DS529 - Investigation of Site Characteristics and Evaluation of Radiation Risks to the Public and the Environment in Site Evaluation for Nuclear Installations

This revised Specific Safety Guide will supersede and expand the IAEA Safety Guide NS-G-3.2, “Dispersion of Radioactive Material in Air and Water and Consideration of Population Distribution in Site Evaluation for Nuclear Power Plants”, which was published in 2002 to provide recommendations and guidance for investigations relating to population distribution, and on the dispersion of effluents in air, surface water and groundwater.

In 2018 the IAEA Safety Guide GSG-10, Prospective Radiological Environmental Impact Assessment for Facilities and Activities, was published, which provides recommendations and guidance on a general framework for performing prospective radiological impact assessments for all facilities and activities, to estimate and control the radiological effects on the public and on the environment.

The revised Safety Guide will provide guidance on the investigation of site characteristics and the evaluation of radiation risks to the public and the environment as part of the process of site evaluation of nuclear installations. It will directly support Requirement 12 (paras 4.38-4.40), Requirement 13 (paras 4.41-4.43), Requirement 14 (para. 4.46), Requirement 25 (paras 6.1-6.7), Requirement 26 (paras 6.86.10) and Requirement 27 (para. 6.11) of SSR-1.

The current Safety Guide NS-G-3.2 needs an update addressing the following aspects:

• Changes of the applicable safety requirements in SSR-1, SSR-3, SSR-4, GSR Part 3, GSR Part 4 (Rev. 1) and GSR Part 7;
• Considerations fulfilling the gap between the existing publication and the state-of-the-art practice in IAEA Member States;
• Evolution of the approach, methodology and techniques to evaluate the radiation risks to the public and the environment of nuclear installations also taking account of recent relevant IAEA publications on dose assessment and radiological environmental impact assessment for facilities and activities (in particular GSG-10 and the forthcoming update to Safety Reports Series No. 19). 

The scope of the revised Safety Guide will cover:

• investigation of site characteristics including population distribution,
• uses of land and water in the region of the nuclear installation site,
• background levels of radioactivity in the environmental media,
• meteorological, hydrological and hydrogeological characteristics of region of the nuclear installation site, which provide the input data to evaluation of the radiation risks to the public and the environment for nuclear installations,
• how to apply the existing IAEA guidance on radiological environmental impact assessment (including analysis of dispersion of radionuclides in atmosphere, analysis of transport of radionuclides in surface and ground water and assessment of overall radiological impact) in the process of site evaluation,
• feasibility of effective emergency response actions,
• application of management system for those activities.

The scope of the revised Safety Guide will also be extended to cover dose assessment. The scope will address all nuclear installations, as defined in the IAEA Safety Glossary.