Canadian and United States regulatory models compared: doses from atmospheric pathways

CANDU reactors sold offshore are licensed primarily to satisfy Canadian Regulations. For radioactive emissions during normal operation, the Canadian Standards Association's CAN/CSA-N288.1-M87 is used. This standard provides guidelines and methodologies for calculating a rate of radionuclide release that exposes a member of the public to the annual dose limit. To calculate doses from air concentrations, either CSA-N288.1 or the Regulatory Guide 1.109 of the United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission, which has already been used to license light-water reactors in these countries, may be used. When dose predictions from CSA-N288.1 are compared with those from the U.S. Regulatory Guides, the differences in projected doses raise questions about the predictions. This report explains differences between the two models for ingestion, inhalation, external and immersion doses