Report on the BWR owners group radiation protection/ALARA Committee

Conference · Wed Mar 01 04:00:00 EST 1995

OSTI ID:54663

Aldrich, L R ^[1]

---

1. Commonwealth Edison Co., Downers Grove, IL (United States)

Radiation protection programs at U.S. boiling water reactor (BWR) stations have evolved during the 1980s and early 1990s from a regulatory adherence-based endeavor to a proactive, risk-based radiation protection and prevention mission. The objectives are no longer to merely monitor and document exposure to radiation and radioactive materials. The focus of the current programs is the optimization of radiation protection of occupational workers consistent with the purpose of producing cost-effective electric power. The newly revised 10 CFR 20 defines the term ALARA (as low as reasonably achievable) to take into account the state of technology, the economics of improvements in relation to the state of the technology, and the benefits to the public health and safety. The BWR Owners Group (BWROG) initially formed the Radiation Protection/ALARA Committee in January 1990 to evaluate methods of reducing occupational radiation exposure during refueling outages. Currently, twenty U.S. BWR owner/operators (representing 36 of the operational 37 domestic BWR units), as well as three foreign BWR operators (associate members), have broadened the scope to promote information exchange between BWR radiation protection professionals and develop good practices which will affect optimization of their radiation protection programs. In search of excellence and the challenge of becoming {open_quotes}World Class{close_quotes} performers in radiation protection, the BWROG Radiation Protection/ALARA Committee has recently accepted a role in assisting the member utilities in improving radiation protection performance in a cost-effective manner. This paper will summarize the recent activities of this Committee undertaken to execute their role of exchanging information in pursuit of optimizing the improvement of their collective radiation protection performance.

• Research Organization: Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Washington, DC (United States). Div. of Regulatory Applications; Brookhaven National Lab., Upton, NY (United States)
• OSTI ID: 54663
• Report Number(s): NUREG/CP--0143; BNL-NUREG--52440; CONF-940505--; ON: TI95008770
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

21 SPECIFIC NUCLEAR REACTORS AND ASSOCIATED PLANTS
22 GENERAL STUDIES OF NUCLEAR REACTORS
ALARA
BWR TYPE REACTORS
OCCUPATIONAL EXPOSURE
OPTIMIZATION
OUTAGES
RADIATION PROTECTION