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Beyond our imagination: Fukushima and the problem of assessing risk
Beyond our imagination: Fukushima and the problem of assessing riskBY M. V. RAMANA | 19 APRIL 2011
Article Highlights
- Severe accidents at nuclear reactors have occurred much more frequently than what risk-assessment models predicted.
- The probabilistic risk assessment method does a poor job of anticipating accidents in which a single event, such as a tsunami, causes failures in multiple safety systems.
- Catastrophic nuclear accidents are inevitable, because designers and risk modelers cannot envision all possible ways in which complex systems can fail.
http://thebulletin.org/web-edition/features/beyond-our-imagination-fukushima-and-the-problem-of-assessing-risk
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Beyond our imagination: Fukushima and the problem of assessing risk (Original Post)
kristopher
May 2012
OP
exboyfil
(17,865 posts)1. My jaw hits the floor by the fact
that liability is limited by law on reactors in the U.S. Anticipated liability is one way that future risk is priced (though imperfectly). Any artificial cap on it is a distortion of the market, and most free marketers are also pro-nuclear. Interesting contradiction.
DCKit
(18,541 posts)3. They don't care because they know the costs will be bourne by society.
Privatize the profits, socialize the risk. It's a cross-industry business model.
bananas
(27,509 posts)2. Good article. nt
kristopher
(29,798 posts)4. I thought so too.