Probabilistic risk assessment in nuclear reactors: Engineering success, public relations failure

Technology and Culture

Volumn 38, Issue 4, 1997, Pages 920-940

  Carlisle, Rodney P ^a  

^a RUTGERS UNIVERSITY   (United States)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 0031327257     PISSN: 0040165X     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.2307/3106954     Document Type: Article

References (55)

1. In Europe, the same techniques came to be called probabilistic safety analysis, or PSA.
2. On Lawrence's use of physics graduate students as technicians see J. L. Heilbron and Robert W. Seidel, Lawrence and His Laboratory: A History of the Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory, vol. 1 (Berkeley, 1989); see also Corbin Allardice, "The First Atomic Pile," Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists 18 (1962).
3. On Lawrence's use of physics graduate students as technicians see J. L. Heilbron and Robert W. Seidel, Lawrence and His Laboratory: A History of the Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory, vol. 1 (Berkeley, 1989); see also Corbin Allardice, "The First Atomic Pile," Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists 18 (1962).
4. Alvin Weinberg, The First Nuclear Era: The Life and Times of a Technological Fixer (New York, 1994), reflects on both the richness of the education at Chicago and the hostility of some of the physicists, especially Eugene Wigner, to the men from industry.
5. On the development of the field of chemical engineering, see Terry S. Reynolds, Seventy-Five Years of Progress: A History of the American Institute of Chemical Engineers (New York, 1983).
6. The early interrelationship between physics and electrical engineering is suggested in Robert Rosenberg, "American Physics and the Origins of Electrical Engineering," Physics Today 36 (1983). For the influence of Rickover on the field of nuclear engineering, see Theodore Rockwell, The Rickover Effect: How One Man Made a Difference (Annapolis, 1992).
7. The early interrelationship between physics and electrical engineering is suggested in Robert Rosenberg, "American Physics and the Origins of Electrical Engineering," Physics Today 36 (1983). For the influence of Rickover on the field of nuclear engineering, see Theodore Rockwell, The Rickover Effect: How One Man Made a Difference (Annapolis, 1992).
8. A. Michael McMahon, The Making of a Profession: A Century of Electrical Engineering in America (New York, 1984).
9. David Hounshell and John Kenley Smith, Science and Corporate Strategy: Du Pont R&D, 1902-1980 (New York, 1988).
10. For Wigner's view of Greenewalt and Du Pont, see Weinberg, The First Nuclear Era, pp. 27-31.
11. Ibid. Richard Rhodes considers the contrasting styles of innovation between engineering and physics in regard to the process tube question in The Making of the Atomic Bomb (New York, 1986), p. 559.
12. Ibid. Richard Rhodes considers the contrasting styles of innovation between engineering and physics in regard to the process tube question in The Making of the Atomic Bomb (New York, 1986), p. 559.
13. Brinn to file. 3 July 1953 [DPW-53-977], Hagley Accession 1957, Ser. 4, Box 46, Hagley Museum and Archives, Wilmington, Delaware.
14. Ernst Frankel, Systems Reliability and Risk Analysis (The Hague, 1984), p. 1. Frankel cited, among others: R. Von Mises, Probability, Statistics, and Truth (New York, 1957); E. Parzen, Modern Probability Theory and Its Applications (New York, 1960); I. Bazovsky, Reliability Theory and Practices (Englewood Cliffs, N.J., 1961).
15. Ernst Frankel, Systems Reliability and Risk Analysis (The Hague, 1984), p. 1. Frankel cited, among others: R. Von Mises, Probability, Statistics, and Truth (New York, 1957); E. Parzen, Modern Probability Theory and Its Applications (New York, 1960); I. Bazovsky, Reliability Theory and Practices (Englewood Cliffs, N.J., 1961).
