Methodology of probabilistic safety assessment for transportation of radioactive material

Abstract The paper is focused on how to apply the Probabilistic Safety Assessment (PSA) methodology to assess the nuclear safety risks associated with the transportation of radioactive material. The methodology is comprehensive and covers the different mode of transports (for example, by road, by train, by ship and by air) used for the transportation of radioactive material. This methodology can be applied to any specific mode of transportation of radioactive material as well as to any specific country. The systematic assessment starts with identification of risk associated with transportation mode and its initiating events to analyze what can go wrong in transportation of radioactive material and how likely it can be. The accident involving the radioactive material has sensitive information and this information is not publicly available, therefore the generic accident data can be utilized to develop the probabilistic models and quantify the risk associated with radioactive material transportation. Another fact is the transportation of radioactive material accidents are extremely rare, consequently the associated statistics are insufficient for the development of PSA models. The lack of statistical data induced the need to use the generic accident data for predicting accident frequency estimations. The paper explores the feasibility of using probabilistic methods to assess the safety risks associated with radioactive material transport. The paper describes how to perform the comprehensive probabilistic assessment and creating a generic accident event tree that is based on road traffic accident data. The focus of the event tree is to outline a range of different traffic accident scenarios and their respective probability of occurrence and its consequences.