Probabilistic safety assessment for the marine transportation of radioactive materials –

methodology, data analysis tool and accident event tree analyses

ABSTRACT

The probabilistic safety assessment for marine transportation of radioactive

waste materials is discussed in this paper, which covers regulations and
requirements, identification of accident scenarios. A systematic methodology to
apply the Probabilistic Safety Assessment to assess the nuclear safety risks
associated with the transportation of radioactive material is proposed. The
proposed methodology covers the identification of potential accident scenarios
associated with marine transportation and estimation of its likelihood that leads
to consequences.

The methodology includes the data analysis to estimate the accident frequencies.
For the data analysis a new tool is developed, and its technical bases and
integration with probabilistic models are discussed in this paper. The probability
of occurrence of nuclear marine transportation is an extreme event, therefore,
generic marine accidents data for 2011-2021 period are studied and data
analysis is performed in the newly developed tool.

Even though, the probability of occurrence of an event associated with marine

transportation of radioactive material is low but could lead to high consequences,
hence these events can be correlated to low probability high consequences, for
example, extreme events. As the associated statistics for marine nuclear
accidents are insufficient for the development of probabilistic models, so the
generic marine accident data can be used to give the predictions for accident
frequency. A probabilistic assessment for marine accidents is performed and an
event tree for marine accidents is proposed with detailed discussion on risk
quantification and results insights; and finally, conclusions are presented.

Keywords: Probabilistic Safety Assessment, Transportation, Radioactive

Material, Radioactive Waste, Marine Safety, Hazard Assessment, Risk and
Reliability

1. INTRODUCTION

Marine nuclear transport refers to the transportation of nuclear materials, such as nuclear fuel
assemblies, radioactive waste, or other radioactive substances related with medical application,
by sea. This type of transport is a specialized and highly regulated due to the potential risks
associated with nuclear materials. The use of marine transportation for dangerous goods
including radioactive waste material is normal practice in many countries. Nuclear radioactive
material is categorized as dangerous goods class 7. Approximately 50% of the dangerous goods
are transported by ships, in which the fraction of radioactive class 7 is approximately 1% [1].
Even though the fraction of marine nuclear transportation is less but has high potential to cause
a radiological consequence to the public, crew members and the environment.

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The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has reported that at present approximately 2
million packages carrying radioactive material is transported every year via different modes of
transportation (e.g., road, train, sea, and air) [1]. These activities will significantly increase in
the future. Most of these packages contain low-level radioactive material that are used for
medical and industrial applications, such as in the production of nuclear medicine, non-
destructive testing and process control in the oil and gas industry. Some of the packages also
contain higher-activity radioactive material, such as nuclear fuel assemblies and spent nuclear
fuel from power reactors.

Looking at the future trend, the existing nuclear power plant fleet/reactor shutdowns, and
decommissioning activities are likely to be increased, consequently will increase transportation
of radioactive waste/material to the interim waste storage facilities and/or the final
disposal/repository. The number of permanently shut down reactors are higher in countries like
US, UK, Germany, Japan, and France [2]. At present many countries like Sweden, Korea, US,
and UK are already practicing transportation of radioactive material by sea, an example is m/s
Sigrid, the ship used in Sweden for radioactive waste material transportation from Barseback
nuclear power plant to the other radioactive waste storage facility where it will be taken to
future deep geological disposal site in Sweden [3], [4].

Another prospective is ongoing nuclear renaissance and increasing interest in nuclear power
growth, e.g., to meet Net Zero and climate change goals (COP28), the United Nation countries
pledged to triple their existing nuclear power capacity by 2050 [5]. In the coming time, this
will increase development of new nuclear power plants and shutdown of older reactors; and
consequently, increasing the nuclear transportation activities in the future. To be noted, some
new nuclear technologies focused on transportation of small modular reactors (SMR) and
micro reactors from technology designer site to operator sites [5]. In the future, it might be
required to look at detailed safety assessment of transportable nuclear technologies and/or
reactors.

