A Simplified Risk Analyses Method and an Electric Systems Solution to Reliability and Continuity of Vital Service Problems in Critical Service Facilities: A Brief Overview of the Work Before the ASCE/AEI C2P Committee

The unconventional attack on the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Office Building in Oklahoma City, and the assaults and collapse of New York City's World Trade Center Towers have shifted the legislative and regulatory spotlight on Codes and Standards as one element of an integrated protection policy. In his testimony to Congress, the Director of the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) identified the need to "take aggressive remedial action to minimize future losses" of critical infrastructure facilities and systems, and for the private sector to "strengthen building codes and standards" as a means of fulfilling internal security objectives. Critical infrastructure systems as defined by the President's Critical Infrastructure Assessment Office (CIAO) are systems "whose incapacity or destruction would have a debilitating impact on the defense or economic security of the nation." The CIAO identifies vital services as: (1) Telecommunications. (2) Electric Power Systems. (3) Gas and Oil. (4) Banking and Finance. (5) Transportation. (6) Water Supply Systems. (7) Government Services and Emergency Systems. (8) Agriculture. (9) National Icons and Monuments. This state-of-affairs requires a new breed of codes and standards that compels Standards Development Organizations (SDOs) to undertake what may be their most challenging tasking for their standards development processes and standards. A new class of "Defensive Codes and Standards" (DCS) is required that maximizes reliability and continuity of vital services in extraordinary circumstances, while at the same time attempting to satisfy practicable economic objectives: traditionally, these two objectives have been mutually exclusive. The suppositions used in Defensive Code and Standards (DCS) development include scenarios where whole sections of buildings are suddenly damaged or obliterated through attacks that involve sustained and intense fire and explosion, loss of utilities and communications, loss of fire suppression systems, loss of access and escape routes and prolonged inaccessibility to emergency support services, and the introduction of chemical, biological and nuclear contaminants.