{"id":1478,"date":"2026-08-25T17:24:25","date_gmt":"2026-08-25T17:24:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/katmal.co.uk\/wordpress\/?p=1478"},"modified":"2026-08-26T06:46:05","modified_gmt":"2026-08-26T06:46:05","slug":"argos-a-decision-support-system-and-more","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/katmal.co.uk\/wordpress\/index.php\/2026\/08\/25\/argos-a-decision-support-system-and-more\/","title":{"rendered":"ARGOS &#8211; A decision Support system and more"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>I listened to a presentation on the ARGOS (Accident Reporting Guidance and Operational Support &#8211; <a href=\"https:\/\/pdc-argos.com\/index.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">https:\/\/pdc-argos.com\/index.html<\/a>) decision support system today (25\/08\/26).<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Their website tells us that ARGOS is useful throughout the entire disaster life cycle:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>During the&nbsp;<strong>Preparedness<\/strong>&nbsp;phase for planning, dimensioning and training &#8211; including evaluation of various &#8216;What-if&#8217; scenarios<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>During the&nbsp;<strong>Response<\/strong>&nbsp;phase by calculating prognoses about how the situation will evolve; what can be the consequences of the dispersion; what the proper emergency or evacuation zones are; etc.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>During the&nbsp;<strong>Recovery<\/strong>&nbsp;phase; what will be the effect of applying possible countermeasures; etc.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>In the&nbsp;<strong>Evaluation<\/strong>&nbsp;phase to study what could have been done better and how could the situation have evolved?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>The code is based on the RIMPUFF atmospheric dispersion modelling code (<a href=\"https:\/\/inis.iaea.org\/records\/2mgb1-mfy59\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">https:\/\/inis.iaea.org\/records\/2mgb1-mfy59<\/a>) but also has a model optimised for short urban distances (URD &#8211; useable for on-site doses, urban dirty bombs and chemical releases).<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The code is available from PDC-Argos in Denmark.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Tracing back to 1986 (following Chornobyl) the code has been constantly maintained and updated, new features have been added.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>It has customers through out the world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Its role as a decision support system is to predict where a radioactive plume will go and estimate the projected doses and avertable doses given a possible suite of protective actions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>On the simple interface you pick a location, a source term and a start time from pull down menus (you can add your own site locations and source terms).<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>You can have up to 1000 release points all with their own source term and time structure.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>You can model moving sources (see below) which is novel but, with the trend to build floating SMRs and nuclear powered shipping, potentially useful.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"602\" height=\"316\" src=\"https:\/\/katmal.co.uk\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/icebreaker-1.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-1480\" srcset=\"https:\/\/katmal.co.uk\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/icebreaker-1.png 602w, https:\/\/katmal.co.uk\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/icebreaker-1-300x157.png 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 602px) 100vw, 602px\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p><br>There are various output formats:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"602\" height=\"267\" src=\"https:\/\/katmal.co.uk\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/ARGOS-output.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-1481\" srcset=\"https:\/\/katmal.co.uk\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/ARGOS-output.png 602w, https:\/\/katmal.co.uk\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/ARGOS-output-300x133.png 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 602px) 100vw, 602px\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>You can input data from permanent monitoring stations (including EurDep) , or manual measurements. It is not clear it me how these relate to the dispersion modelling but nonetheless it can be valuable to have measured data and predicted results in the same place.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>It does food chain modelling, but to set up for a new region would be a significant amount of work. This allows you to predict where crops may exceed thresholds and for how long that situation would pertain.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>You can investigate food countermeasures and land remediation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>You can investigate other dose pathways and how they might vary with time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>You can also now set it up to undertake continuous calculations \u2013 automatically work through a whole library of weather data and export to spreadsheet for a statistical analysis of the dose end points.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Automatic running also allows you to have periodic (daily or hourly maybe) predictions of plume arrival times for different source locations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"602\" height=\"469\" src=\"https:\/\/katmal.co.uk\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/ARGOS-plumne-arrival.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-1482\" srcset=\"https:\/\/katmal.co.uk\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/ARGOS-plumne-arrival.png 602w, https:\/\/katmal.co.uk\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/ARGOS-plumne-arrival-300x234.png 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 602px) 100vw, 602px\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>This seems like a good code to have available in national response centres linked to the national meteorological centre and the national fixed monitor grid, preloaded with NPP locations and a library of sources terms from the safety cases of each. You would then need a skilled operator or two to update the data being fed into the model and interpreting the results and decision makers familiar with the output and the radiological implications of an airborne plume.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The initial role would be radionuclide plume footprint and arrival times (where to apply protective actions), followed by avertable dose as a function of time &#8211; checking protective action advice to confirm that it is of sufficient initial extent and is withdrawn in a timely manner.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>If you use the code in the planning stage to determine how big the emergency planning zones should be under different circumstances you would gain valuable experience in setting up the code and running it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>It can also be used in exercises, generating off-site radiological conditions for the umpire&#8217;s side and modelling the release footprint, arrival time and dose implications for the players.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>A useful code for a national response body and a nuclear utility to consider.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I listened to a presentation on the ARGOS (Accident Reporting Guidance and Operational Support &#8211; https:\/\/pdc-argos.com\/index.html) decision support system today (25\/08\/26). Their website tells us that ARGOS is useful throughout the entire disaster life cycle: The code is based on the RIMPUFF atmospheric dispersion modelling code (https:\/\/inis.iaea.org\/records\/2mgb1-mfy59) but also has a model optimised for short &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/katmal.co.uk\/wordpress\/index.php\/2026\/08\/25\/argos-a-decision-support-system-and-more\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">ARGOS &#8211; A decision Support system and more<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1,4,47,12],"tags":[48,51,49,50,27],"class_list":["post-1478","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blog","category-emergency-planning-advice-and-regulation","category-epr-computer-models","category-thoughts","tag-argos","tag-decision-support-system","tag-dispersion-model","tag-nuclear-emergency-planning","tag-protection-of-the-public"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/katmal.co.uk\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1478","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/katmal.co.uk\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/katmal.co.uk\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/katmal.co.uk\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/katmal.co.uk\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1478"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/katmal.co.uk\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1478\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1486,"href":"https:\/\/katmal.co.uk\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1478\/revisions\/1486"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/katmal.co.uk\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1478"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/katmal.co.uk\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1478"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/katmal.co.uk\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1478"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}