One of the safety assessment methodologies focused on probabilistic safety assessment (PSA)
is applied to assess the risk of nuclear core damage (or fuel damage) and the large early release
after the core damage [6]. The PSA is also used in the risk informed decision-making process
[6]. However, the application of PSA methods is not thoroughly applied in the quantification
of radioactive material transportation risk and quantifying the accident frequencies during the
transport of high-level waste like spent nuclear fuel. The conditional failure probability of
transportation accidents could be extremely low; however, the resulting consequences could be
high, like ‘low probability and high consequences’ external events. An example, of such
accident is Fukushima Daiichi, 2011 accident in Japan, where the combination of seismic and
tsunami events predicted to be extremely low probability, but the consequences were very
severe [7]. Therefore, for the nuclear safety perspective, it is important to assess the risk
generated from the transportation of radioactive material, so this paper is focused on systematic
assessment of nuclear safety aspect during the transportation of radioactive material.

The examples of radioactive material transportation safety assessments are provided in

NUREG-2125 [[21]], NUREG/CR-4829 [[32]], NUREG-6672 [[33]], NUREG- 6886 [[34]],
NUREG-7209 [[35]] and IAEA safety guidelines have been reviewed thoroughly. NUREG-
6672 [[33]] as well as NUREG-2125 [[21]] stressed the need to estimate risk by using new data
and improved methods of analysis. The test series for type B casks, which utilize the risk
assessment approaches are discussed in [[22]].

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There are some studies related with software tool [[23]] for integrated risk assessment for spent
fuel transportation via means of maritime, aircraft and on-site transportation, however, models
used in the studies are focused on South Korea and have limitation of lack of input data and
uncertainties associated with model itself [[23]]. The route specific systems for risk assessment
[[24]] [[25]] used geographic information system (GIS), which is integrated in software like
RADTRAN [[24]]. The articles focusing on estimation of accident occurrence probability
[[26]] [[27]] and optimization of radioactive material transport routes [[28]] mentioned
shortcomings in input data in calculation of accident probability and uncertainty involved in
the models. The application of proposed methodology in the route analysis is a part of future
publication of this work.

Examples of probabilistic risk assessment for on-site fuel transportation [[29]], maritime
transportation [[30]] and aircraft [[31]] are also reviewed, however, scope of these studies are
limited to a specific transportation mode and detailed risk factors that could cause accidents
are not discussed thoroughly.

This research also encompasses an extensive review, which confirms the assumption that
overall, limited experience exists, to date, with regards to probabilistic methods for assessing
safety risks during radioactive material transport. The challenge is related with unavailability
of reliable, recent, and comprehensive accident data, which is required in probabilistic
methodology i.e., event and fault trees analysis, which have the potential to serve as a valuable
complement to the existing safety assessment regime.

The radioactive material transportation involves the movement of radioactive materials and
nuclear waste by various transport modes such as road, rail, sea, and air. To protect the public
and environment, the safe transportation of radioactive materials is critical to prevent accidents
and avoid radiological releases. The safe transportation of radioactive material can be ensured
by implementation of stringent regulations to cover the following:

• Inspection of packaging, labelling, routing, and documentation of the radioactive materials,

• Providing the training and qualifications to the personnel involved in the transportation;
and
• Evaluating the safety of the transportation system by utilizing safety assessment methods
like PSA.

The safety of transportation of radioactive materials are highly dependent on design of

packages which carries the radioactive materials. These packages are designed to withstand
impact, fire, and submersion in water, and to prevent the release of radioactive material in case
of an accident [1]. Additionally, transportation routes are chosen to avoid densely populated
areas and sensitive environments [1]. The drivers and other personnel involved in the
transportation must be trained and qualified to handle and transport radioactive material safely.
However, there are some significant events reported, for example, the receipt of packages with
high external radiation levels due to unshielded sources [8] that were shipped from international
customers, where package safety requirements are not followed, e.g., either inadequate
packaging of the radioactive material or/and administrative error e.g., untrained personnel,
human errors, and handling events.

The transport of nuclear materials by sea is subject to strict international regulations and
guidelines to ensure the safety and security of both the transport operation and the environment.

