Report to Local Liaison Committee on radioactive discharges and environmental monitoring, 2002

This report is produced by UKAEA for the Harwell Local Liaison Committee and details the discharges made by UKAEA at Harwell and results from the environmental monitoring programme. The report covers the calendar year 2002. UKAEA Harwell disposes of radioactive wastes within authorisations under the Radioactive Substances Act 1993. These cover discharges to atmosphere, discharges to the River Thames and disposal by transfer to Drigg. All discharges have been within authorised limits extant during 2002. In late 1998 an application for revised authorisations was submitted to the Environment Agency (EA). New limits were put in place under a new single (multimedia) authorisation that came into effect in May 2003. Throughout the report, the significance of discharges and measurements of concentrations of radioactivity in environmental media are assessed by comparison with Generalised Derived Limits (GDLs) published by NRPB. GDLs define the amount of radioactivity that would equate to the public dose limit of 1000 μSv/y. The most recent NRPB GDLs published in early 1998 are used in this report. NRPB advise that further investigation need not be carried out if measurements are less than 10% of the GDL. Measurements made during 2002 were substantially below this level in nearly all cases. The environmental monitoring programme undertaken by UKAEA is partly funded by some of the tenants on the site, noteably AEA Technology, Harwell Scientifics and EBIS lotron. These organisations operate under separate authorisations to discharge radioactivity to the atmosphere and in some cases transfer liquid and solid wastes to UKAEA. (author)