At the heart of a fire risk assessment is a simple relationship — risk is the product of how likely an event is and how severe its consequences are. A performance-based design then demonstrates that a proposed design meets defined objectives (life safety, property protection, continuity) for a set of design fire scenarios. The exam expects you to know the steps of the process, not just the definition.

The textbook shows how to structure that analysis, pick defensible design fires, and avoid the traps NCEES builds into these questions.