We recently reviewed a risk analysis of a European tailings system prepared for a NGO. Although the document is public, we will keep site, owner, NGO and author’s names confidential. Indeed, the aim of this blogpost is not to be polemic, but to foster better quality of such documents. The study encompasses studying four main archival documents and reviewing more than one thousand others. These confirmed the main documents data and interpretation. In addition the authors perfromed a site visit.…
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Last week we focused on technical aspects of the Risk analysis of dam break. This week we go further by looking at societal tolerance and approaches. These may integrate ethical and economical approaches to these studies. Probability of failure and bench-marking of the case history dam A recent study of a tailings dam (centerline, rockfill, well investigated, built and monitored) using the ORE2_Tailings app delivered an estimate of the probability of failure. The result was pf in the 10-4 to…
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Keystone pipeline has spilled substantially more oil, and more often, than indicated in the risk assessments the company provided to regulators. But why and how a common risk assessment becomes an unrealistic risk assessment describing a rosy scenario? Indeed what regulators saw in the pre-construction project risk assessment was reportedly the following. “A spill of more than 50 barrels will occur “ not more than once every seven to 11 years over the entire length of the pipeline in the…
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