Monitoring to Support a Radiological Environmental Permit
Sam Watson is a member of the SRP Magazine Committee . She works in the Radiation Assessments Department of the UK Health Security Agency ( UKHSA ).
The discharge or disposal of radioactive material to the environment requires a radioactive environmental permit unless the activity is low risk and classified as exempt or ( in Scotland ) falls within a lower tier of regulation ( general binding rules , notification or registration ). Operators of nuclear and non-nuclear sites must therefore apply to the relevant regulator ( Environment Agency ( England ), Scottish Environment Protection Agency , Natural Resources Wales or Department of Agriculture , Environment and Rural Affairs ( Northern Ireland )) for a permit / authorisation for new or altered discharges to air or water , or for the disposal of solid radioactive wastes . In the case of discharges to air or water , applications must include information on the types and quantities of radionuclides to be released , dose assessments compared against applicable dose limits , and details of proposed monitoring and sampling arrangements . The radioactive substances activity may also require authorisation and supporting assessments to be submitted under other regulatory regimes , including the Ionising Radiations Regulations 2017 ( IRR17 ) and the Radiation ( Emergency Preparedness and Public Information ) Regulations 2019 ( REPPIR ).
Environmental regulators will require some form of assessment to demonstrate compliance with radioactive substances permits and authorised limits . This may include monitoring . Other monitoring objectives may be to assess doses to representative persons ; impacts on wildlife and the environment ; provide reassurance to the public and stakeholders ; assess
Radiation Protection Today Spring 2024
An extract from a sample Environmental Authorisation ( acknowledgement SEPA )
long-term trends ; detect abnormal , fugitive or non-permitted releases ; and to give an indication of the operator ' s performance .
Regulators take a graded approach to monitoring , with requirements proportionate to the quantities of radionuclides being discharged and the resulting level of risk . In addition to environmental monitoring , nuclear sites will be required to account for gaseous and aqueous discharges , which may involve flow measurement at the point of discharge alongside measurements of activity concentration .
In contrast , sites with lower impacts from discharges may not require such comprehensive monitoring . Many nonnuclear operators use a calculational process for determining their discharges rather than monitoring the discharges to sewer etc . directly . However , low-risk sites may still need to undertake comprehensive environmental monitoring in the short term if there are increases in discharge limits or changes to the radionuclides used and hence discharged .
As well as deciding which locations and parameters to measure / sample , the operator must determine how often and how to do so , and what the analytical and reporting requirements are . The table overleaf shows some types of monitoring that may be required .
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