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Re: Acerinox, was Re: Public info, risk perception and fear of nuclear
In fact the decontamination in Acerinox point of view of radiation
protection was well done, the the average individual occupational dose of
the personnel involved in decontamination operations, was 0.6 mSv and the
maximum individual dose was 3.5 mSv, for the 5 months period, and (no
internal contamination was found. My point was the lack of technical and
public information in terms of what have happened? - How many papers were
generated by the Spanish Regulatory Agency on this atypical incident? No one
word on lessons to be learned. Communication on competence dealing with
such cases is important to open mind of public and diminishing the fear of
radiation.
Your information about the activity of the source 3000 Ci seems to be
unrealistic comparing with the 1.500 Ci of the Radiological Accident in
Goiania, the worst radiological accident to date. About the source in
Acerinox , there is no one credible information (to my knowledge) concerning
the activity and or any information about study to evaluation.
In Brazil we had to discuss with scientific community and environmentalists,
press present, the amount of Cesium that was recovered, mathematical model
was developed and calculus was opened to any discussion. This was not an
easy task, because of the many foci of contamination, different of Acerinox,
anyhow your figure of activity seem to me unrealistic
Best Regards,
Jose Julio Rozental
joseroze@netvision.net.il
Israel
My point
----- Original Message -----
From: Marco Caceci <mcaceci@radal.com>
To: <radsafe@list.vanderbilt.edu>
Sent: Tuesday, March 12, 2002 7:19 PM
Subject: Acerinox, was Re: Public info, risk perception and fear of nuclear
Not much was ever told about that accident, but than again there was
probably not much to know.
According to our good friends at the Spanish Regulatory Agency (CSN.es),
that was a well managed case, though.
The radioactive cloud went out to sea, did a couple of turns to spare Ibiza
and the happy crowd there, and then turned up into France by a most devious
route.
It also coincided with a major release of toxic waste in a national park, so
that attention and money were diverted into providing relief to little birds
and unemployed seasonal workers.
By the time the alarm was given in Cadiz, I heard it said, the activity had
been so widely distributed (slag was partly recicled) as to make it
unreasonable to handle, hence the cost for cleaning that mess was zero.
50.000 men-hours looks realistic to me, its 20 men/years isn't it?
The only number I saw was an estimate that 3000 Ci Cs137 had been smelted.
Cannot remember the source of this news.
They were supposed to have a portal, and it seems it was out-of-order, but
sounded an alarm on a truck coming back.
Is it possible that if those noughty French hadn't spilled the beans nobody
would have noticed? And would that have been so bad after all?
Anyhow, there were no major panic scenes, nor protracted debate.
I checked on the cns.es website: no mention anywhere of the source strength,
they will invest some money into covering the dirt that was discharged into
a swamp with more (different) dirt, and they say they implemented better
controls, which has helped find a dozen or so moderately radioactive objects
in recycled metallic scrap. Good.
Marco
Dr Marco Caceci
Principal
LQC s.l.
Noorderbrink 26
2553 GB Den Haag
The Netherlands
Tel + 31 70 397 5653
http://radal.com
-----Original Message-----
From: owner-radsafe@list.vanderbilt.edu
[mailto:owner-radsafe@list.vanderbilt.edu]On Behalf Of J. J. Rozental
Sent: 12 March, 2002 15:28
To: BRISSON Nicolas; radsafe@list.vanderbilt.edu; pduport@uottawa.ca
Subject: Re: Public info, risk perception and fear of nuclear
Thank you for both information
As you have mentioned, once the network is totally independent from the
owner of the nuclear site, the credibility will be also important in terms
of public communication.
Such effectiveness can be demonstrated with the Incident of Acerinox. At the
end of May 1998 a Cs-137 source was melted accidentally in one of the
stainless steel production plant furnaces that the ACERINOX company has in
Cadiz (Spain), this activated alarm systems in southern France, the French
independent laboratory CRII-Rad (Commission de Recherche et d'Information
Independantes sur la Radioactivite) has detected high levels of
radioactivity coming from ashes of the factory of Acerinox and this was the
first indication of something was wrong. Even the Spanish Regulatory
Authority, Consejo de Seguridad Nuclear (CSN) didn't know at that moment. I
have papers on this incident, however there is no mention that the first
detection was out of Spain, this detail came from the press, (besides France
also Italy, Swissland and German have detected).
Inclusive Decontamination took 5 months, and 50.000 man-hours were necessary
to perform the whole work and approximately 2000 Ton of low level activity
wastes were produced in the decontamination, however there is no document
about the activity of the Cs-137 source.
If you have any other detail, please let us know, if possible
Jose Julio Rozental
joseroze@netvision.net.il
Israel
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