16. Ernst Frankel, Systems Reliability and Risk Analysis (The Hague, 1984), p. 1. Frankel cited, among others: R. Von Mises, Probability, Statistics, and Truth (New York, 1957); E. Parzen, Modern Probability Theory and Its Applications (New York, 1960); I. Bazovsky, Reliability Theory and Practices (Englewood Cliffs, N.J., 1961).
17. Ernst Frankel, Systems Reliability and Risk Analysis (The Hague, 1984), p. 1. Frankel cited, among others: R. Von Mises, Probability, Statistics, and Truth (New York, 1957); E. Parzen, Modern Probability Theory and Its Applications (New York, 1960); I. Bazovsky, Reliability Theory and Practices (Englewood Cliffs, N.J., 1961).
18. On the gradual increase in use of probabilism in a variety of fields, see Ian Hacking, "Was There a Probabilistic Revolution, 1800-1930?" in The Probabilistic Revolution, ed. Lorenz Kruger (Cambridge, 1987), pp. 45-55.
19. Hacking and others in this collection suggest that the advent of probabilism should be viewed as a case of scientific revolution as described by Thomas Kuhn. For a history of the use of probability concepts in the development of physics, see, particularly, Stephen G. Brush, "A History of Random-Processes: Brownian Movement from Brown to Perrin," in Studies in the History of Statistics and Probability, ed. Maurice Kendall and R. L. Plackett, vol. 2 (New York, 1977), pp. 347-82 .
20. The story of the development of production reactors and their relation to the emergence of the nuclear engineering profession receives more detailed treatment in Rodney Carlisle and Joan Zenzen, Supplying the Nuclear Arsenal: American Production Reactors, 1942-1992 (Baltimore, 1996).
21. F. R. Farmer, "Reactor Safety and Siting: A Proposed Risk Criterion," Nuclear Safety 8 (1967): 539-48 (originally presented at IAEA Symposium on Containment and Siting of Nuclear Reactors, Vienna, Austria, April 1967); Chauncey Starr, "Social Benefit versus Technological Risk," Science, September 19, 1969, 1232-38. Starr's article was often cited as a leading work in the area. See James L. Adams, Flying Buttresses, Entropy, and O-Rings: The World of an Engineer (Cambridge, 1991), pp. 224-25; Susan Rafter, Risk Analysis and Risk Management: A Selected Bibliography, (Monticello, Ill., 1986), also cites Starr as seminal .
22. F. R. Farmer, "Reactor Safety and Siting: A Proposed Risk Criterion," Nuclear Safety 8 (1967): 539-48 (originally presented at IAEA Symposium on Containment and Siting of Nuclear Reactors, Vienna, Austria, April 1967); Chauncey Starr, "Social Benefit versus Technological Risk," Science, September 19, 1969, 1232-38. Starr's article was often cited as a leading work in the area. See James L. Adams, Flying Buttresses, Entropy, and O-Rings: The World of an Engineer (Cambridge, 1991), pp. 224-25; Susan Rafter, Risk Analysis and Risk Management: A Selected Bibliography, (Monticello, Ill., 1986), also cites Starr as seminal .
23. F. R. Farmer, "Reactor Safety and Siting: A Proposed Risk Criterion," Nuclear Safety 8 (1967): 539-48 (originally presented at IAEA Symposium on Containment and Siting of Nuclear Reactors, Vienna, Austria, April 1967); Chauncey Starr, "Social Benefit versus Technological Risk," Science, September 19, 1969, 1232-38. Starr's article was often cited as a leading work in the area. See James L. Adams, Flying Buttresses, Entropy, and O-Rings: The World of an Engineer (Cambridge, 1991), pp. 224-25; Susan Rafter, Risk Analysis and Risk Management: A Selected Bibliography, (Monticello, Ill., 1986), also cites Starr as seminal .
