The 1989 Annual Meeting of the Society for Risk Analysis dramatically demonstrated one of the most important reasons for having the Society - to bring together people with highly diverse backgrounds and disciplines to assess the common problems of societal and individual risks. The physical scientists emphasized the analytical tools for assessing environmental effects and for modeling risks from engineered systems and other human activities. The health scientists presented numerous methods of analyzing health effects, including the subject of dose-response relationships, especially at low exposure levels - never an easy analysis. The social and political scientists concentrated on issues of risk perception, communication, acceptability, and human touch. Others discussed such issues as cost-benefit analysis and the risk-based approach to decision analysis. Use of risk assessment methods for risk management continued to be a matter of strong opinion and debate. The impacts of state and federal regulations, existing and planned, were assessed in sessions and in luncheon speeches. These impacts show that risk analysis practitioners will have an increasingly important role in the future. They will be challenged to provide clear, easily understood evaluations of risk that are responsive to society's concern for risk, as evidenced in laws and regulations. Of course, the various risk analysis specialties overlapped in domains of interest.

The 1989 Annual Meeting of the Society for Risk Analysis dramatically demonstrated one of the most important reasons for having the Society - to bring together people with highly diverse backgrounds and disciplines to assess the common problems of societal and individual risks. The physical scientists emphasized the analytical tools for assessing environmental effects and for modeling risks from engineered systems and other human activities. The health scientists presented numerous methods of analyzing health effects, including the subject of dose-response relationships, especially at low exposure levels - never an easy analysis. The social and political scientists concentrated on issues of risk perception, communication, acceptability, and human touch. Others discussed such issues as cost-benefit analysis and the risk-based approach to decision analysis. Use of risk assessment methods for risk management continued to be a matter of strong opinion and debate. The impacts of state and federal regulations, existing and planned, were assessed in sessions and in luncheon speeches. These impacts show that risk analysis practitioners will have an increasingly important role in the future. They will be challenged to provide clear, easily understood evaluations of risk that are responsive to society's concern for risk, as evidenced in laws and regulations. Of course, the various risk analysis specialties overlapped in domains of interest.

The perception, assessment and management of risk are increasingly important core principles for determining the development of both policy and strategic responses to civil and environmental catastrophes. Whereas these principles were once confined to some areas of activity i.e. financial and insurance, they are now widely used in civil and environmental engineering. Comprehensive and readable, Civil and Environmental Risk: Mitigation and Control, provides readers with the mathematical tools and quantitative methods for determining the probability of a catastrophic event and mitigating and controlling the aftermath. With this book engineers develop the required skills for accurately assessing risk and formulating appropriate response strategies. The two part treatment starts with a clear and rigorous exposition of the quantitative risk assessment process, followed by self-contained chapters concerning applications. One of the first books to address both natural and human generated disasters, topics include events such as pandemic diseases, climate changes, major hurricanes, super earthquakes, mega tsunamis, volcanic eruptions, industrial accidents and terrorist attacks. Case studies appear at the end of the book allowing engineers to see how these principles are applied to scenarios such as a super hurricane or mega tsunamis, a reactor core melt down in a nuclear plant, a terrorist attack on the national electric grid, and an abrupt climate change brought about by a change in the ocean currents in the North Atlantic. Written by the current Chairman of the U.S. Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board, Environmental risk managers will find this reference a valuable and authoritative guide both in accurately calculating risk and its applications in their work.

Key Features
Mathematical tools for calculating and Controlling Catastrophic Risk
Presents a systematic method for ranking the importance of societal threats
Includes both Natural and Industrial Catastrophes
Case studies cover such events as pandemic diseases, climate changes, major hurricanes, super earthquakes, mega tsunamis, volcanic eruptions, industrial accidents, and terrorist attacks.