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The mission of the Decommissioning and Environmental Sciences (DES) Division is to promote the development and use of those skills and technologies associated with the use of nuclear energy and the optimal management and stewardship of the environment, sustainable development, decommissioning, remediation, reutilization, and long-term surveillance and maintenance of nuclear-related installations, and sites. The target audience for this effort is the membership of the Division, the Society, and the public at large.
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College students help develop waste-measuring device at Hanford
A partnership between Washington River Protection Solutions (WRPS) and Washington State University has resulted in the development of a device to measure radioactive and chemical tank waste at the Hanford Site. WRPS is the contractor at Hanford for the Department of Energy’s Office of Environmental Management.
S. Joseph Cope, Robert B. Hayes
Nuclear Technology | Volume 205 | Number 9 | September 2019 | Pages 1219-1235
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.1080/00295450.2019.1590074
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The alpha activity discrimination problem between radon progeny and transuranic (TRU) isotopes is evaluated at the times relevant for radiological emergency response using temporal decay properties. This study evaluates various effects from naturally occurring radon progeny creating alpha spectral overlap with the TRU region of interest. The methodology helps to address the potential masking of a radiological threat at worst or, at best, inhibiting response efforts due to delays caused by high levels of radon progeny. This work seeks to provide a rapid, conservative TRU estimation method in as little as 30 min. Surrogate TRU activity is introduced to the assays via check sources as a validation test for discrimination against varied levels of radon progeny collected on environmental air samples. A 2-h activity decay profile counting window was sectioned into multiple combinations of 30-min increments to investigate optimal counting segments and to simulate potential field-collection scenarios with limited resource availability. The experiment sought to discriminate low levels of introduced TRU activity comparable to the natural background on each sampled filter. Using this approach, the study confirmed the utility of the estimation methodology in as little as 30 min. Additional measurement time taken in the decay profile demonstrated marked improvements in both accuracy and precision of the TRU activity estimate as expected. Studies on the potential functional dependence of fitting parameters that influence the TRU estimate and associated uncertainty may improve further model development. The methodology is flexible to accommodate any gross alpha/beta scalar counter and is designed to be implemented within a graded approach based on time and resource availability present in the response. The estimation framework enables rapid air assay with a proper technical basis in times not currently realized in radiological emergency response.