Domestic nuclear power plants conduct radiological environmental impact assessments every year in accordance with the Nuclear Safety and Security Commission (NSSC) notice. Among them, gaseous effluents are evaluated for their effects due to inhalation, external exposure in the air, exposure from ground surface deposits, food intake. In order to evaluate the impact of this exposure pathway, an evaluation point for each pathway must be selected. In the case of evaluation points, each country has different evaluation points. In the case of Korea, the evaluation point is calculated on the assumption that one lives 365 days a year at the EAB and consumes food from the nearest production area. In the case of the United States, external exposure and inhalation are evaluated at the site boundary or the nearest residential area, and food intake is evaluated by assuming that food produced in the nearest residential area or the nearest production area is consumed. Currently, the dose evaluation is optimized and selected so that EAB evaluation point for each site includes 16 direction evaluation points for each unit. In the E-DOSE60 program currently under development, the evaluation point was selected by calculating 16 direction x number of units without optimization. The food intake evaluation point was selected as the point that satisfies the minimum farmland area of the U.S. NRC NUREG-1301 and is the shortest distance from the site. The location of the production point from multiple units in included all 16 directions for each unit and quantity of evaluation points was optimized to satisfy the shortest distance. It can contribute to improving the reliability of the E-DOSE60 program currently under development by selecting new evaluation points for evaluating inhalation and external exposure evaluation and selecting optimized dose evaluation points for each site for evaluation by ingestion.
K-DOSE60, a off-site dose calculation program currently used by khnp, is performing evaluation based on the gaseous effluent evaluation methodology of NRC Reg. Guide 1.109. In particular, H-3 and C-14, which are the major nuclides of gaseous effluent, are evaluated using a ratio activity model. Among them, H-3 is additionally evaluating the dose to OBT (Organically Bound Tritium) and HT as well as HTO (Triated water). However, NRC Reg. Guide 1.109 is a methodology developed in the 1970s, and verification was performed by applying the evaluation methodology of H-3 and C-13 presented by IAEA TRS-472 in 2010 to the current K-DOSE60. The IAEA TRS-472 methodology also includes OBT and HT for H-3. In order to apply the ratio radioactivity model presented in IAEA TRS-472, the absolute and relative humidity were calculated using the weather tower of the nuclear site and used for H-3 evaluation. For the dose evaluation of HT, the previously used Canada Chalk River Lab. (CNL) conversion factor was used. For atmospheric carbon concentration, the carbon concentration presented in IAEA TRS-472 was used, not the carbon concentration in the 1970s of NRC Reg. Guide 1.109. It was confirmed that the K-DOSE60, which applied the changed input data and methodology, was satisfied by performing comparative verification with the numerical calculation value.
Kr-85 has a half-life of 10.7 years and it stays in the atmosphere for a long time. However it does not accumulate as an noble gas but only emits beta particles. Therefore its contribution to environmental radiation dose is lower than any other radionuclides. Kr-85 is one of the main fission products produced by nuclear fission reaction and artificial radionuclide that does not exist in nature. For these reasons, monitoring Kr-85 from the atmosphere is meaningful so that the nuclear-related facilities are recommended to control and regulate environmental emissions. Post Irradiation Examination Facility (PIEF) which located in KAERI is a facility that conducts various material and chemical experiments using the irradiated nuclear fuels. Therefore, various radionuclides can present in gaseous effluent including Kr-85. To prevent the environmental hazards and guarantee the radiation safety of the public, nuclear facilities are recommended to be equipped with stack radiation/radioactivity monitoring system, so that the Kr-85 concentration in gaseous effluent is controlled within the regulatory criteria. Particularly, the Kr-85 concentration of gaseous effluent is commonly monitored by the stack monitoring system connected to the process ventilation system from the hot cell. The monitoring system supply the information such as beta count rate, dose rate and flow rate, etc. Due to the concentration of Kr-85 in gaseous effluent is subject to regulatory guide lines, a systemized procedure for calculating Kr-85 concentration of the stack exhaust is necessary. Furthermore, the emission should be monitored whether it satisfies the regulatory standard or does not. This paper performed discussion on the process of calculating the concentration of Kr-85 in the gaseous effluent of PIEF stack from the monitoring system (NGM209, MGP), and the amount of Kr- 85 over the last 2 years emissions was calculated. In addition to calculating effluent rate of radioactive Kr-85, the Minimum Detectable Concentration (MDC) and Decision Threshold (SD) were calculated. As a result, the calculated Kr-85 concentration was below the SD during the entire period. It is considered that there are no environmental emissions of Kr-85.