- Author
- Hirano, T.
- Title
- Methodology for Hazard Assessments.
- Coporate
- University of Tokyo, Japan
- Report
- Session 1
- Book or Conf
- Safety in the Transport, Storage and Use of Hazardous Materials, International Workshop. (IWS). Proceedings. Organized by The National Research Institute of Fire and Disaster (NRIFD) and The Fire and Disaster Management Agency/The Ministry of Home Affairs (FDMA/MHA). March 11-13, 1998, Tokyo, Japan, Tamura, M.; Roberts, T. A.; Hasegawa, K.; Koseki, H., Editors, 119-136 p., 1998
- Keywords
- hazardous materials | safety | storage | hazard assessment | methodology | disasters | accidents
- Abstract
- This paper presents methodology for hazard assessments on the basis of a fundamental concept. If the time and site to assess hazard and the initial and boundary conditions at disaster occurrence are known, we can evaluate the expected hazard degree at a site, which is the integrated loss at the site caused by an assumed type of disaster per unit period. In general, only the effects of a limited number of variables on the expected hazard degree are known, and the hazard assessments have been performed on the basis of such known effects. As the number of variables, of which effects on the hazard are known, increases, the accuracy of hazard assessments increases. Appropriate hazard assessments of possible disasters must depend on knowledge about the effects of variables on the expected hazard degree. The first step to accumulate such knowledge is to perform case studies. So many data needed for hazard assessments have been obtained through case studies performed with appropriatc procedures. Data accumulation through basic studies on material properties, characteristics of operators, equipment, apparatus, and/or systems, phenomena at disasters are also important. Many methods for hazard assessments based on those have been proposed and applied in various factories. Prediction of individual phenomena in the process to a disaster is indispensable in the hazard assessment for effectiveness evaluation in reliable management for loss prevention. Despite of its importance for hazard assessments, this fact is sometimes not realized. Various types of methods for hazard assessments have been adopted for solving a number of problems on loss prevention. Each type of method can be characterized on the basis of the concept introduced in this paper. Finally, desirable features of methods for hazard assessments are presented. For hazard assessments, it is necessary to establish a measure by which hazards can be quantitatively evaluated. Once the measure is established, we can evaluate each hazard on the basis of the fundamental concept presented in this paper