Abstracts (PDF file, 1.8MB) - Society for Risk Analysis

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SRA 2013 Annual Meeting Abstracts W2-F.2 Paulson, G; Brennan, T*; US Environmental Protection Agency; paulson.glenn@epa.gov Developments in Scientific Peer Review at EPA The EPA has a strong tradition of scientific peer review. In fact, the agency’s Peer Review Policy notes that “Peer review of all scientific and technical information that is intended to inform or support agency decisions is encouraged and expected.” This presentation will cover the tradition of peer review at the agency as well as a few of the recent developments on peer review activities. First, the historical context for the importance and practice of peer review at the agency as summarized in the EPA Peer Review Handbook will be presented. The Agency is currently in the process of revising the 2006 third edition of the Handbook. One area of focus for this revision is options to increase agency oversight of implementation of the peer review policy. In addition, in May of 2013, EPA’s Acting Administrator announced a new process for peer reviews conducted by panels of experts selected and managed by EPA contractors. Much of the new process focuses on opportunities for public engagement on the peer review process and conflict of interest procedures for these contractor-led reviews. Finally, the Science Advisory Board’s (SAB) process of peer review will be summarized, from panel selection, to access to meeting materials, to new efforts by the SAB Staff Office to enhance public transparency of the work of the SAB. P.51 Pawlisz, AV; Conestoga-Rovers& Associates; apawlisz@craworld.com Hydraulic Fracturing Failure Rates – Key to Understanding Actual Risks Extraction of natural gas deposits via hydraulic fracturing (fracking) has grown at an unprecedented rate in the United States and worldwide. For various reasons, this method of natural resource retrieval has met considerable opposition from the regulatory community and the public. One of the sensitive issues is the potential for adverse impacts to the environment and human health, particularly relative to groundwater extraction, drinking water pollution, deep chemical injection, well failures, blow outs, on-site spills, air emissions, transport accidents, and noise. This presentation compiles the most recent data on various incident/accident/spill/release rates published by the industry, government agencies, and open literature. Failure data are used to conduct a predictive risk assessment where the calculated odds ratios are compared to those for conventional hydrocarbon extraction methods. The overall objective is to provide an insight on how fracking compares to other drilling and oil/gas operations in terms of the potential for overall environmental impacts. M4-A.5 Perez, V*; Garry, MR; Alexander, DD; Tsuji, JS; Exponent; vperez@exponent.com Noncancer risk assessment of epidemiological studies of arsenic and cardiovascular disease The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is currently revising their 1988 noncancer and cancer risk assessments for inorganic arsenic. Cardiovascular disease (CVD) is an endpoint with considerable recent studies supporting derivation of a non-cancer reference dose (RfD) for arsenic. We conducted a systematic review of the epidemiologic literature through March 2013 for scientific evidence that may support an RfD specific to CVD. Eleven cohort and case-control studies (Taiwan, Bangladesh, and China) assessing the effect of water arsenic at levels
SRA 2013 Annual Meeting Abstracts P.127 Phillips, JK*; Anderson, JK; TRC Solutions; US Air Force; JKPhillips@trcsolutions.com Challenges Associated with Practical Environmental Restoration Risk Assessment and Management Decisions for Perfluoroalkyl Substances (PFASs) Perfluoroalkyl substances (PFASs) are environmental emerging contaminants with widespread applications in industry. PFASs do not have federal cleanup standards; however, some PFASs are environmentally persistent, bioaccumulate in living organisms, and have demonstrated toxicity in laboratory animals. Thus, despite the lack of federal regulations, it may be prudent to assess and potentially mitigate human and/or environmental exposures. A risk management decision process for the management of emerging contaminants such as PFASs at restoration sites is outlined. The identification of PFASs can significantly impact site objectives, schedule, cost and ongoing remedial activities, particularly without clear regulatory criteria. PFASs present unique challenges including identifying potential sources related to PFAS release, and characterizing PFAS contaminated groundwater and/or soil. EPA’s Office of Water is conducting reanalysis of PFAS toxicity information to revise their 2009 subchronic Provisional Health Advisories (PHAs). PHAs are non-enforceable guidelines that may or may not be utilized within state-led regulatory environmental cleanup decisions, leading to inconsistent national application. Within the US, there are several States with PFAS guidance levels, however only Minnesota has promulgated standards. This poster presentation will introduce PFASs, their sources, and the available screening levels for data comparison. It will also highlight the management challenges and current technical options available for groundwater contaminated with PFAS. Until consistent and defensible toxicity values are developed and practical remedial technologies are available, it remains challenging to execute consistent risk management practices to protect human health and the environment from PFAS exposures. T3-A.2 Pinto, A; Safe@Plant; abel.fnpinto@gmail.com A Qualitative Safety Risk