Fault Tree Usage
Fault trees are generally used to identify system reliability or safety issues at design time. They are also frequently used to assess system reliability or safety during system operation. Fault trees are also used to:
• Verify product requirements and/or certify product reliability.
• Evaluate design changes
• Enhance understanding of the system
• Display the causes and consequences of events
• Identify system-critical components
• Identify the effects of common cause failures (CCFs)
• Identify root causes of equipment failure
• Provide qualitative and/or quantitative insight into the probability of occurrence of a particular, usually undesirable, event
• Identify components that may need testing or more rigorous quality assurance scrutiny
• Identify resources committed to preventing failure
• Evaluate the effectiveness of and need for redundancy
• Identify how to deploy resources to minimize risk
• Assess product risk
• Provide documentation of analytical results
• Investigate accidents or incidents