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To ensure the safe and secure transportation of radioactive material, the regulatory
requirements for the compliance of transport safety regulations will be expected to be more
stringent. This could result a potential development in tasks related with nuclear safety
regulatory compliance and safety assessment approaches to assess the risk of transportation of
radioactive material.

Overall, a comprehensive study for the transport of nuclear waste would be a complex and
multi-disciplinary process that would require a thorough understanding of the various technical,
regulatory, and societal aspects of nuclear waste transportation.

This paper covers a comprehensive study of marine transportation of radioactive material and
discusses various accident scenarios that could lead to potential risk in maintaining nuclear
safety during the nuclear waste transportation. Section 2 of this paper covers regulations and
requirements for transportation of radioactive material with more emphasis on marine
transportation, section 3 discusses the proposed methodology for marine transportation of
radioactive waste material, section 4 presents marine probabilistic safety assessment with event
tree and results and finally section 5 presents the conclusion of this paper.

2. REGULATIONS AND REQUIREMENTS FOR TRANSPORTATION OF

RADIOACTIVE MATERIAL

To ensure the safe transportation of radioactive material, strict regulations and guidelines are
in place, including the IAEA regulations, the Code of Practice on the International Transports
of Radioactive Material [9], and the regulations of the national authorities.

The IAEA SSR-6 (2018) [1] provides a regulatory framework for the safe transport of all types
of radioactive material. Together with IAEA SSR-6 [1], the following are IAEA safety guides
that describes how these requirements can be fulfilled in practice [9] - [16]:

• IAEA SSG-26 (2022), Advisory Material for the IAEA Regulations for the Safe Transport
of Radioactive Material [10].
• IAEA SSG-33 (2021), Schedules of Provisions of the IAEA Regulations for the Safe
Transport of Radioactive Material [11].
• IAEA SSG-65 (2022), Preparedness and Response for a Nuclear or Radiological
Emergency Involving the Transport of Radioactive Material [12].
• IAEA SSG-66 (2022), Format and Content of the Package Design Safety Report for the
Transport of Radioactive Material [13].
• IAEA SSG-78 (2023), Compliance Assurance for the Safe Transport of Radioactive
Material [14].
• IAEA SSG-86 (2023), Radiation Protection Programmes for the Transport of Radioactive
Material [15].
• IAEA TS-G-1.4 (2008), The Management System for the Safe Transport of Radioactive
Material [16].

With IAEA requirements, the requirements of end consequences analysis as outlined in NRC's
ISG-5-R1 [[37]] and NUREC-1536 [[36]] are also studied. The design of transport package
together with additional regulatory safety guides and controls ensure the safety of the
radioactive material transport. The spent nuclear fuel waste is transported by Type B packages
(refer Figure 1(a) and (b)), defined in IAEA SSR-6 [1]. As substantial structures Type B
packages will survive most transport accidents without sustaining any damage or increase in

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dose rate from leakage etc. However, it is necessary to consider specific accident scenarios that
include the below listed requirements (also refer Figure 1(c)), which could result in some
damage and an increase in external dose rate [1]. The implementation of these requirements in
probabilistic modelling, fundamentally depends on the type of available data.

• Drop of 9 m onto an unyielding surface.

• Fire with flame temperature 800 °C for 30 minutes.
• Water immersion in 15 m of water for 8 hours.
• Ambient operating temperature conditions -40 °C to +38 °C.

Figure 1. (a), (b) Type B packages design, 1 (c) Type B packages various tests to ensure
compliance with regulations and requirements, for example, free-drop impact, puncture
impact, fire, and water immersion [8].

2.1. MARINE NUCLEAR TRANSPORTATION

Marine transport, or shipping, involves the movement of goods, people, or materials by sea.
The requirements for marine transport encompass a wide range of considerations to ensure
safety, environmental protection, and efficient operation. Here are some key aspects of marine
transport requirements:

Regulatory compliance: For marine radioactive material transport together with IAEA,
International Maritime Organization (IMO) sets global standards for the safety, security, and
environmental protection. Regulations cover areas such as ship design, construction,
equipment, operation, and environmental protection. Additionally, ships are required to follow
the national regulations for their operation and ensuring compliance with international
regulations, for example, the European Agreement concerning the International Carriage of
Dangerous Goods on Inland Waterways (ADN) [1]; and the Regulations for the Transport of
Dangerous Goods on the Rhine (ADNR) [1].

