A primer and success stories on performance-based fire design of structures

PurposeThe extreme nature of fire makes structural fire engineering unique in that the load actions dictating design are intense and neither geographically nor seasonally bound. Simply, fire can break out anywhere, at any time and for any number of reasons. Despite the apparent need, the fire design of structures still relies on expensive fire tests, complex finite element simulations and outdated procedures with little room for innovation. This paper aims to discuss the aforementioned issues.Design/methodology/approachThis primer highlights the latest state of the art in this area with regard to performance-based design in fire structural engineering. In addition, this short review also presents a series of examples of successful implementation of performance-based fire design of structures from around the world.FindingsA comparison between global efforts clearly shows the advances put forth by European and Oceanian efforts as opposed to the rest of the world. In addition, it can be clearly seen that most performance-based fire designs are related to steel and composite structures.Originality/valueIn one study, this paper presents a concise and global view to performance-based fire design of structures from success stories from around the world.