The general formulation of the environmental risk problem captures the
entire process of identifying the source term of the risk agent, its
fate and transport through porous media, estimation of human exposure,
and conversion of such exposure into the risk level. The contaminant
fate and transport is modeled using the solute flux formulation evalua
ted with its first two moments, which explicitly account for the spati
al variability of the velocity field, sorption properties, and paramet
ric uncertainty through the first-order analysis. The risk level is qu
antified on the basis of carcinogenicity using the risk factor (which
describes the risk per unit dose or unit intake) employed to the total
doses for individuals potentially consuming radionuclide-contaminated
groundwater. As a result of the probabilistic formulation in the solu
te flux and uncertainty in the water intake and dose-response function
s, the total risk level is expressed as a distribution rather than a s
ingle estimate. The results indicate that the geologic heterogeneity a
nd uncertainty in the sorption estimate are the two most important fac
tors for the risk evaluation from the physical and chemical processes,
while the mean risk factor is a crucial parameter in the risk formula
tion.