Safety by design – ship and containers/cask: Marine transportation safety can be ensured by
safer ship design and containers specifically design for nuclear material transport. The ship
used for nuclear material transportation should be robust and capable of withstanding the
adverse weather conditions in the sea and can handle the water stresses in the normal
operational conditions as well as the accident conditions of transport. The design of marine
vessel should be stable to avoid capsizing (i.e., when ship or boat overturned in the water) [1].
Regarding shipping containers, it should be designed to apply graded approach to safety, e.g.,

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to provide confinement to prevent and shielding to minimize radiation exposure to the public
and crew/worker and to maintain the integrity in case of an accident.

Planning and information sharing: The marine transportation route planning should consider
of navigational safety, geographical conditions, and population density. Timely and accurate
information sharing, and continued monitoring of transport route is critical for safe
transportation of radioactive material. In addition, one of the important factors is technical
competence and training of the personnel who will be responsible for marine nuclear
transportation.

2.2. MARINE NUCLEAR TRANSPORTATION IN SWEDEN – AN EXAMPLE

In 1977, Swedish Nuclear Fuel and Waste Management Company ‘Svensk

Kärnbränslehantering AB’ (SKB) was established by Swedish nuclear industry and is
responsible for the management of nuclear fuel and radioactive waste in Sweden. The SKB has
marine nuclear transportation system that was built in 1980s. Marine radioactive waste material
transportation is performed by ship m/s Sigrid (refer Figure 2 (a), (b)), which was
commissioned in 2014 as a replacement of ship m/s Sigyn, which was used for transportation
for approximately 30 years [3].

In this ship, safety by design is achieved by a double bottom and hull, which protects the cargo
in the event of collision or grounding. Ship m/s Sigrid makes between 30/40 trips per year with
12 transport casks or 40 freight containers cargo capacity per trip between the Swedish nuclear
power plants and waste storage sites. The ship is equipped with extra communication
equipment and has many internal and external safety-enhancing features.

Figure 2. (a) Figure 2. (c)

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 Figure 2. (b) Figure 2. (d)

Figure 2. (a), (b) Example of Swedish radioactive waste transport ship m/s Sigrid and
2 (c) transport containers for short-lived radioactive waste (ATB) and transport cask
for core components (TK) [3], 2(d) different waste packages e.g. ISO containers used in
short-lived radioactive waste (SFR) [4]

Different transport containers (refer Figure 2 (c)) is used according to type of radioactive waste
(e.g., low- and intermediate-level, or spent nuclear fuel) or new fuel, which followed regulatory
requirements. ISO containers (refer Figure 2 (d)) are used for low-level waste and do not
require radiation shielding; however, intermediate level waste, which requires radiation
shielding is mostly embedded in concrete or bitumen at the nuclear power plants for
transportation [4]. Depending on type of radioactive waste, transport containers with 7-20 cm
thick walls of steel (refer Figure 2 (c)) are used for shipping and for boiling water reactor (BWR)
control rods waste, approximately 30 cm thick walls of steel are used in transport cask to
provide shielding from residual radiation. Such transport casks have copper cooling fins to
remove the decay heat generated by the fuel [3]. Transport casks are complied with
international standards, which include being able to withstand a drop of 9 m on to an unyielding
surface, sustain more than 30 minutes in a fire at over 800 °C, and bear external pressure
corresponding to immersion at a depth of 200 m under water without any leakage occurring.
The casks comply with these requirements with very broad margins, for example, it can
withstand pressure corresponding to immersion at a depth of more than 400 m under water. A
new cask design is proposed with double lids to protect the fuel from water penetration after
an accident. An increased transport volume of radioactive waste is envisaged in the future in
conjunction with shipments of decommissioning waste and canisters with spent nuclear fuel
[3], [4].

