During 10-11 October 1957 a fire in the core of a nuclear reactor at Windscale Works, Sellafield (in the current county of Cumbria, England) led to a significant release of radioactive material to atmosphere. The accident at Windscale No. 1 Pile required a large-scale environmental monitoring programme to be conducted and the results of this survey led to a restriction on the distribution of milk from an area adjacent to Windscale Works for a period of several weeks. This monitoring programme was described in detail by H J Dunster and his colleagues from the Industrial Group of the United Kingdom Atomic Energy Authority (which operated Windscale Works in 1957) in a paper presented to the Second United Nations International Conference on the Peaceful Uses of Atomic Energy, held in Geneva during 1-13 September 1958. The paper, from the proceedings of this conference, is reproduced here.
The purpose and the objections to surface Contamination measurements are reviewed. The need for permissible values in this field is evident and the general basis of the derivation of the values in use in the United Kingdom is discussed. Surface contamination can provide an indicator of the degree of control which is being maintained over operations with radioactive materials and, in most cases, is a reliable indication of whether air monitoring is required.
The concept of a constraint on individual doses to be applied in the process of the optimisation of protection was included in the 1990 recommendations of the International Commission on Radiological Protection. The concept was not new, having been established at least as early as 1973. A dose constraint as understood by ICRP is not a subsidiary limit on the dose to individuals, nor is it a form of investigation level. It is a prospective tool forming an integral part of the procedure of the optimisation of protection. The choice of the magnitude of a constraint is not easy and only general guidance has been forthcoming. It is to be hoped that authorities making such choices will give open explanations of their decisions.
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