Assessment Method to Construction Industry incorporating uncertainties by the use of fuzzy sets A new fuzzy Qualitative Occupational Safety Risk Assessment model (QRAM), was developed to mitigate occupational injuries in construction sites by improve the quality of occupational safety risk assessment. The innovative aspects of QRAM model is to embody the safety climate and the safety barriers effectiveness as assessment dimensions and the use of fuzzy sets theory to enhance the use of imprecise information. The QRAM model grouped the safety risk factors in four dimensions: Safety Climate, Severity, Possibility and Safety Barriers, used to estimate the risk of the 8 accident modes that encompass 97% of the work accidents that occur on construction sites Safety Climate importance lies in support the management of safety risks, i.e., safety climate factors are not direct agents in the occurrence of work accidents but create the conditions for accidents happening. Safety Climate estimates is made by the set of predictors. Severity is assessed, qualitatively, by fuzzy functions modeled from predictors related to the amount of energy dissipated/absorbed and that can be evaluated in situ like, heights, speeds, weights, morphology of objects, etc..., and using the biomechanical limits of the human body appointed in several studies. AP is the possibility of work accident occurrence. Each accident mode may be caused by a specific set of factors that determine the greater or lesser possibility of occurring a work accident. For each accident mode, safety barriers are divided in 4 types (physical, functional, symbolic and incorporeal). Real tests proved that QRAM is user friendly and its results are more accurate that obtained by other methodologies. M3-A.7 Pluess, DN*; Groso, A; Meyer, T; Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Lausanne; david.pluess@epfl.ch Analyzing and managing risks in research labs: How it is done Available risk analysis techniques are well adapted to industry since they were developed for their purposes. For academic research environment, most of these techniques are of limited use because of several differences compared to the industrial environment. Due to the nature of scientific research, accurate statistical data for processes or equipment are hardly available. However, most of the existing techniques depend on these data, e.g. studies on reliability for risk quantification. Another difficulty is to take into account special conditions present in research laboratories when using available methodologies. A majority of these techniques are designed for analyzing clearly defined processes. In academic research settings, most of the process’ variables are not well defined or continuously evolving. Additionally, different hazards present in the same laboratory may influence each other and can therefore be amplified. Different solutions for the challenge of adapting an existing method to research laboratories are available in the literature. However, most of recommendations focus on a specific field of scientific research, such as chemistry. In order to tackle this problem, we developed a holistic risk analysis technique for research and development environment. This newly developed method features an enhancement of the risk estimation (using probability, severity and detectability) with a new risk dimension, called worsening factors. Additionally, a semi-quantitative calculation method based on Bayesian networks is used to improve the risk estimation. This new risk analysis technique, specific for the research environment, is intuitive, easily performable by non-experts (web interface), less resource demanding than other techniques and more accurate. Linked with an adapted safety policy it becomes a comprehensive risk management tool. We will illustrate the application of this new method through several real research laboratories’ risk assessments. M3-F.1 Pollard, SJT*; Mauelshagen, C; Prpich, G; Lickorish, F; Delgado, JC; Jude, S; Cranfield University; s.pollard@cranfield.ac.uk Risk analysis for better policies – environmental risk governance for the green economy Straightened financial times are forcing a reappraisal of public risk governance in the UK. A tension exists between a necessity to share risk and cost with other actors, and a smaller public administration managing more risk - for the risk it retains - as Government becomes fleet of foot. Coincident with this, environmental policy is expected to support economic growth; this shift highlighting themes such as the effective appraisal of distant environmental threats, the apportioning of shared accountabilities for public risk, and the development of risk management maturity in Government. Taken in concert, these changes are improving environmental risk governance practice and providing rich opportunities for risk analysts. We summarise this new policy landscape, illustrating it with practical examples to show trends in environmental risk governance practice. Examples include the application of risk characterisation tools for appraising strategic policy risk and environmental futures, an examination of infrastructure risk under climate change and the systems approach to animal disease threats. What emerges is a reappraisal of some research themes familiar to the risk analysis community, but set in a new landscape of devolved accountability and networked risk. These are discussed by reference to the new opportunities they provide for policy and risk analysts alike. December 8-11, 2013 - Baltimore, MD
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Abstracts (PDF file, 1.8MB) - Society for Risk Analysis

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