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Guidance for Conducting Expert Elicitation in Risk-Informed Decisionmaking Activities (NUREG-2255)

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Publication Information

Manuscript Completed: November 2024
Date Published: November 2024

Prepared by:
J. Xing
S. Morrow

Jing Xing, NRC Project Manager

Office of Nuclear Regulatory Research
U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission
Washington, DC 20555-0001

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Abstract

Expert judgment is often needed when the available data about a technical issue is sparse or not applicable, the issue has great uncertainty, or is too complex to model accurately. This report provides insights and guidance on the process of eliciting and integrating expert judgment, referred to as expert elicitation. The report is intended to be used by U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) staff when performing an expert elicitation to derive expert judgment that will be used as an input to decisionmaking activities. This report is based primarily on existing expert elicitation guidance, past experience of conducting expert elicitation, literature studies, and lessons learned from three pilot applications where the draft guidance was used to support the elicitation of parameter inputs for risk analysis methods and models. The report includes an introduction to expert elicitation and its use within the NRC, the basic principles of using expert judgment, guidance, and a recommended process for conducting a formal expert elicitation, and supplemental information based on lessons learned from research literature, existing guidance documents published by the NRC and other organizations, and recent expert elicitations performed by NRC staff. The principles and process described in this document are applicable to expert elicitation of estimating quantitative parameters and qualitative knowledge extraction such as Phenomena Identification and Ranking Table (PIRT). The report emphasizes that the ultimate objective of using expert judgment in decisionmaking activities is to appropriately represent the center, body, and range of the technical community's views about a technical problem. As such, expert elicitation should conform to the basic principles, regardless of the scope, level of effort, and the method or procedures employed for the elicitation process.

Page Last Reviewed/Updated Friday, November 22, 2024