The nuclear safety of marine transportation of radioactive material is ensured by the design of
the packages carrying the radioactive waste, however, there is lack of clarity on what safety
assessment approach or methodologies are applied to ensure integrity of transport packages
during an accident and quantifying the associated probabilistic risk to the public.

3. METHODOLOGY FOR MARINE TRANSPORTATION OF RADIOACTIVE

WASTE MATERIAL

During the initial review, it is found that lack of systematic approach to probabilistic safety
assessment for such radioactive waste material transport accidents. There are some examples
of few studies performed in the USA and other studies in Germany and the U.K.; to assess the
risk from transport activities [17]. However, such approaches are not described in detail with
the use of the statistics of the transport accidents for all modes of transportation (e.g., road,

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train, air and marine) accidents and even the discussion of marine accidents is very brief in the
IAEA-TECDOC-1346 (2003) [17]. In addition, it is specific to the respective country and could
not be applied as it is (or with slight modification) to another country, hence it is needed to
propose a generic transport probabilistic safety assessment approach that could be applied to
any country.

Overall, there is no systematical approach/method available for risk assessment of the

transportation of radioactive material. Therefore, this paper proposed a PSA based generic
methodology for risk assessment of transportation of radioactive material for marine
transportation as a case study.

The structure of proposed comprehensive methodology [18] for marine transportation of

radioactive waste material is illustrated in Figure 3. The methodology covers the following
main elements:

1. Accident scenarios
2. Accident consequences
3. Accident failure frequency

To identify various marine related hazards and accidents, the IMO investigation reports are
studied and referenced [19], [20]. After in-depth study of various accidents, the following
accident scenarios, are considered to be involved with radioactive transportation via marine:

• Collision
• Capsize
• Grounding
• Submersion or Sank
• Accidents aboard ship
• Fire/Explosion
• Other events

The accident scenario ‘collision’ can be a head on or rear or side collision with another ship or
boat. It can be grouped with other moving and/or non-moving vehicles or objects. The collision
can be also grouped to hitting a structure or poles or hard surfaces.
Capsize corresponds to overturning of the shipping vessel. This could happen if the anchor
handling capabilities of the vessel did not match the physical and environmental challenges
and the crew was not sufficiently familiar with the vessel to recognize its limitations.

Grounding can be caused by the failure to alter course when required or by lack of effective
bridge team management or communication or human error.

An accident resulting in water ‘submersion’ is considered as a ‘stand-alone’ event rather than

one occurring in conjunction with an impact followed by a fire. The transport regulations
require the package to survive immersion in 15 m of water for 8 hours unless the contents
include large quantities of irradiated nuclear fuel [20]. If such fuel is present, then it is necessary
to demonstrate the integrity of critical components when subjected to an external pressure of 2
MPa (200 m of water) [20].

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Accident aboard ship could happened while onboarding or when ship is off duty. These types
of accidents are caused by lack of knowledge, incomplete understanding of ship operations,
inadequate training or taking unnecessary risk by the ship crew.

Regarding ‘fires’ (or explosion) accident scenarios, a rational for assuming a flame temperature
of 800 °C for a duration of 30 minutes is included in the regulations [1]. Attention is drawn to
the practice that when lives are not at risk, fires are often allowed to continue to natural
extinction. Consequently, care is required when assessing historical records of fire duration.
The remaining accidents are covered in ‘Other events’.

The accident consequences are divided into four cases, which correspondences to damage of
the marine vessel or ship that translate into damage to the radiative material transport package,
for example,
• in ‘Case 1’ when the marine vessel or ship is not affected by the accident then the accident
consequence is ‘Package integrity OK’, however,
• in ‘Case 2’ when marine vessel or ship is damaged but can be used to transport during an
accident then the accident consequence is ‘Small damage’.
• Similarly, in ‘Case 3’ when marine vessel or ship is severely damaged and cannot be used
to transport during an accident then the accident consequence is expected to be equivalent
to ‘Radiological leakage’, as it is anticipated that radioactive material package could be
damaged, for example, package safety barriers like shielding, confinement are impacted
that could cause radiological leakage, even though probability of occurrences of such
events are less.
• In ‘Case 4’ when marine vessel or ship is demolished then the accident consequence is
expected to be equivalent to ‘Package integrity Not OK’ leading to complete loss of
radioactive transport package that leads to severe accident due to failure of all safety
barriers.

