Risk Management Approaches

Abstract

The EVERSAFE project has the challenge to identify potential safety issues for vehicles which have had limited commercial sales, and thereby, limited field data to document safety and reliability issues in terms of event details and frequency. ISO 26262 isa new branch specific standard for functional safety of automotive electrical/ electronic/ programmable electronic (E/E/PE) systems carrying out a safety function. The standard aims to identify the potential hazards caused by malfunctions of E/E/PE systems, to assess their risks and to reduce the risks demonstrably to an acceptable level by taking the appropriate countermeasures. As safety investigations are part of EVERSAFE project, ISO 26262 is a relevant approach for this project. In addition, the determination of risks that must be further reduced is covered by the safety life cycle of ISO 26262, independent of their reduction by E/E/PE safety functions or not. The EVERSAFE project is planning a workshop to identify the main safety risks that should be addressed in the project. The main goal of this report is to review the ISO 26262 and to identify the safety life cycle phases that are covered by project activities for active safety investigation of EVERSAFE. This framework will be a basis for the workshop. Of particular relevance is the Automotive Safety Integrity Level (ASIL) system that provides a system for identifying the hazards, their exposure (expected frequency) to the vehicle occupants, controllability by the driver, and the resulting severity. For this purpose, the scope, structure and content of ISO 26262 are described in detail. In particular, safety life cycle phases, their requirements and analysis methods to fulfil them are presented.