Mathematical modeling and evaluation of the safety culture for the operating nuclear power plants in China: Critical review and multi-criteria decision analysis.

• Safety culture and its assessment were primarily required for the ONPP. • MCDA (Multiple Criteria Decision Analysis) was adopted for assessing nuclear safety culture. • An assessment index and model for the nuclear safety culture were implemented. • FTOPSIS method was applied to arrange different positions. • Present research could benefit the safety culture constructions of the ONPP. The health and safety of an operating nuclear power plant (NPP/ONPP) is its important objective and task, which is usually accomplished by strengthening nuclear safety culture (NSC). With the objective to establishing an effective system of NSC assessment (NSCA) index, the present paper adopts the method of multiple criteria decision analysis (MCDA) and constructs a NSCA model in order to rank the NSC level of different job positions. It first of all applies a combination of fuzzy decision-making trial and evaluation laboratory (FDEMATEL) and fuzzy network analytic process (FNAP) to determine the weights of the different indexes of the NSC, on the basis of which the NSC level of the selected seven job positions of an ONPP is ranked by employing the fuzzy technique for order performance by similarity to ideal solution (FTOPSIS) method. The results thus obtained demonstrate that the safety culture level of general manager was the highest, whereas that level of field operator was the lowest. In addition, it was necessary to systematically strengthen employee responsibility awareness and scientific management decision-making process. In brief, the present research and procedure could facilitate the establishment of a healthy safety culture, and effectively improve organizational safety culture and become a bulwark against safety accidents in the ONPP. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]