24. F. R. Farmer, "Reactor Safety and Siting: A Proposed Risk Criterion," Nuclear Safety 8 (1967): 539-48 (originally presented at IAEA Symposium on Containment and Siting of Nuclear Reactors, Vienna, Austria, April 1967); Chauncey Starr, "Social Benefit versus Technological Risk," Science, September 19, 1969, 1232-38. Starr's article was often cited as a leading work in the area. See James L. Adams, Flying Buttresses, Entropy, and O-Rings: The World of an Engineer (Cambridge, 1991), pp. 224-25; Susan Rafter, Risk Analysis and Risk Management: A Selected Bibliography, (Monticello, Ill., 1986), also cites Starr as seminal .
25. On the development of technological knowledge, see Edwin T. Layton, "Technology as Knowledge," Technology and Culture, 15 (1974): 31-41. R. E. Hollingsworth toJ. T. Ramey, 12 July 1961, JCAE General Correspondence, Box 652, Folder Savannah River Plant, RG 128, National Archives. Du Pont safety philosophy was detailed in a lengthy speech by A. A. Johnson, "Post Start-Up Reactor Safety," originally presented to the IAEA May 1962; Hagley Accession 1957, Box 6. The full organizational structure is presented in "Nuclear Safety Control Procedures for the Savannah River Reactors," 10 May 1976 [DPW-75-123, pt. 1], Hagley Accession 1957, Box 6.
26. For a full description of the place of containment in the range of safety features, see J. Samuel Walker, Containing the Atom: Nuclear Regulation in a Changing Environment, 1963-1971 (Berkeley, 1992), pp. 139-43.
27. Code of Federal Regulations, Title 10, Parts 20 and 100 (1987).
28. F. B. Baranowski to R. E. Hollingsworth, "Report on Hazards of Production Reactors," 26 May 1965, Hagley Accession 1957, Box 63; M. C. Leverett and R. E. Trumble, "Establishment of Reliability of Important Reactor Safety Systems," 2 July 1964 [HW-83123], Hanford Records Holding Area, Box 9920, MH&S 16-4, Reactor Safeguards (July-December 1964), p. 5. On Douglas United Nuclear see Minutes, 97th Meeting of the AEC General Advisory Committee (GAC), 12-14 July 1966, DOE Archives, Secretariat Collection, Box 8008, Folder GAC minutes, RG 326, National Archives.
29. F. B. Baranowski to R. E. Hollingsworth, "Report on Hazards of Production Reactors," 26 May 1965, Hagley Accession 1957, Box 63; M. C. Leverett and R. E. Trumble, "Establishment of Reliability of Important Reactor Safety Systems," 2 July 1964 [HW-83123], Hanford Records Holding Area, Box 9920, MH&S 16-4, Reactor Safeguards (July-December 1964), p. 5. On Douglas United Nuclear see Minutes, 97th Meeting of the AEC General Advisory Committee (GAC), 12-14 July 1966, DOE Archives, Secretariat Collection, Box 8008, Folder GAC minutes, RG 326, National Archives.
30. F. B. Baranowski to R. E. Hollingsworth, "Report on Hazards of Production Reactors," 26 May 1965, Hagley Accession 1957, Box 63; M. C. Leverett and R. E. Trumble, "Establishment of Reliability of Important Reactor Safety Systems," 2 July 1964 [HW-83123], Hanford Records Holding Area, Box 9920, MH&S 16-4, Reactor Safeguards (July-December 1964), p. 5. On Douglas United Nuclear see Minutes, 97th Meeting of the AEC General Advisory Committee (GAC), 12-14 July 1966, DOE Archives, Secretariat Collection, Box 8008, Folder GAC minutes, RG 326, National Archives.
