What kinds of emergencies could occur at a nuclear facility?
Similar to other industrial facilities, a nuclear facility may encounter failures involving mechanical equipment, electrical power, instrumentation and control systems, or personnel error. Although significant efforts are made to minimize these occurrences, it is certainly prudent to assume that failures will occur, and that plans and procedures should be in place to prevent the initial failure from causing additional failures or threatening public health and safety. Nuclear facilities contain radioactive materials within systems, structures, or components commonly referred to as “barriers.” Several of these barriers must fail before a significant release of radioactive materials can occur. The severity of an emergency at a nuclear facility then, can be linked to the number of radiation barriers which are being threatened or have been damaged. A diagram of the typical radiation barriers at a nuclear power plant is available here. Nuclear power plants, research and test reactors, nuclea
