Hazardous Materials Commodity Flow Survey

The US Department of Energy, Office of Packaging and Transportation, has conducted a number of highway Commodity Flow Surveys along the major shipping corridors it uses for shipment of hazardous (radioactive and chemical) materials, in response to requests from its transportation stakeholders. The objective of a Commodity Flow Survey is to collect data which can be analyzed to provide clear images, over time, of the types and amounts of hazardous materials shipments moving past a point along a transportation corridor. The information produced by such a survey can be an indispensible tool in helping emergency planners understand and identify the planning, training, and resource requirements needed to effectively respond to a transportation incident involving hazardous materials. This paper discusses requisites for conducting a useful Commodity Flow Survey and presents lessons learned on how results are developed and how insights on hazardous materials movements are gained through use of a survey. A key issue in the process is the care that must be exercised in planning and executing the survey, such that high data quality is achieved, with the result that the survey findings are clear and useful to transportation emergency planners. Among the activities described and discussed are: establishing survey location and objectives cooperatively with local emergency planners; establishing and training an effective survey team; survey data interpretation and analysis; and presentation of results as clear and persuasive images.