No abstract available

[en] The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has developed the Rapid Response program to perform time-critical removal actions and cleanups at federal hazardous, toxic and radiological waste sites. Rapid Response is a successful program which fills the niche between emergency response and long-term remedial action. The goal of Rapid Response is to be on-site and operational within thirty to sixty days after project acceptance. Omaha District is the home of the Rapid Response unit; however, the mission of this full-service organization is to conduct cleanups for federal agencies nationwide. Since the inception of Rapid Response in the fall of 1989, over ninety-three projects have been completed. Typical Rapid Response projects include; source control measures, contaminated soil excavations, waste drum cleanup and disposal, groundwater free product recovery systems, and underground storage tank removals. Project costs ranged from under $20,000 to over $5,000,000, with the average cost being approximately $621,000. Rapid Response customers include the: U.S. Army, Navy, Air Force, EPA, Department of Transportation, Interior, and Commerce

[en] The Nuclear Materials Development Facility (NMDF), building 055, was utilized for research, development, and production work on radiotoxic nuclear fuels, primarily ²³⁹Pu. The decision was made in FY 1982 to decommission the facility as part of the Department of Energy's (DOE's) Surplus Facilities Management Program. The intent was to decontaminate and decommission (D and D) the NMDF to the extent it would be suitable for unrestricted use. A project plan was prepared to describe the scope of the work, the techniques used, and the equipment needed for D and D. Activity requirements and detailed work procedures were prepared to define the work required on each major segment of the decommissioning. A facility description, history, and the special techniques used during D and D are given in this report. The more significant D and D activities, which include glovebox decontamination, support area contamination, and HVAC decontamination, are summarized in this document. The NMDF was decontaminated to levels that were as low as reasonably achievable (ALARA), but in all cases to levels below the limits prescribed for unrestricted use. The disposal of potentially contaminated NaK, contained in 10 bubblers that were used to purify the inert atmosphere of the glove boxes, also is discussed. The decommissioning of Rockwell's NMDF began in October 1982 and was completed in October 1986. Final surveys, waste shipments, and the final report were completed by March 1987. The final schedule for the project is shown in Section 5.0 (Figure 46). 48 figs., 8 tabs

[en] The first Active Cavity Radiometer Irradiance Monitor I (ACRIM I) experiment on the NASA Solar Maximum Mission (SMM) was launched in February 1980 and has monitored solar total irradiance on a nearly continuous basis since. Its objectives were to begin a program of long term solar monitoring with maximum precision and accuracy to compile a data base on total solar irradiance variations of significance to climate and solar physics. ACRIM I, the first flight experiment designed specifically for total solar irradiance monitoring, has produced a 4 1/2 year solar irradiance data base with 0.02% or better long term precision. Direct relationships between solar activity, solar global oscillations and solar total irradiance variability have been discovered using the ACRIM I results

[en] Uptake and depuration experiments for the edible periwinkle Littorina littorea have been performed using ¹³¹I-labelled seawater. Throughout the experimental phase the winkles were fed on unlabelled Chondrus crispus. ¹³¹I concentrations in winkles during uptake followed linear first-order kinetics with an uptake half-time of 11 days, whereas for depuration a triphasic sequence with biological half-lives of 4, 23 and 56 days was determined. In general, iodine turnover in winkles via labelled seawater appears to be slower than observed for other molluscs (2-3 days). Most of the activity prior to and after depuration is found to be in the shell, with indications that shell and soft parts accumulate and depurate ¹³¹I at a similar rate. The operculum displays the highest specific activity of all fractions with a concentration factor of 750 l kg^-1. Concentration factors for whole winkle, shell, soft parts and digestive gland are in the order of 40-60 l kg^-1, higher than the IAEA recommended CF value for iodine in molluscs of 10 l kg^-1. The ¹³¹I CF in winkles is closer to that of the conservative radionuclides ⁹⁹Tc and ¹³⁷Cs than the CF of the particle reactive radionuclides ^239,240Pu and ²⁴¹Am

[en] This report documents the readiness assessment for initial startup of the 300-FF-1 Remedial Action Task. A readiness assessment verifies and documents that field activities are ready to start (or restart) safely. The 300-FF-1 assessment was initiated in April 1997. Readiness assessment activities included confirming the completion of project-specific procedures and permits, training staff, obtaining support equipment, receipt and approval of subcontractor submittals, and mobilization and construction of site support systems. The scope of the 300-FF-1 Remedial Action Task includes excavation and disposal of contaminated soils at liquid waste disposal facilities and of waste in the 618-4 Burial Ground and the 300-FF-1 landfills. The scope also includes excavation of test pits and test trenches

[en] Multiple pulse NMR techniques are utilized to determine the amorphous fraction of polyethylene. The averaging condition of the multiple pulse experiment, t/sub c/parallelH/sub int/parallelvery-much-less-than1, where t/sub c/ is the cycle time and parallelH/sub int/parallel the magnitude of the internal interaction averaged by the multiple pulse sequence in question, allows for unique separation of the response of the protons in the amorphous phase from the response of the total system by means of appropriate adjustment of t/sub c/

