The political aspects of monitoring radioactive materials in the environment of our region E. Wirth, M Zähringer Federal Office for Radiation Protection, Freiburg, Germany Topical Day on monitoring of radioactivity in the environment April 2011, Oslo, Norway

The political aspects of monitoring radioactive materials in the environment and The special aspects of the Baltic Sea Region. (man made radioactivity only)

Limitation of the dose to the public: 1mSv per year from nuclear installations Derived maximum permissible releases per year fro NPP: Atmopsphere 3 x Bq/a arosolbound radionuclides 10 x Bq/a iodine x Bq/a noble gases (+ C-14 +H-3) Waste water 5 x Bq/a fission and activation products 5 x Bq/a H-3 Similar limits are specified for enrichment plants, fuel fabrication plants, research reactors or repositories accordingly. Site specific monitoring

Monitoring of effluents (stack and waste water) Environmental Monitoring Licencee has to demonstratre that dose limits are met. Emission monitoring ensures that maximum permissible releases are not exceeded. Conservative environmental dose model uses the measured annual release rates as input to prove that dose limits are met. The regulator has to control the measurements. Immission monitoring ensures that maximum permissible releases are not exceeded. The measurement program is not dense and frequent enough for a proper dose estimation of man but gives an independent additional check that doses calculated from emissions are indeed below the limit. According to “Richtline zur Emissions- und Immissionsüberwachung kerntechnischer Anlagen“

General environmental monitoring Decided in the aftermath of the Chernobyl accident Purpose: 1.assess contamination in the environment and 2.dose From recognizing 1.unknown sources 2.from accidental releases with impact in longer range (>25km) Goal: Keep doses as low as reasonably achievable, i.e. be precautionary According to: „Strahlenschutzvorsorgegesetz“

IMIS Routine Monitoring Program External radiation1800 Dose rate monitoring probes Inhalation40 Air measurement stations (DWD) Ingestion10000 samples of food, animal feed, drinking water. Measurements carried out by „Länder“ Additional measurements Mobile in-situ systems, River water, North- and Baltic Sea, Trace analysis Purpose also: Excersise and Training

IMIS Accidential Monitoring Program During plume passage1800 GDR probes report every 10 minutes + automatic nuclides specific measurements Sheltering, evacuation, thyroid blocking After plume passage1800 GDR probes + 27 mobile in-situ systems + 4 airborne systems, Food and feed sampling, particularly where contamination is of the order of EU limits Late evacuation, recovery, identification of critical areas, enforce food bans Late phaseDecrease of measurement frequency, Recovery, observe succss of countermeasures

German network of 1800 GDR probes Great interest of the public after the Fukushima accident, though no signal to be expected. Timeliness important, not verified data (!)

Trace analysis 1953 first detection of weapon test fallout at Schauinsland Kr-85 monitoring since > Global fissile material inventory (reprocessed Weapon-Pu) Participation in CTBT verification Strong CTBT support of EU (Joint action) Strong support for scientific and civil use of CTBT data

Aspects for the Baltic Sea Region Densitiy of German GDR network comparable to NL, A, CH, B but much more than F,E,GB and others. This shows different aproaches, i.e equal distribution vs. focus on populated areas

The EU monitoring program Dense networkSparse network = IMIS Routine monitoring program in Germany Few samples /sampling sites with high sensitive measurements Asses relevant contamination and representative levels in different media Observe low levels and trends, measure above MDC

How to overcome differences Agree on common objectives, not on unified programmes Clarify what can be achieved by environmental monitoring (and what cannot …)