[en] Radiation is nowadays used in many applications in industry and medicine; accidental exposure, however, can have grave consequences as large doses of radiation occur in the 600 accelerator or gamma source plants in use around the world. This film explains the operation of irradiation plants and the safety procedures that must be followed to prevent accidents and to ensure safe use

[en] A conference covering aspects of industrial plant design. Included are papers on nuclear fuel reprocessing plants. (u.k.)

[en] In Volume II, a quality assurance (QA) guideline, recommendations for a QA system are offered in more detail. The basis of the QA guideline is the German Pressure Vessel Ordinance, together with the related regulations and the common procedures used in chemical plant engineering and construction. This gives advice for the organization and content of the overall requirements to be given by the owner to the manufacturer. Further, it comprises detailed informations for the activities of the manufacturer and the independent inspectors. (orig./HP)

[en] Several questions were raised following the speakers' presentations. The question arose as to whether Congress should have let the 1986 milestone in the original Act occur, rather than drafting the Amendments Act in an effort to alleviate a potential problem. Generally, response held that allowing things to run their course would have raised pertinent issues, caused conflict, and ultimately resulted in negotiation and compromise. A question was raised about managing the transition from public involvement and participation to actual negotiations. The speakers responded that negotiation is a necessary step after informing the public. Letting people vent their frustrations is important but does not solve the problems. Controversy can result from public participation as easily as may consensus, because of value disagreements. The next step is to bargain and negotiate after the information is shared. The speakers were then asked how they felt about enforced (by state statute) mediation. All speakers responding felt that by building in mandatory mediation, the process is hurt more than helped. Mediation only works if all parties want it

[en] This document, Volume IV Book XII, contains calculations for the shielding analysis of a monitored retrievable storage facility. (KS)

[en] This paper provides a point/counterpoint view of a quality assurance director and a project manager. It presents numerous aspects of quality assurance requirements along with analyses as to the value of each

[en] Research suggests that certain regions of the US will face shortages of hazardous waste disposal facilities within the next decade. Two primary factors that interfere with state officials ability to develop an effective hazardous waste disposal facility siting program are inconsistencies in federal regulations and public opposition. This paper examines the technical and political inputs to the siting process. Specifically, it targets inconsistencies in federal regulations and the issue of reducing public opposition by deriving minimum site location standards from a review of standards of thirty-two states that are greater than existing federal regulations. The authors conclude that neither technical site-specific criteria nor public involvement alone can assure facility location approval. However, a combination of considerable host community involvement and technical site-specific criteria may increase the probability of site approval. A decision methodology based on these conclusions is proposed to aid developers in selecting sites for hazardous waste disposal facilities

[en] Environmental justice is a term that has developed as a result of our need to address whether some of the environmental decisions we have made -- and others we will make -- are fair. The idea of environmental justice has been actively pursued by the Clinton Administration, and this consideration has resulted in Executive Order 12898, which was signed by President Clinton on February 11, 1994. The Executive Order calls for adverse impacts of Federal actions on minority or low-income populations to be identified before decisions implementing those actions are made. Numerous studies show that noxious facilities, such as incinerators and landfills, have been constructed in minority or low-income communities. And since the Department has not yet decided on sites for high-level waste storage or disposal facilities, it will have to take the new Executive Order into consideration as another piece in the complicated quilt of requirements that cover facility siting. An interesting twist to this is the fact that twenty Native American Indian Tribes expressed interest in voluntarily hosting a high-level radioactive waste management facility for temporary storage. They made these expressions on their own initiative, and several Tribes continue to pursue the idea of negotiations with either the Federal Government or private entities to locate a temporary storage site on Tribal land. The Executive Order goes beyond simply studying the effect of siting a facility and addresses in spirit a criticism that the Federal Government has been guilty of open-quotes environmental racismclose quotes in its siting policies -- that it has intentionally picked minority or low-income communities for waste management facilities. What Department of Energy staff and others may have considered foregone conclusions in terms of interim storage facility siting and transportation options will have to be reevaluated for compatibility with provisions of the new Executive Order

[en] Short communication

[en] We are studying the isotope dilution gamma-ray spectrometry (IDGS) technique for the simultaneous measurement of concentrations and isotopic compositions for both plutonium and uranium in highly irradiated spent-fuel dissolver solutions at a reprocessing plant. Experiments have demonstrated the applicability of the IDGS technique to determining the plutonium concentration and isotopic compositions in dissolver solutions. The chemical separation and recovery methods for just plutonium were anion exchange and resin beads. To keep both plutonium and uranium in the sample for simultaneous measurements, a new sample preparation method has been studied and developed. The new sample preparation method currently under development uses 30% tri-n-butyl phosphates-n dodecane to separate uranium and plutonium from fission products and then uses silica resins coated by TOPO/cyclohexane to recover both uranium and plutonium. More than 30 samples including four unspiked and four spiked dissolver solutions, pure uranium, and five U/Pu mixed-oxide solutions were prepared and measured by high-resolution gamma-ray spectrometry