Analytical propagation of uncertainties through fault trees

A method is presented which enables one to propagate uncertainties described by uniform probability density functions through fault trees. The approach is analytical. It is based on calculating the expected value and the variance of the top event probability. These two parameters are then equated with the corresponding ones of a beta-distribution. An example calculation comparing the analytically calculated beta-pdf (probability density function) with the top event pdf obtained using the Monte-Carlo method shows excellent agreement at a much lower expense of computing time.