A systematic procedure has been proposed to construct Petri nets for modeling the fault propagation behaviors in batch processes. In this work, a complete system model is organized according to a hierarchy of four levels, i.e. (1) the controller/operator; (2) the valves; (3) the process units; and (4) the sensors. Every component in this system model consists of two distinct elements. One is used to characterize the equipment states and the other the input-output relations. For the purpose of reducing model construction effort, the general structure of object-oriented abbreviations is also developed to represent the PN in a user-friendly format. The effectiveness and correctness of this approach have been successfully demonstrated with a number of practical examples.