Abstract
Probabilistic risk analysis has been evolving as a scientific discipline quite rapidly over the last 15 years. The major reason for this growth has been the explicit recognition of the need for a consistent framework for the analysis of the safety of large industrial facilities, especially nuclear power plants, which other approaches such as worst-case analyses, do not provide. It has been realized, however, that the conventional methods of statistics and reliability theory cannot be applied in a straightforward manner because of the rarity of events of interest and consequent lack of meaningful statistical records. The frequent use of judgment and the initial reporting of very low probabilities raised questions concerning the credibility of the whole approach and controversy inevitably resulted, as witnessed by the release of the United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s Reactor Safety Study (RSS) (1) and subsequent developments (2–5).
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Reference 39 also has stimulated comments from colleagues (Easterling, R. G., “Comments on the Bayesian Method for Estimating Reactor Core Melt Frequency,” Nuclear Science and Engineering, 75, Page 202, 1980). As a result of these comments, its authors have revised their prior distribution (Nuclear Science and Engineering, 75, Page 203, 1980). This is a good example of the usefulness of Bayesian methods; by being explicit and quantitative, the authors of Reference 39 have allowed others to express their disagreement also, explicitly and quantitatively.
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Apostolakis, G. (1981). Bayesian Methods in Risk Assessment. In: Lewins, J., Becker, M. (eds) Advances in Nuclear Science and Technology. Advances in Nuclear Science and Technology, vol 5. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4613-9919-3_5
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