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Nuclear Energy Conference & Expo (NECX)
September 8–11, 2025
Atlanta, GA|Atlanta Marriott Marquis
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The RAIN scale: A good intention that falls short
Radiation protection specialists agree that clear communication of radiation risks remains a vexing challenge that cannot be solved solely by finding new ways to convey technical information.
Earlier this year, an article in Nuclear News described a new radiation risk communication tool, known as the Radiation Index, or, RAIN (“Let it RAIN: A new approach to radiation communication,” NN, Jan. 2025, p. 36). The authors of the article created the RAIN scale to improve radiation risk communication to the general public who are not well-versed in important aspects of radiation exposures, including radiation dose quantities, units, and values; associated health consequences; and the benefits derived from radiation exposures.
Risto S. Andsten, Jussi K. Vaurio
Nuclear Technology | Volume 98 | Number 2 | May 1992 | Pages 160-170
Technical Paper | Nuclear Reactor Safety | doi.org/10.13182/NT92-A34671
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
A number of supplementary studies and applications associated with probabilistic safety assessment (PSA) are described, including sensitivity and importance evaluations of failures, errors, systems, and groups of components. The main purpose is to illustrate the usefulness of a PSA for making decisions about safety improvements, training, allowed outage times, and test intervals. A useful measure of uncertainty importance is presented, and it points out areas needing development, such as reactor vessel aging phenomena, for reducing overall uncertainty. A time-dependent core damage frequency is also presented, illustrating the impact of testing scenarios and intervals. The methods and applications presented are based on the Level 1 PSA carried out for the internal initiating events of the Loviisa 1 nuclear power station. Steam generator leakages and associated operator actions are major contributors to the current core-damage frequency estimate of 2 × 10-4/yr. The results are used to improve the plant and procedures and to guide future improvements.