To estimate the accident failure frequency, the data analysis is required however it is
challenging to find the databases and statistic information to estimate the accident frequencies.
To overcome this challenge international research has been performed on the available data
and a database is created for data analysis. To support the extensive data analysis for marine
radioactive material, transport a new python-based tool is developed, see Figures 4 and 5,
where its graphical user interface with steps is shown for marine accidents. When the different
transport mode data files are in the tool then accident frequencies are calculated based on the
user selection of transport accident scenarios. The accident frequencies are calculated for all
accident consequences cases and the results can be either directly shown in accident event tree
or data can be exported in excel file which can be imported or interfaced to other software.
This tool gives input to Probabilistic Safety Analysis and Event Tree Modelling, which is
presented in Section 4.

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Figure 3. Structure of proposed comprehensive methodology for marine transportation
of radioactive waste material.

(a) (b)

(c)

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 (d) (e )

Figure 4. Steps of Graphical User Interface (GUI), (a) Step 1 – Mode, where any
transport mode of radioactive transportation can be selected, e.g. Marine, as per scope
of this paper; (b) Step 2 – Accident selection, e.g. Collision – marine; (c) Step 3 –
Accident frequency, estimation of all consequences accident frequencies from the
database; (d) Option to extract accident frequencies in event tree; (e) Option to export
data in excel sheet to import into PSA code like RiskSpectrum in this case.

Figure 5. Complete layout of Graphical User Interface of newly developed tool for data
analysis.

4. MARINE PROBABILISTIC SAFETY ASSESSMENT

During the PSA implementation for the transportation of radioactive material, different
accident scenarios are considered and analyzed, such as collision, fire, drop or release of
radioactive material. The likelihood and potential consequences of these scenarios are
evaluated. These measures may include changes to the design of the transportation system,
changes to the routing or packaging of the radioactive material, or improvements to emergency
response plans.

4.1 EVENT TREE ANALYSIS FOR MARINE TRANSPORT

A transport event tree is a type of decision tree used to analyze and plan for potential risks and
hazards associated with transportation systems. Branch points (refer Figure 6) in the tree
represent different possible outcomes or scenarios, and the branches stemming from those
points represent the actions that can be taken in response to those outcomes, for example, a

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branch point in the tree may represent a collision, and fire etc. The purpose of a transport event
tree is to help identify and plan for potential risks and hazards to minimize their impact and
ensure the safety of the transportation system and its users. This safety assessment is
undertaken by way of review of historical accident statistics and then employing event tree
analysis techniques to arrive at an estimate of accident frequencies.

Function events (refer Figure 6) are included in event trees, and they are the events that
influence the development of the sequence of events that occur following an initiating event.
The event tree branch at the function events. Depending on the performance of a function event
an event tree branches into several sequences. To be able to branch sequences, there must be
at least two branch point alternatives (refer Figure 6, shows four branch point alternatives in
this paper) in which a function event can occur (for example, in Figure 5 branch point # 29
COLLISION_MARINE with consequences ‘not OK (NOK) integrity’). The uppermost branch
is usually called the success branch (for example, branch point # 1). For a function event that
can occur in more than two branch points alternatives, PSA software (e.g. RiskSpectrum)
allows to create multiple branches originating from the same point. It can also specify different
input events as alternatives and called as branch points alternatives (for example, Figure 6
shows four branch points alternatives for different branches in the event tree). Each alternative
contains a definition of input event type, reference to an input event and optionally a boundary
condition set.

The methodology is applied to radioactive material transport by marine and structure of

proposed probabilistic event tree analysis model for marine transportation of radioactive
material with accident frequency results are illustrated in Figure 6.

Function
events

Branch
points

Function
events modes

Figure 6. Structure of proposed probabilistic event tree analysis model for marine
transportation of radioactive material.

