas.

Study advice (preparation and review)

To enhance learning outcomes, students are expected to refer to the relevant sections of textbooks and distributed materials, and allocate time for both preparation and review of the content covered in the class.

Textbook(s)

NA

Reference books, course materials, etc.

Karlsson et al: Enclosure Fire Dynamics

Evaluation methods and criteria

Grading will be based on the results of exercises assigned during the lecture.

Related courses

  • UDE.S501 ： Disaster Mitigation for Building Structures

Prerequisites

NA