Quintessa has launched a new website, quintessa-online (www.quintessa-online.com). Quintessa-online is an initiative designed to explore the benefits of making scientific modelling tools available on the internet. Online modelling can:
Where online modelling can be very powerful is in presenting and demonstrating key principles that underlie more detailed mathematical models. For example, the key features of global climate change modelling could be demonstrated to interested parties with a simple model that allows them to consider the possible impacts of different levels of reduction from present-day CO2 levels.
Online modelling can also be very useful for other reasons. For example, there may be a need for a number of people in remote locations to have access to a single model that uses data that is frequently updated at a central location, e.g. environmental monitoring data or financial information. An online currency converter is an example of a very simple 'model' that works on these principles.
SafetyNet is the first scientific modelling tool to be made available at quintessa-online.
An important area of mathematical modelling is the analysis of the long-term behaviour of hazardous materials in the environment. Modelling allows the potentially harmful effects to people and the environment to be evaluated before they occur, allowing the hazardous material to be managed more safely.
Radioactive waste is one of the most important hazardous materials that need to be managed. Key inputs into decision-making for radioactive waste are assessments of potential future hazards ('performance assessments'). However, these can be very technical and opaque to the general public.
The SafetyNet example is a simple example of a performance assessment model that represents radioactive wastes in a near-surface repository. Although such models are very much more complicated, it captures some of the main pathways by which radionuclides can travel into the environment and represents the main features - the repository, the rock in which it is built, and environmental media like rivers, soil and plants.
Users can change characteristics to see how they affect the calculated radiation dose to a hypothetical person farming the contaminated land. This can help those unfamiliar with performance assessments to get a better understanding of the principles, as well as identifying key characteristics of the repository and the environment.