External Hazard Assessment

SwRI assess potential risks and natural hazards, such as earthquakes, landslides and floods, as well as man-made hazards, such as aircraft accidents and fires. Current state of practice relies on probabilistic assessments to evaluate the risks to human safety and the environment from external hazards.  Probabilistic risk assessment (PRA) services at SwRI include:

• Environmental damage
• Severe accidents and mitigation
• Operational and infrastructure safety
• Oil and gas exploration and production
• Geotechnical instability risk (e.g., slope, tunnel, liquefaction)
• Next-Generation Liquefaction (NGL) Consortium

Using a risk-informed, performance-based approach, SwRI staff:

• Develop insights about the nature and significance of potential risks
• Quantify risk and identify approaches to provide defense in depth or mitigation
• Integrate available site and engineering information
• Identify risk factors driving system performance
• Identify alternative models to describe system behavior
• Design system features to provide improved confidence in performance

SwRI brings innovative engineering solutions to complex risk assessment problems through expertise in:

• Fire hazard assessment and fire protection engineering
• Flooding  hazard assessments
• Tornado and high wind assessments
• Tsunami assessments
• Volcanic hazard assessments
• Probabilistic risk assessments and safety assessments
• Structure, system, and component fragility analysis
• Performance assessments
• Detailed and abstracted process modeling (conceptual and mathematical) Application-oriented generic and tailored (e.g., site-specific) system software development
• Global and climate change impact assessments
• Seismic hazards assessments

We have applied risk assessment techniques to a variety of facilities and projects. We also can assist clients in simplifying complex risk assessment information for use in public outreach.