A HYBRID KNOWLEDGE-BASED SYSTEM FOR CHEMICAL INCIDENT MANAGEMENT

A methodology for the diagnosis and management of the effects of small chemical releases into the environment is presented This methodology, termed real world modelling by the authors, has been used to develop a prototypical knowledge-based system for managing such incidents. Thi s system processes explicit knowledge of different aspects of the rele ase, i.e. the geography of the release area, the nature and properties of released chemicals and the current weather conditions around the r elease site. These three areas act as separate modules controlled by a co-ordinating module which accesses the information held within them in producing recommendations on different aspects of the chemical rele ase, including corrective action, evacuation and routing, hazard area identification, medical symptomatology, persistency and risk assessmen t. The system has been developed in the logic programming language PRO LOG and utilizes a synthesis of different knowledge representation met hods, varying from modelling of simple databases to more complex aggre gation and inheritance. (C) 1997 Elsevier Science Ltd.