A model-based approach to operational event groups ranking

The operational experience (OE) feedback provides improvements in all industrial activities. Identification of the most important and valuable groups of events within accumulated experience is important in order to focus on a detailed investigation of events. The paper describes the new ranking method and compares it with three others. Methods have been described and applied to OE events utilised by nuclear power plants in France and Germany for twenty years. The results show that different ranking methods only roughly agree on which of the event groups are the most important ones. In the new ranking method the analytical hierarchy process is applied in order to assure consistent and comprehensive weighting determination for ranking indexes. The proposed method allows a transparent and flexible event groups ranking and identification of the most important OE for further more detailed investigation in order to complete the feedback. (orig.)