CONFIDENCE: COping with uNcertainties For Improved modelling and DEcision making in Nuclear emergenCiEs – NRPA’s participation

CONFIDENCE is a large European project with 31 partner institutes from 17 countries. The project aims to reduce uncertainties and improve decision making in human and ecosystem radiological risk assessment and management in nuclear emergencies and existing exposure situations. A multidisciplinary approach is used to deal with all aspects regarding the radiological situation following an accidental release, from the prognosis of dispersion and its spatial-temporal evolution, to the offsite consequences, and the decision making to select, implement and evaluate remediation strategies, including the viewpoints of stakeholders. Development and application of nuclear release scenarios are important within CONFIDENCE's work plan, being used for simulation during the acute phase of an accident as well as basis for stakeholder discussions on long-term recovery. The scientific challenges identified are addressed through six interlinked work packages (WPs), with an additional Education & Training WP, to achieve the objectives. CONFIDENCE is a three-year project, started in 2017 and ends in late 2019. This report refers DSA's activities and results during the calendar year 2018. In work-package 1 "Model improvement in the pre-and release phase, through uncertainty analysis and propagation with an ensemble approach" DSA has developed a hypothetical accident scenario related to the floating Russian nuclear power plant, which affects southwestern Norway. The scenario will be further developed and used as basis for discussion of stakeholders' preferences in selection of remediation strategies in the transition to long-term recovery as part of WP4 "Transition to long-term recovery, involving stakeholders in decision-making processes". In WP2 "Reduction of uncertainty in dose assessment for improving situation awareness and risk estimation" DSA has contributed to preparing a workshop and report identifying critical points regarding strategies for international integration and consolidation of existing biodosimetry and retrospective physical dosimetry infrastructures in emergency preparedness and response. DSA's involvement in WP3 "Radioecological modelling: fit for purpose" mainly focus on improving the agriculture food-chain transfer model FDMT/ECOSYS to take into account regional parameters and practices, and allowing probabilistic simulations. In WP5 "Social, ethical and communicational aspects of uncertainty management" DSA has been involved in developing a methodology for the analysis of stakeholders' decision pathways linked to uncertainty management, while activities in WP6 "Decision making under uncertainties" focussed on how to use agent-based modelling and multi-criteria decision-aiding in studies of decision making process.

See the attached separate report on results for a description of the impact of this one year project in the middle of a three-year large European project.

CONFIDENCE aims to improve decision making for the protection of the population affected by nuclear emergencies and to minimise disruption of normal living conditions. This will be achieved through the reduction of uncertainties, where practicable, and the development of approaches to deal with uncertainty information. It will use a multidisciplinary approach dealing with all aspects regarding the radiological situation following an accidental release, from the prognosis of dispersion and its spatial-temporal evolution, to the offsite consequences, and the decision making to select, implement and evaluate remediation strategies, including the viewpoints of stakeholders. The scientific challenges identified will be addressed though 7 interlinked work packages (WP) to achieve the following objectives: - Tackle uncertainties in the pre- and early release phase of the accident (WP1) - Develop comprehensive software tools for the quick and efficient assessment of cancer risk to affected populations (WP2) - Develop approaches and tools integrating external and internal dosimetric monitoring data and link it with dose simulations and risk assessment tools (WP2) - Improve the capabilities of radioecological models used to predict activity concentrations in foodstuffs (WP3) - Engage national stakeholders to improve the preparedness and response in the transition phase (WP4) - Identify social and ethical issues related to uncertainty management in emergency and post-accident situations (WP5) - Support and improve communication of uncertainties (WP5 and WP6) and facilitate robust decision making taking into account the variability of the radiological situation and decision makers’ preferences (WP6) - Develop training courses and educational material for professionals and students (WP7) The project is a collaboration between 31 institutes from 17 European countries. The project started in January 2017 and has a duration of 36 months.