Environmental Radiological Impact of Nuclear Power. Monitoring and Control Programs

Radioactive contamination of the environment and public exposure to ionizing radiation may result from releases from programmed or accidental operations in regulated activities, or they may be due to preexisting situations such as contamination caused by past accidents, radioactive rain caused by nuclear tests, or increased natural radioactivity resulting from human activities. In many cases, both the emission sources and the environment should be monitored to determine the risk to the population and verify to what extent the limits and conditions established by competent authorities are being observed. Monitoring can be divided into three categories: monitoring of the emission source, of the receiving medium and of members of the public; individual monitoring of the population is extremely rare and would only be considered when estimated doses substantially exceed the annual public dose limit. In practices likely to produce significant radioactive releases, as is the case of nuclear fuel cycle facilities, the limits and conditions for monitoring and controlling them and the requirements for environmental radiological monitoring are established in the licensing process. Programs implemented during normal operation of the facilities form the basis for monitoring in the event of accidents. in addition to environmental radiological monitoring associated with facilities, different countries have monitoring programs outside the facilities zones of influence, in order to ascertain the nationwide radiological fund and determine possible increases in this fund. In Spain, the facilities that generate radioactive waste have effluent storage, treatment and removal systems and radiological monitoring programs based on site and discharge characteristics. The environmental radiological monitoring system is composed of the network implemented by the owners in the nuclear fuel cycle facilities zones of influence, and by nationwide monitoring networks managed by the Consejo de Seguridad Nuclear (CSN): Automatic Station Network (REA) and Sampling Station Network (REM). The CSN's biannual reports to Spain's Congress and Senate provide information on the results of the monitoring programs, and a summary of the results of the monitoring programs, and a summary of the results is posted on the Consejo's Web site to provide information to the public. The data are also sent on a yearly basis to the European Union commission and are published together with information form other member states. (Author)