Dose rate measurements around consignments of radioactive material

The International Atomic Energy Agency's (IAEA) Regulations for the Safe Transport of Radioactive Material require compliance with various radiation protection control measures and also require the competent authority to arrange for periodic assessments of the radiation doses to workers and to members of the public. It is a two-fold approach of controls and assessments. Periodic reviews of the radiological impact arising from the transport of radioactive materials by road, rail, sea and air, have been undertaken by NRPB on behalf of the UK Competent Authority. Dose assessments were made using estimated exposure times together with measured and extrapolated dose rates from 'near-field' regions close to consignments, 'mid-field' regions occupied by transiently exposed persons and 'far-field' regions occupied by members of the public. The results show that annual doses to workers and public are generally small fractions of dose limits. The exception is a small group of driver/handlers involved with packages for medical and industrial use. Compliance with the Regulations has ensured that a sufficient degree of control exists. Originally, most packages were small compared with the distances to exposed persons. Point source geometry was therefore used. More recently, it has been estimated that only a minority of all consignments of radioactive material is of sufficiently small dimensions for point source geometry to continue to apply. Instead, initial despatches of radionuclide packages can consist of consignments of several cubic metres in size, and only at tertiary despatch level would point source geometry prevail. However, for all physically large loads, the measured dose rates do not decline as rapidly as point source geometry would suggest based on the Tl value. Development of the methodology adopted by the IAEA Regulations over some 40 years has introduced parameters to compensate in part for these levels of dose rate, and, together with operational improvements in transport procedures and practices, have ensured that annual doses remain low, well below dose limits. The methodologies employed for Regulatory control measures and those for assessment of annual doses, differ with the former based on robust and conservative models. For dose assessment purposes, realistic data are used based on measured dose rates and exposure times. (author)