31. Remarks by C. Rogers McCullogh, A Forum Report, Proceedings of the Atomic Industrial Forum, 1963, p. 326; copy in Hagley Accession 1957, Box 9. Clearly, industrialists trusted the experts in the 1960s more than did environmental advocates. Such patterns of opinion-clustering in the 1980s and 1990s have been noted and confirmed in rigorous statistical studies through polling techniques and can be identified retrospectively for the 1960s in the more impressionistic fashion suggested here. A number of close studies of risk perceptions by various groups and the communication of risk to the public have been produced by a group at the Environmental Communication Research Program of Cook College, Rutgers University. See, for example, Peter M. Sandman et al., What Does the Public Need to Know about Environmental Risk and How Should the Public Be Told? (Newark, 1990).
32. Remarks by C. Rogers McCullogh, A Forum Report, Proceedings of the Atomic Industrial Forum, 1963, p. 326; copy in Hagley Accession 1957, Box 9. Clearly, industrialists trusted the experts in the 1960s more than did environmental advocates. Such patterns of opinion-clustering in the 1980s and 1990s have been noted and confirmed in rigorous statistical studies through polling techniques and can be identified retrospectively for the 1960s in the more impressionistic fashion suggested here. A number of close studies of risk perceptions by various groups and the communication of risk to the public have been produced by a group at the Environmental Communication Research Program of Cook College, Rutgers University. See, for example, Peter M. Sandman et al., What Does the Public Need to Know about Environmental Risk and How Should the Public Be Told? (Newark, 1990).
33. Price-Anderson Act of 1957, United States Statutes at Large 71 (1957): 576. The 1987 act raised the liability from $500 million to $6 billion in constant dollars. The passage of the original act is discussed in George Mazuzan and J. Samuel Walker, Controlling the Atom: The Beginnings of Nuclear Regulation, 1946-1962 (Berkeley, 1984), pp. 93-121.
34. Price-Anderson Act of 1957, United States Statutes at Large 71 (1957): 576. The 1987 act raised the liability from $500 million to $6 billion in constant dollars. The passage of the original act is discussed in George Mazuzan and J. Samuel Walker, Controlling the Atom: The Beginnings of Nuclear Regulation, 1946-1962 (Berkeley, 1984), pp. 93-121.
35. Walker, Containing the Atom, pp. 144-51.
36. R. J. Mulvihill et al., A Probabilistic Methodology for the Safety Analysis of Nuclear Power Reactors, 2 vols. (Los Angeles, 1966). The study was noted in Ralph R. Fullwood and Robert E. Hall, Probabilistic Risk Assessment in the Nuclear Power Industry: Fundamentals and Applications (Oxford, 1988), p. 4. Fullwood and Hall did not note the inverse "success-rate" rather than failure-rate approach adopted in the Mulvihill study. The suppression of the Mulvihill study and other reports incorporating such research generated an extensive controversy in the press. See Walker, Containing the Atom, pp. 124-30.
37. R. J. Mulvihill et al., A Probabilistic Methodology for the Safety Analysis of Nuclear Power Reactors, 2 vols. (Los Angeles, 1966). The study was noted in Ralph R. Fullwood and Robert E. Hall, Probabilistic Risk Assessment in the Nuclear Power Industry: Fundamentals and Applications (Oxford, 1988), p. 4. Fullwood and Hall did not note the inverse "success-rate" rather than failure-rate approach adopted in the Mulvihill study. The suppression of the Mulvihill study and other reports incorporating such research generated an extensive controversy in the press. See Walker, Containing the Atom, pp. 124-30.
38. R. J. Mulvihill et al., A Probabilistic Methodology for the Safety Analysis of Nuclear Power Reactors, 2 vols. (Los Angeles, 1966). The study was noted in Ralph R. Fullwood and Robert E. Hall, Probabilistic Risk Assessment in the Nuclear Power Industry: Fundamentals and Applications (Oxford, 1988), p. 4. Fullwood and Hall did not note the inverse "success-rate" rather than failure-rate approach adopted in the Mulvihill study. The suppression of the Mulvihill study and other reports incorporating such research generated an extensive controversy in the press. See Walker, Containing the Atom, pp. 124-30.