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The probabilities are often assigned to each branch, and the product of these probabilities along
a path represents the overall probability of that specific scenario occurring. To be noted that all
events in the event tree model in Figure 6 is exclusive to each other in case any events are
successive then it could be included in the event tree. For example, if event A (e.g. collision)
and B (e.g. capsize) are successive then for two events A and B, and the probability of A leading
to B is P(A→B), the probability of both A and B occurring in sequence is P(A∩B) = P(A) ×
P(A→B).

Quantitative values, such as probabilities, can be assigned to each branch and node to provide
a quantitative assessment of the likelihood and consequences of various scenarios. The general
equation for calculating the probability of an event in an event tree is as follows:

P(E)=P(E1) × P(E2∣E1) × P(E3∣E1∩E2) ×…×P(Ei∣E1∩E2∩…∩Ei−1) (1)

Where:
• P(E) is the probability of the final event or outcome.
• P(Ei∣E1∩E2∩…∩Ei−1) is the conditional probability of event Ei given that all the
previous events E1,E2,…,Ei−1 have occurred.

This equation is used to calculate the overall probability of a particular sequence of events
leading to an outcome in the event tree (for example, Figure 6 frequency values). The
probabilities are typically estimated based on historical data, expert judgment, or other relevant
information. In practice, event tree analysis involves constructing a graphical representation of
the events and their relationships, assigning probabilities (or frequencies) to each branch, and
calculating the overall probabilities (or frequencies) of different outcomes (refer Figure 6). The
analysis helps in understanding the likelihood and consequences of various scenarios,
supporting risk-informed decision-making.

4.2 RESULTS DISCUSSION

The result from probabilistic analyses is extracted and presented in Figure 7, which represents
the risk of significant accident scenarios and its frequency for the marine transportation. The
result presents the most risk significant accident scenario based on the statistical data used in
this study, for examples, top 3 dominating contributors are, as follows:

• collision which leads to radiological leak (M_C_RAD_LEAK), then

• grounding which leads to radiological leak (M_G_RAD_LEAK), and
• collision which leads to damage to package integrity (M_C_NOK_INTEGRITY).

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 Figure 7. Risk significance - accident scenario and its frequency for marine
transportation of radioactive material.

Based on risk significance, the results are only focused on accident consequences related for
‘Case 3: Radiological leakage’ and ‘Case 4: Package integrity Not OK’. Moreover, there are
the following other accident scenarios that leads to radiological leak and loss of package
integrity, but are not in top 3 contributors:

• accidents during aboard ship which leads to radiological leak (M_AB_RAD_LEAK),

• grounding which leads to damage to package integrity (M_G_ NOK_INTEGRITY),
• fire or explosion which leads to damage to radiological leak (M_F_RAD_LEAK),
• accidents during aboard ship which leads to damage to package integrity (M_AB_
NOK_INTEGRITY),
• other events which lead to radiological leak (M_O_RAD_LEAK),
• fire or explosion which leads to damage to package integrity (M_F_NOK_INTEGRITY),
• other events which lead to damage to package integrity (M_O_ NOK_INTEGRITY),
• submersion or sank which leads to radiological leak (M_S_RAD_LEAK),
• submersion or sank which leads to damage to package integrity
(M_S_NOK_INTEGRITY),
• capsize which leads to radiological leak (M_CP_RAD_LEAK),
• capsize which leads to damage to package integrity (M_CP_NOK_INTEGRITY).

During the transportation of radioactive material and marine accident consequences/ impact
results presented in Table 1 below:

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Accident consequences
Case 1: Package integrity OK
Frequency % Remarks
2.39E-01 68% 68%-time package integrity is
OK and it expected to occur at a
frequency of 2.39E-01 per year,
or approximately 1 in 4 years.

Case 2: Small damage 9.10E-02 26% 26%-time package integrity has

small damage and it expected to
occur at a frequency of 9.10E-02
per year, or approximately 1 in
11 years.

Case 3: Radiological leakage 1.30E-02 4% 4%-time loss of package

integrity leads to radiological
leakage, and it expected to occur
at a frequency of 1.30E-02 per
year, or approximately 1 in 77
years.

Case 4: Package integrity Not OK 9.37E-03 3% 3%-time package integrity is Not

OK and it expected to occur at a
frequency of 9.37E-03 per year,
or approximately 1 in 107 years.

