Medical and radiological aspects of emergency preparedness and response at SevRAO facilities.

Regulatory cooperation between the Norwegian Radiation Protection Authority and the Federal Medical Biological Agency (FMBA) of the Russian Federation has the overall goal of promoting improvements in radiation protection in Northwest Russia. One of the projects in this programme has the objectives to review and improve the existing medical emergency preparedness capabilities at the sites for temporary storage of spent nuclear fuel and radioactive waste. These are operated by SevRAO at Andreeva Bay and in Gremikha village on the Kola Peninsula. The work is also intended to provide a better basis for regulation of emergency response and medical emergency preparedness at similar facilities elsewhere in Russia. The purpose of this paper is to present the main results of that project, implemented by the Burnasyan Federal Medical Biophysical Centre. The first task was an analysis of the regulatory requirements and the current state of preparedness for medical emergency response at the SevRAO facilities. Although Russian regulatory documents are mostly consistent with international recommendations, some distinctions lead to numerical differences in operational intervention criteria under otherwise similar conditions. Radiological threats relating to possible accidents, and related gaps in the regulation of SevRAO facilities, were also identified. As part of the project, a special exercise on emergency medical response on-site at Andreeva Bay was prepared and carried out, and recommendations were proposed after the exercise. Following fruitful dialogue among regulators, designers and operators, special regulatory guidance has been issued by FMBA to account for the specific and unusual features of the SevRAO facilities. Detailed sections relate to the prevention of accidents, and emergency preparedness and response, supplementing the basic Russian regulatory requirements. Overall it is concluded that (a) the provision of medical and sanitary components of emergency response at SevRAO facilities is a priority task within the general system of emergency preparedness; (b) there is an effective and improving interaction between SevRAO and the local medical institutions of FMBA and other territorial medical units; (c) the infrastructure of emergency response at SevRAO facilities has been created and operates within the framework of Russian legal and normative requirements. Further proposals have been made aimed at increasing the effectiveness of the available system of emergency preparedness and response, and to promote interagency cooperation.

Regulatory supervision of sites for spent fuel and radioactive waste storage in the Russian northwest.

In the 1960s two technical bases for the Northern Fleet were created in the Russian northwest at Andreeva Bay in the Kola Peninsula and Gremikha village on the coast of the Barents Sea. They maintained nuclear submarines, receiving and storing radioactive waste and spent nuclear fuel. No further waste was received after 1985, and the technical bases have since been re-categorised as temporary storage sites. The handling of these materials to put them into a safe condition is especially hazardous because of their degraded state. This paper describes regulatory activities which have been carried out to support the supervision of radiological protection during recovery of waste and spent fuel, and to support regulatory decisions on overall site remediation. The work described includes: an assessment of the radiation situation on-site; the development of necessary additional regulatory rules and standards for radiation protection assurance for workers and the public during remediation; and the completion of an initial threat assessment to identify regulatory priorities. Detailed consideration of measures for the control of radiation exposure of workers and radiation exposure of the public during and after operations and emergency preparedness and response are complete and provided in sister papers. The continuing requirements for regulatory activities relevant to the development and implementation of on-going and future remediation activities are also outlined. The Norwegian Radiation Protection Authority supports the work, as part of the Norwegian Government's plan of action to promote improvements in radiation protection and nuclear safety in northwest Russia.

[Results of radiation monitoring in Moscow]. / Rezul'taty radiatsionnogo monitoringa v Moskve.

The results of assessing the radiation situation due to global fallouts, obtained from measurement of 137Cs and 90Sr in over 400 samples from natural environmental objects in Moscow in 1979-1999 have indicated that the levels of the substances in the atmospheric fallouts are in agreement with the mean Russian levels and the mean annual activity of these radionuclides in the ambient air are 6 orders lower than the allowable values laid down in NRB-99. In Moscow, the mean effective dose of external exposure to natural and cosmogenic radionuclides is no greater than 1 m3v a year. The individual effective doses of internal and external exposures of the population to global fallouts averages 13 mu k3v a year.

[Radiation safety of the population and agricultural production industry (standardization of the radionuclide content of agricultural products)]. / Radiatsionnaia bezopasnost' naseleniia i agropromyshlennoe proizvodstvo (k voprosu o normirovanii soderzhaniia radionuklidov v sel'skokhoziaistvennoi produktsii).

The topical problems of standardization of the radionuclide content in food products and radiation control in agricultural production have been considered. The fundamental principles for establishing the permissible radionuclide concentrations in foodstuffs and acceptable contamination levels of agricultural land and products were justified.

[The subjective assessment by the population of the radiation risk]. / Sub''ektivnaia otsenka naseleniem radiatsionnogo riska.

The role of a subjective factor in the population's rating of various risk factors in radionuclide-polluted and radionuclide-free areas was studied. The residents from both areas consider to live in the radioactively polluted areas to be the first among risk factors. The coefficients of radiation risk rating by the population are 1.3-1.8.

[Characterization of irradiation levels of the population in the controlled areas 4 years after the Chernobyl AES accident]. / Kharakteristika urovnei oblucheniia naseleniia kontroliruemykh raionov za 4 goda posle avarii na Chernobyl'skoi AES.

Based on a summary of the radiation and hygienic control data, the authors suggest empiric mathematic models depicting the dynamics of the formation of external and internal radiation doses within the first 4 years after the Chernobyl NPP accident. It has been established that in the areas of rigid control, the mean radiation dose amounted, within the period indicated, to 3.5 kev, that due to external radiation to 2.67 kev; the collective dose for 273,00 population living in those areas constituted 9.6 kev.

[A radiation criterion of permissible living of the population in polluted areas]. / Radiatsionnyi kriterii dopustimogo prozhivaniia naseleniia na zagriaznennykh territoriiakh.

The authors review approaches to the basing of the "life dose" standardization as a criterion for "intervention" into the rehabilitation period after the disaster and the numerical value of that standard equal to 350 mev for 70 years. Relate principles that underlie the models of predicting estimated doses of external and internal radiation. The total estimated life dose is computed in accordance with the following formula: D(70)3 = 21 (4.5 x 10(-3) qm + 1) + 0.87 X 10(-4) sigma, mev, where qm is 90% quantile of the content of 137Cs in milk, Bq/l; sigma is density of area pollution, Bq/m2. The predicting model enables estimating the individual dose of the critical population group radiation. However, it cannot be employed for assessing the expected collective risk, the long-term somatic and genetic sequelae.