Assessing Risks Through the Determination of Rare Event Probabilities

Allan R. Sampson and Robert L. Smith
Additional contact information
Allan R. Sampson: University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
Robert L. Smith: University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan

Operations Research, 1982, vol. 30, issue 5, 839-866

Abstract: We consider the problem of evaluating the probability of occurrence of rare, but potentially catastrophic, events. The lack of historical data renders conventional statistical approaches inappropriate. The problem is compounded by complex multivariate dependencies that may exist across potential event sites. In order to evaluate the likelihood of one or more such catastrophic events occurring, we provide an information theoretic model for merging a decision maker's opinion with expert judgment. Also provided is a methodology for the reconciling of conflicting expert judgments. This merging approach is invariant to the decision maker's viewpoint in the limiting case of exceptionally rare events. These methods are applied to likelihood assessment of liquid natural gas tanker spills and seismic induced light water nuclear reactor meltdowns.

Keywords: 91 risk assessment; 566 merging judgments; 821 low probability/high consequence risk (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 1982
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (7)

Downloads: (external link)
http://dx.doi.org/10.1287/opre.30.5.839 (application/pdf)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:inm:oropre:v:30:y:1982:i:5:p:839-866

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in Operations Research from INFORMS Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Chris Asher ().