A Study on the Integration of Systems Engineering Process and Systems Safety Process in the Conceptual Design Stage to Improve Systems Safety

Abstract

Recently, we have witnessed the definitely negative impacts of large-scale accidents happened in such areas as atomic power plants and high-speed train systems, which result in increased fear for the potential danger. The problems appear to arise due to the deficiency in the design of large-scale complex systems. One of the causes can be attributed to the design process that does not fully reflect the safety requirements in the early stage of the system development because of the substantially increased complexity. In this paper, to enhance the systems safety an integrated process is studied, which considers simultaneously both the system design process and system safety process from the beginning of the system development. In the conceptual system design phase an integrated process model is constructed by analyzing the activities of both the system design and safety processes. As a case study example, an inner city train system is described with the application of the developed process. The computer simulation of the example case is followed by the result discussed. The results obtained in the paper are expected to be the basis for the future study where a detailed process and its associated activities can be developed.