[en] The first combined multiple pulse-magic angle experiment is reported in which both homonuclear dipole interactions and chemical shift anisotropies are removed to resolve chemically shifted fluorines. The sample selected was KEL-F.(AIP)

[en] Martin Marietta Energy Systems, Inc., manages the Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) for the US Department of Energy (DOE). Since ORNL's beginning in the 1940's, a variety of solid and liquid low-level radioactive waste (LLW), hazardous waste, and mixed waste has been generated. The solid wastes have been disposed of on site, primarily in shallow trenches called solid waste storage areas (SWSAs). SWSA 6, opened in 1969, is the only operational disposal site at ORNL for solid LLW. In 1984, SWSA 6 was closed for three months when it was discovered that wastes regulated by the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA) were being inadvertently disposed of there. SWSA 6 was then added to ORNL's Part A RCRA permit, administrative controls were modified to exclude RCRA regulated wastes from being disposed of at SWSA 6, and a RCRA closure plan was prepared. This paper describes the regulatory challenges of integrating RCRA,- the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act; and the National Environmental Policy Act into a cohesive remediation strategy while managing the project with multiple DOE contractors and integrating the regulatory approval cycle with the DOE budget cycle. The paper does not dwell on the recommended alternative but presents instead a case study of how some difficult challenges, unique to DOE and other federal facilities, were handled

[en] Full text: Littorina littorea following uptake from both seawater and seaweed (Chondrus crispus) has been developed and successfully tested. This relatively simple biokinetic model is capable of reproducing the uptake and release concentration profiles, uptake half times, biological half-lives, concentration factors and the basic differences in organ distribution observed experimentally by Vives i Batlle et al., and Wilson et al., using a unique set of calibration parameters. The model thus calibrated has also been found to provide a reasonable approximation to the available monitoring data for ¹²⁹I in winkles from the Sellafield area in the UK, spanning the years between 1950 and 2003. The model as a whole can be described as a first order linear differential equation system containing 12 compartments and pertaining to it is a set of 34 parameters encapsulating the calibration information generated from the laboratory experiments and knowledge of the local ecosystem. The model comprises sub- modules for the calculation of ¹²⁹I concentrations in the coastal ecosystem near Sellafield, food and the winkles themselves. Central to the design is a biokinetic sub-model for winkles containing compartments for the shell, gastro- intestinal tract, soft tissue and storage organs. The model is found to reproduce the uptake and release patterns observed for radioiodine in winkles. Specifically, the model returns uptake profiles compatible with an uptake half time of 11 days, as observed for winkles exposed to either (a) radioiodine in seawater or; (b) radioiodine ingested from radio- labelled Chondrus crispus. Additionally, the model returns release patterns compatible with the triphasic depuration sequence with biological half-lives of 4 days, 23 days and 56 days following uptake of radioiodine from seawater, and the biphasic depuration sequence with biological half- lives of 1 and 24 days following uptake from Chondrus crispus. A good degree of correlation between experimentally measured and modelled activities in winkles has been found. The model predicts correctly that, following ingestion from seaweed radioiodine partitions towards the soft parts in favour of shell whereas the opposite occurs following uptake from seawater. To represent the field situation a combined input from both seawater and seaweed was modelled. Under these conditions the model successfully predicts that the activity associated with the edible fraction of the winkles is only ∼20%, and that the majority (some 90%) of the activity retained by winkles will originate from seawater. Turning to comparisons with the available monitoring data for ¹²⁹I in winkles from the Sellafield coastal zone, we found that modelled edible winkle concentrations follow the general profile of the discharge as expected. The limited monitoring data available is approached by the model prediction which is given with a range of variation of typically ± 13%, as derived from confidence interval calculations. The model calculation is that for the period 1970-1974 activity concentrations of ¹²⁹I in winkles were low (< 0.1 Bq kg-1), then an increase occurred and a second plateau would be reached in 2003, with activity concentrations typically in the order of 1 Bq kg^-1. Beyond this, model runs with projected ¹²⁹I discharge scenarios for 2004-2030 predict that winkle concentrations will continue at about 1 Bq kg-1 until about 2022, followed by a sharp decrease of more than one order of magnitude in the ensuing 2 years. By 2030 ¹²⁹I concentrations would be stabilised at about 0.05 Bq kg^-1. Predicted committed effective doses to the West Cumbrian critical group of fish and shellfish consumers arising from the consumption of winkles as predicted by the model are low and have no radiological significance. The single 2002 annual dose reported by BNFL specifically for winkles at 0.36 μSv a-1 is close to the model prediction of 0.57 μSv a-1. Predicted annual doses due to ¹²⁹I in the winkles themselves, calculated using up-to-date doses to biota methodology, are also very low, peak doses being only in the order of 0.3 μGy a^-1. Clearly, in terms of the present model prediction, winkles are not at risk from exposure to ¹²⁹I under the current discharge regime. (author)