Modeling the economic consequences of LWR accidents

Conference · Sun Sep 09 04:00:00 EDT 1984

OSTI ID:6555562

Burke, R P; Aldrich, D C; Rasmussen, N C

Models to be used for analyses of economic risks from events which may occur during LWR plant operation are developed in this study. The models include capabilities to estimate both onsite and offsite costs of LWR events ranging from routine plant outages to severe core-melt accidents resulting in large releases of radioactive material to the environment. The models can be used by both the nuclear power industry and regulatory agencies in cost-benefit analyses for decisionmaking purposes. The newly developed economic consequence models are applied in an example to estimate the economic risks from operation of the Surry Unit 2 plant. The analyses indicate that economic risks from US LWR operation, in contrast to public health risks, are dominated by relatively high-frequency forced outage events. Even for severe (e.g., core-melt) accidents, expected offsite costs are less than expected onsite costs for the Surry site. The implications of these conclusions for nuclear power plant operation and regulation are discussed.

• Research Organization: Sandia National Labs., Albuquerque, NM (USA); Massachusetts Inst. of Tech., Cambridge (USA)
• DOE Contract Number: AC04-76DP00789
• OSTI ID: 6555562
• Report Number(s): SAND-84-0056C; CONF-840914-9; ON: DE84016786
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

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