Publications Details

Application of spreadsheets to standardize transportation radiological risk assessments

Mcclure, J.D.

Because of the complexity, volume of data and calculations required, one preferred analytical tool to perform transportation risk assessments is the RADTRAN computer code. RADTRAN combines user-determined material, packaging, transportation, demographic and meteorological factors, with health physics data to calculate expected radiological consequences and accident risk from transporting radioactive materials by all commercial modes including truck, rail, ship, air and barge. The computer code consists of two major modules for each transport mode: the incident-free module, in which doses from normal transport are calculated; and the accident module, in which dose consequences and probabilities are evaluated to generate risk estimates. The purpose of this presentation is to describe the development of a standardized procedure to perform transportation radiological risk assessments employing conventional spreadsheet programs to automate generation of RADTRAN input files and post-processing analysis of the resulting output.