Current practices in risk assessment and management for industrial systems are characterized by its methodical diversity and fragmented approaches. In retrospect these risk and safety paradigms resulted from diverse industries driven and limited by available knowledge and technologies. A change based on industry driven R&D work is needed. At present the European Industry recognised their obligation to reconsider risk and safety policies, having a more competitive industry and more risk informed and innovation accepting society in vision. Therefore the large collaborative project IRIS is proposed to identify, quantify and mitigate existing and emerging risks to create societal cost-benefits, to increase industrial safety and to reduce impact on human health and environment.