[en] This report documents the results of the Routine Environmental Reaudit of the Argonne National Laboratory - West (ANL-W), Idaho Falls, Idaho. During this audit, the activities conducted by the audit team included reviews of internal documents and reports from previous audits and assessments; interviews with U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), State of Idaho Department of Health and Welfare (IDHW), and DOE contractor personnel; and inspections and observations of selected facilities and operations. The onsite portion of the audit was conducted from October 11 to October 22, 1993, by the DOE Office of Environmental Audit (EH-24), located within the Office of Environment, Safety and Health (EH). DOE 5482.113, open-quotes Environment, Safety, and Health Appraisal Program,close quotes established the mission of EH-24 to provide comprehensive, independent oversight of Department-wide environmental programs on behalf of the Secretary of Energy. The ultimate goal of EH-24 is enhancement of environmental protection and minimization of risk to public health and the environment. EH-24 accomplishes its mission by conducting systematic and periodic evaluations of the Department's environmental programs within line organizations, and by utilizing supplemental activities that serve to strengthen self-assessment and oversight functions within program, field, and contractor organizations

[en] The feedback experience of the Fukushima accident has led to 4 kinds of consequences. First, complementary assessment of safety have been performed in each nuclear facility to evaluate the safety margin for exceptional natural disasters. Secondly, the conformity to safety requirements of nuclear facilities has to be checked continuously because it can be altered by modifications made on the facility or by maintenance activities. Thirdly, the safety standard framework has to be upgraded in order to take into account some accidents in a cumulative way. Fourthly, the social, humane and organizational factors have to be taken into account and issues like sub-contracting, staff training,or the loss of expertise have to be dealt with. (A.C.)

[en] The report sets out the findings of the team which carried out the recent audit of health and safety at Dounreay. The audit was initiated on behalf of the Health and Safety Executive by the Chief Inspector of Nuclear Installations and followed an incident on 7 May of this year which left the 'Fuel Cycle Area' on the site without its normal electricity supplies for 16 years. The audit has shown that much has to be done to improve safety at Dounreay to bring it up to the standards HSE requires for continued operation of a nuclear installation and to enable Dounreay to be safely decommissioned and made safe for future generations. However, HSE considers that the site is under proper control under the nuclear licensing regime and presently safe; operations in the Fuel Cycle Area are shut down and they will need a Consent of HSE before they can restart. HSE believes that, subject to the recommendations in this report about organisation, management and training, the current staff at Dounreay have the knowledge, skills and commitment to enable Dounreay to operate safely and to bring it up to the standards that HSE expects. Consent to restart will only be given when the Chief Inspector is satisfied that an adequate safety case for operation has been made

[en] This paper discusses the program to train and develop a community of experts with the highest standards of professional practice in measuring, accounting, auditing and managing greenhouse gas emissions. Experts should operate with a common code of conduct and ethics, and provide the high levels of professional competency.

[en] In the framework of environmental management, the concept of voluntary environmental compliance auditing is not in itself a new development. Environmentally conscious firms have for more than a decade, undertaken voluntary audits to help achieve and maintain compliance with environmental regulations and to help identify and correct unregulated or poorly regulated environmental hazard. The firms undertaking the audits were motivated by a desire to mitigate legal and financial risks and/or the desire to be a highly responsible member of the corporate community. Much of the early attention to environmental auditing was in the chemical process industries. Today, there are four current trends affecting environmental auditing: (1) the practice is becoming widespread in all industry groups in both large and small firms; (2) environmental management and audit methodolgies and approaches are being codified in the form of written national and International standards; (3) environmental management programs and in-house audits are increasingly being certified by independent auditors (who are not associated with regulatory agencies); and (4) the certifications are being viewed as marketing and public relations tools. The adoption of ISO 14000 is destined to become the most significant development in international environmental management and auditing. International standards for the development of Environmental Management Systems and the execution of environmental audits do not currently exist. Individual countries, such as England and France, have national standards. One multi-national standard currently exists--the European Economic Community's Eco-Management and Audit Scheme (EMAS). The United States does not have a national environmental management and auditing standard

[en] Time, money and resources are being wasted completing alternative compliance evaluations that have already been completed, reviewed and accepted. As Codes and Standards are updated new requirements are introduced. Not all facilities will satisfy these requirements. The design criteria of the installed fire protection systems is valuable information that is being lost. Competing priorities at the facility impact design and operations. The reasons for these decisions are not always readily available. When new personnel are tasked with the fire protection, not all of the previous knowledge can be passed down. Fire protection reviews are mandated by the regulations / standards. These reviews rely on the site documentation and the knowledge of the current staff. Maintaining a database deviations, recommendations, resolutions, alternative compliance and analysis results is critical.

[en] The External Audit Group (EAQ) is established and supported by IAEA. Its main objective is to audit the accuracy of dose delivery to patients in radiotherapy centres or hospitals in developing countries in IAEA member states. At MINT the operation of EAG is managed by Medical Physics Group and supported by Secondary Standard Dosimetry Laboratory (SSDL), MINT. The selected radiotherapy centers are supplied with TLD powder in capsule form, to be irradiated with the required radiation doses, by their physicists. The irradiated TLD is analysed at SSDL. The result of the audit for a few radiotherapy centres in Malaysia, is presented in brief in this paper. (Author)

[en] The paper describes the International Safety Rating System (ISRS) and its application and suitability to auditing an organization's radiation protection arrangements. Particularly pertinent elements in the audit system are identified and briefly described. The benefits derived from the practical application of the audit are identified. (author)

[en] AIMS: To assess the quality of the imaging procedure requests and radiologists' reports using an auditing tool, and to assess the agreement between different observers of the quality parameters. MATERIALS AND METHODS: In an audit using a standardized scoring system, three observers reviewed request forms for 296 consecutive radiological examinations, and two observers reviewed a random sample of 150 of the corresponding radiologists' reports. We present descriptive statistics from the audit and pairwise inter-observer agreement, using the proportion agreement and kappa statistics. RESULTS: The proportion of acceptable item scores (0 or +1) was above 70% for all items except the requesting physician's bleep or extension number, legibility of the physician's name, or details about previous investigations. For pairs of observers, the inter-observer agreement was generally high, however, the corresponding kappa values were consistently low with only 14 of 90 ratings >0.60 and 6 >0.80 on the requests/reports. For the quality of the clinical information, the appropriateness of the request, and the requested priority/timing of the investigation items, the mean percentage agreement ranged 67-76, and the corresponding kappa values ranged 0.08-0.24. CONCLUSION: The inter-observer reliability of scores on the different items showed a high degree of agreement, although the kappa values were low, which is a well-known paradox. Current routines for requesting radiology examinations appeared satisfactory, although several problem areas were identified

[en] With the EEC Directive on voluntary Eco-Audits of 29 June 1993, the concept of eco-audits concept' has also become a major topic in Europe. The experiences made in the USA, where environmental audits have been performed for years already, is demonstrated in this article with a power plant. (orig.)