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Atlanta, GA|Atlanta Marriott Marquis
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Fusion Science and Technology
Latest News
INL makes a case for eliminating ALARA and setting higher dose limits
A report just released by Idaho National Laboratory reviews decades of radiation protection standards and research on the health effects of low-dose radiation and recommends that the current U.S. annual occupational dose limit of 5,000 mrem be maintained without applying ALARA—the “as low as reasonably achievable” regulatory concept first introduced in 1971—below that threshold.
Noting that epidemiological studies “have consistently failed to demonstrate statistically significant health effects at doses below 10,000 mrem delivered at low dose rates,” the report also recommends “future consideration of increasing this limit to 10,000 mrem/year with appropriate cumulative-dose constraints.”
Kazuyuki Noborio, Yasushi Yamamoto, Satoshi Konishi
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 47 | Number 4 | May 2005 | Pages 1280-1284
Technical Paper | Fusion Energy - Nonelectric Applications | doi.org/10.13182/FST05-A865
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Using a 1-D particle code, we have analyzed characteristics of an Inertial Electrostatic Confinement Fusion device with external ion source which is added to enable low pressure operation. When the pressure becomes low, though neutron yield decreases, the decreasing amount is less than estimated from the decrease in background (target) gas density and it is confirmed that ions are accelerated efficiently with little energy loss through charge-exchange collision with background gas at low pressure. And when the pressure is lower than 0.05Pa, almost all injected ions reach to the cathode and it is expected that applying high geometrical transparency enhances accumulation of ion and enlarges neutron yield.