39. U.S. Atomic Energy Commission, Reactor Safety Study (Rasmussen Report) (Washington, D.C., 1974). The final draft was published by the Nuclear Regulatoiy Commission (NRC) as NUREG-75 014 in 1975. "NUREG" was (and still is) used as a report designation by the NRC. Since those reports, which are available in NRC reading rooms around the country, are most easily retrieved under the NUREG number, I have used that designation throughout this article. The NUREG numbering system itself contains some inconsistencies, which are reflected here.
40. Rasmussen Report, p. 2.
41. -3: NUREG 1050.
42. For the concept of reactors as weapons surrogates, see Spencer Weart, Nuclear Fear: A History of Images (Cambridge, 1988).
43. Daniel F. Ford, A History of Federal Nuclear Safety Assessments: from WASH 740 through the Reactor Safety Study (Washington, D.C., 1977).
44. Malcolm Ernst, "Task Force Report: Study of the Reactor Licensing Process," cited in Ford, pp. 41-43.
45. Reviews and comments appeared in congressional hearings: U.S. Congress, House Committee on Interior and Insular Affairs, Subcommittee on Energy and the Environment, Observations on the Reactor Safety Study, 95th Cong., 1st sess., 1977. NUREG 1420 indicated that as a result of these reviews, "The staff of the NRC was directed to avoid using [the Rasmussen Report] or its methodology in regulatory applications." U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Office of Nuclear Regulatory Research, Special Committee Review of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission's Severe Accident Risks Report (NUREG-1150), NUREG-1420 (Washington, D.C., 1990), p. 2.
46. Code of Federal Regulations, Title 10, chap. 1, pt. 50.34, sbpt. F, 1 January 1987 edition. The requirements spurred by Three Mile Island were replicated in later editions of this title of the CFR, although the particular license applications pending in 1982 to which the clause applied were canceled.
47. B. W. Sheron and T. P. Speis, "Small Break LOCA Mitigation - A New Licensing Perspective" (paper presented to the Specialists Meeting on Small Break Loss of Coolant Accident Analyses in LWRs, 25-27 August 1981, Monterey, California), cited in Guidebook to Light Water Reactor Safety Analysis, ed. P. B. Abramson (Berlin, 1985), pp. 18-19.
48. B. W. Sheron and T. P. Speis, "Small Break LOCA Mitigation - A New Licensing Perspective" (paper presented to the Specialists Meeting on Small Break Loss of Coolant Accident Analyses in LWRs, 25-27 August 1981, Monterey, California), cited in Guidebook to Light Water Reactor Safety Analysis, ed. P. B. Abramson (Berlin, 1985), pp. 18-19.
49. "Measuring Nuclear Risks - An Interview with Norman Rasmussen," The Center Magazine, May-June 1981, pp. 15-21.
50. U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Office of Nuclear Regulatory Research, Severe Accident Risks: An Assessment for Five Nuclear Power Plants, NUREG-1150 (Washington, D.C., 1987), pp. ES 1-10.
51. Ibid., p. ES 10.
52. Abramson, pp. 5-7.
53. The emergence of institutional apparatus in the form of professional societies is central to the study of scientific revolutions. Ian Hacking (n. 11 above), p. 49: "Don't look for a big revolution until you find new kinds of institutions that epitomize the new directions created by the revolution." Meetings of SMiRT and their transactions represented the sort of institution to which Hacking referred. The course materials at Sandia were published by the NRC as NUREG/CR4350, Probabilistic Risk Assessment Course Documentation, 7 vols., August 1985. See also James L. von Herrmann et al., "The Practical Application of PRA: An Evaluation of Utility Experience and USNRC Perspectives," Reliability Engineering and System Safety 24 (1989): 167-98.
54. For the impact of the Chernobyl disaster on the U.S. production reactor program, see Carlisle and Zenzen (n. 12 above), pp. 188-90.
55. The listing of pros and cons was developed by the author through discussions with ONPR staff in 1990 and 1991.