ISO 19706:2011 is intended to serve as general guidelines for the assessment of the fire threat to people. ISO 19706:2011 encompasses the development, evaluation and use of relevant quantitative information for use in fire hazard and risk assessment. This information, generally obtained from fire-incidence investigation, fire statistics, real-scale fire tests and from physical fire models, is intended for use in conjunction with computational models for analysis of the initiation and development of fire, fire spread, smoke formation and movement, chemical species generation, transport and decay, and people movement, as well as fire detection and suppression [ISO/TR 13387 (all parts)]. Aspects of the methodology described in this ISO 19706:2011 are further amplified in ISO 13571 and ISO 13344.

ISO 19706:2011 is intended to facilitate addressing the consequences of a single, acute human exposure to fire effluent. ISO 19706:2011 does not address other effects of the heat, gases and aerosols, such as effects on electronic equipment and effects of frequent, multiple environmental exposures of people, which are of importance in fire safety design.