Construction site risk analysis based on Shannon entropy: a case study application

This paper provides a method based on information theory for risk analysis and evaluation. A basic method to construction site risk evaluation by Shannon entropy is used. Safety and technical risk of the building construction process has been calculated by Shannon’s entropy which provides information of the system, of various kinds under uncertainties. The method has been applied to a case study in Florence (Italy) and results have been compared to those obtained by the application of the commonly used management and assessment methods (FMEA/FMECA). The information theory application using risk entropy, to macro and micro-phases of the studied process, that concern the actions and factors (the corresponding risk elements defined by FMEA/FMECA), is used to identify and quantify the potential risks and critical levels of each working process conditions for each different project phase. The validity of the proposed method is justified by the correspondence between results for two alternative project solutions. This proposed method is useful to evaluate different alternative measures for finding less damage and hazards at designing stages to reduce and control each kind of risk. It also provides a homogeneous scale for the parameter evaluation and a rational criterion for linking and integrating the risk evaluation factors.