Modelling and mitigating dose to firefighters from inhalation of radionuclides in wildland fire smoke [electronic resource]

• Ngôn ngữ: eng
• Ký hiệu phân loại: 610 Medicine and health
• Thông tin xuất bản: Aiken, S.C. : Oak Ridge, Tenn. : United States. Dept. of Energy. Savannah River Site ; Distributed by the Office of Scientific and Technical Information, U.S. Dept. of Energy, 2015
• Mô tả vật lý: Size: p. 723-733 : , digital, PDF file.
• Bộ sưu tập: Metadata
• ID: 261163
• Chủ đề: 1. 60 applied life sciences; 2. 61 radiation protection and dosimetry; 3. 63 radiation, thermal, and other environ. pollutant effects on living orgs. and biol. mat; 4. Atmospheric dispersion; 5. Radioactive dose; 6. Radioecology

Tóm tắt

 Firefighters responding to wildland fires where surface litter and vegetation contain radiological contamination will receive a radiological dose by inhaling resuspended radioactive material in the smoke. This may increase their lifetime risk of contracting certain types of cancer. Using published data, we modelled hypothetical radionuclide emissions, dispersion and dose for 70th and 97th percentile environmental conditions and for average and high fuel loads at the Savannah River Site. We predicted downwind concentration and potential dose to firefighters for radionuclides of interest (<
 sup>
 137<
 /sup>
 Cs, <
 sup>
 238<
 /sup>
 Pu, <
 sup>
 90<
 /sup>
 Sr and <
 sup>
 210<
 /sup>
 Po). Predicted concentrations exceeded dose guidelines in the base case scenario emissions of 1.0 x 10<
 sup>
 7<
 /sup>
 Bq ha<
 sup>
 -1<
 /sup>
  for <
 sup>
 238<
 /sup>
 Pu at 70th percentile environmental conditions and average fuel load levels for both 4- and 14-h shifts. Under 97th percentile environmental conditions and high fuel loads, dose guidelines were exceeded for several reported cases for <
 sup>
 90<
 /sup>
 Sr, <
 sup>
 238<
 /sup>
 Pu and <
 sup>
 210<
 /sup>
 Po. The potential for exceeding dose guidelines was mitigated by including plume rise (>
 2ms<
 sup>
 -1<
 /sup>
 ) or moving a small distance from the fire owing to large concentration gradients near the edge of the fire. This approach can quickly estimate potential dose from airborne radionuclides in wildland fire and assist decision-making to reduce firefighter exposure.