Table 1. Marine accident consequences frequencies and its percentage.

Marine accident consequences frequencies and their percentage contribution shown in Table 1
provides useful information by utilizing the probabilistic methodology to highlight which
consequences can lead to worst consequences to the public to support regulators and/or
operators in risk-informed decision making for any specific accident conditions. For example,
based on present analysis results the probability of occurrence of any radiological leakage is
once in 77 years, similarly a potential complete loss of package integrity could occur once in
107 years. To be noted that like extreme events, this likelihood of occurrence of a marine
transport accident for a time frame of 77 years and/or 107 years could happen now or in next
year or near future, as the transportation of radioactive transportation via marine mode is a
common transport practice in many countries in the world and likely to be increased in the
future. Therefore, utilizing the probabilistic assessment methodologies the public safety related
decision can be made based on risk estimation and accident data analyses, as performed here.

During the transportation of radioactive material and marine accident scenarios results
presented in Table 2 and Figure 8 show that:

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Accident scenarios Frequency % Remarks
Collision 1.00E-01 28% 28%-time collision scenario occurred, which
expected to occur at a frequency of 1.00E-01 per
year, or approximately 1 in 10 per year.

Grounding 7.29E-02 21% 21%-time grounding events occurred, which

expected to occur at a frequency of 7.29E-02 per
year, or approximately 1 in 14 per year.

Accidents aboard 6.27E-02 18% 18%-time accident aboard ship scenario occurred,
ship which expected to occur at a frequency of 6.27E-
02 per year, or approximately 1 in 16 per year.

Fire/explosions 4.63E-02 13% 13%-time fire/explosion scenario occurred, which

expected to occur at a frequency of 4.63E-02 per
year, or approximately 1 in 22 per year.

Other events 3.74E-02 11% 11%-time other events occurred, which expected
to occur at a frequency of 3.74E-02 per year, or
approximately 1 in 27 per year.

Submersion or Sank 2.48E-02 7% 7%-time submersion or sank scenario occurred,

which expected to occur at a frequency of 2.48E-
02 per year, or approximately 1 in 40 per year.

Capsize 7.50E-03 2% 2%-time capsize scenario occurred, which

expected to occur at a frequency of 7.50E-03 per
year, or approximately 1 in 133 per year.

Table 2. Marine accident scenarios frequencies and its percentage.

Figure 8. Results of marine accident scenarios contribution in percentage.

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After analyzing the results for the marine accidents, the worst-case scenario is collision and
then grounding which could lead to either radiological leak or impact the integrity of the
package. The accident scenario ‘collision’ can be a head on or rear or side collision with another
ship or boat, which can be grouped with other moving and/or non-moving vehicles or objects.
The collision can be also grouped to hitting a structure or poles or hard surfaces. The result
shows that 28%-time collision scenario occurred, which expected to occur at a frequency of
1.00E-01 per year, or approximately 1 in 10 per year.

In case of grounding accident scenario ‘Grounding’ can be caused by the failure to alter course
when required or by lack of effective bridge team management or communication or human
error. The result shows that 21%-time grounding events occurred, which expected to occur at
a frequency of 7.29E-02 per year, or approximately 1 in 14 per year.

Collision and grounding accidents are also presented in the results with top 3 dominating
contributors for marine transportation, which also means their likelihood of occurrence can be
expected in 10 years.

5. CONCLUSIONS

The paper presents a comprehensive methodology for the marine transportation of radioactive
waste material, covered regulations and requirements with example from Sweden marine
nuclear transportation, methodology, hazard identification and application of Probabilistic
Safety Assessment methodology to assess the nuclear safety risks associated with the
transportation of radioactive material. The systematic assessment identified different accident
scenarios associated with marine transportation and estimation of its likelihood that leads to
consequences. For the data analysis a new tool developed, and its technical bases and
integration with probabilistic models are discussed in this paper. A detailed probabilistic
assessment for marine accidents is performed and an event tree for marine accidents is
proposed with detailed discussion on risk quantification and results insights.

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