A regulatory perspective on the radiological impact of NORM industries: the case of the Spanish phosphate industry

Radioactive and chemical risks coexist in NORM industries although they are usually addressed separately by regulations. The European Union (EU) has developed extensive legislation concerning both matters, which has been diversely reflected in national policies. We consider the case of the Spanish phosphate industry and analyse to which extent regulatory mandates have reduced the historical and ongoing radiological impact on the environment of phosphate facilities. Although no specific radiological constraints on effluent monitoring and release or on waste disposal have yet been imposed on NORM industries in Spain, other environmental regulations have achieved a substantial reduction on the phosphate industry impact. Nevertheless, a more efficient control could be established by eliminating the current conceptual and practical separation of chemical and radioactive risks in NORM industries. We highlight research needs to accomplish so and propose shorter-term measures that require active cooperation among the regulatory bodies involved.     

Phospholipid fatty acid biomarkers in a freshwater periphyton community exposed to uranium: discovery by non-linear statistical learning

Phospholipid fatty acids (PLFA) have been widely used to characterize environmental microbial communities, generating community profiles that can distinguish phylogenetic or functional groups within the community. The poor specificity of organism groups with fatty acid biomarkers in the classic PLFA-microorganism associations is a confounding factor in many of the statistical classification/clustering approaches traditionally used to interpret PLFA profiles. In this paper we demonstrate that non-linear statistical learning methods, such as a support vector machine (SVM), can more accurately find patterns related to uranyl nitrate exposure in a freshwater periphyton community than linear methods, such as partial least squares discriminant analysis. In addition, probabilistic models of exposure can be derived from the identified lipid biomarkers to demonstrate the potential model-based approach that could be used in remediation. The SVM probability model separates dose groups at accuracies of ∼87.0%, ∼71.4%, ∼87.5%, and 100% for the four groups; Control (non-amended system), low dose (amended at 10 μg U L⁻¹), medium dose (amended at 100 μg U L⁻¹), and high dose (500 μg U L⁻¹). The SVM model achieved an overall cross-validated classification accuracy of ∼87% in contrast to ∼59% for the best linear classifier.     

Realistic retrospective dose assessments to members of the public around Spanish nuclear facilities

In the frame of an epidemiological study carried out in the influence areas around the Spanish nuclear facilities (ISCIII-CSN, 2009. Epidemiological Study of The Possible Effect of Ionizing Radiations Deriving from The Operation of Spanish Nuclear Fuel Cycle Facilities on The Health of The Population Living in Their Vicinity. Final report December 2009. Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación, Instituto de Salud Carlos III, Consejo de Seguridad Nuclear. Madrid. Available from: http://www.csn.es/images/stories/actualidad_datos/especiales/epidemiologico/epidemiological_study.pdf), annual effective doses to public have been assessed by the Spanish Nuclear Safety Council (CSN) for over 45 years using a retrospective realistic-dose methodology. These values are compared with data from natural radiation exposure. For the affected population, natural radiation effective doses are in average 2300 times higher than effective doses due to the operation of nuclear installations (nuclear power stations and fuel cycle facilities). When considering the impact on the whole Spanish population, effective doses attributable to nuclear facilities represent in average 3.5 × 10⁻⁵ mSv/y, in contrast to 1.6 mSv/y from natural radiation or 1.3 mSv/y from medical exposures.     

Inventory and vertical migration of 90Sr fallout and 137Cs/90Sr ratio in Spanish mainland soils

In this paper the inventory of ⁹⁰Sr in 34 points distributed along the Spanish peninsular territory is presented. Obtained values range between 173 Bq/m² and 2047 Bq/m². From these data set and those ¹³⁷Cs data obtained in a previous work the ¹³⁷Cs/⁹⁰Sr activity ratio has been established, laying this value between 0.9 and 3.6. Also the migration depth of both radionuclides has been analysed obtaining for ¹³⁷Cs an average value 57% lower than that obtained for ⁹⁰Sr.Additionally, this paper presents the results obtained in 11 sampling points in which the activity vertical profile has been measured. These profiles have been analysed to state the behaviour of strontium in soils and after, by using a convective-diffusive model, the parameters of the model which governs the vertical migration of ⁹⁰Sr in the soil, v (apparent convection velocity) and D (apparent diffusion coefficient) have been evaluated. Mean values obtained are 0.20 cm/year and 3.67 cm²/year, respectively.     

Aerial measurement of radioxenon concentration off the west coast of Vancouver Island following the Fukushima reactor accident

In response to the Fukushima nuclear reactor accident, on March 20th, 2011, Natural Resources Canada conducted aerial radiation surveys over water just off the west coast of Vancouver Island. Dose-rate levels were found to be consistent with background radiation, however a clear signal due to ¹³³Xe was observed. Methods to extract ¹³³Xe count rates from the measured spectra, and to determine the corresponding ¹³³Xe activity concentration, were developed. The measurements indicate that ¹³³Xe concentrations on average lie in the range of 30-70 Bq/m³.     

Geomorphometric study of the spatial organization of forest ecosystems

The use of an extended set of basic characteristics of the terrain topography for studying the spatial variation of a forest ecosystem has shown that it is significantly related to the terrain topography. The relationships with the topographic attributes determining the local hydrological and thermal conditions in the ecosystem has been paid special attention. Maps of ecosystem characteristics based on the observed relationships with topography have been calculated and drawn.     

Influence of peatland and land cover distribution on fire regimes in insular Southeast Asia

Anthropogenic biomass burning in insular Southeast Asia facilitates conversion and degradation of ecosystems and emits high amounts of carbon into the atmosphere. We analyzed the influence of peat soil and land cover distribution on the occurrence and characteristics of vegetation fires. Two years of satellite-based active fire detections over Peninsular Malaysia, Sumatra, Borneo and Java were examined together with land cover and peatland maps. Our results showed that fire occurrence nearly tripled (23,000 → 68,000) from a wet La Niña year (2008) to a drier El Niño year (2009). In both years, fires were concentrated in peatlands (in 2009 41% of fires vs. 10% of land area), and the majority of large-scale burning took place in peatlands. Variation in peatland land cover within the study area was noticed to create remarkable different fire regimes. Biomass burning in the intensely managed Sumatran peatlands was characterized by large-scale land clearance fires that took place annually to varying extent. The largely unmanaged degraded peatland ecosystems of Borneo, on the other hand, experienced very little fire activity in a wet year but were ravaged by large-scale wildfires when El Niño conditions arose. We conclude that fire regime characteristics in insular Southeast Asia are strongly connected to occurrence of peat soil and land management status. This leads to high variation of fire activity within this region both annually (depending on weather patters) and over longer time range (depending on land cover/management issues) and greatly complicates estimation of the effects of fires.     

Assessment of Uncertainty in Long-Term Mass Balances for Acidification Assessments: A MAGIC Model Exercise

Long-term (1860–2010) catchment mass balance calculations rely on models and assumptions which are sources of uncertainty in acidification assessments. In this article, we report on an application of MAGIC to model acidification at the four Swedish IM forested catchments that have been subject to differing degrees of acidification stress. Uncertainties in the modeled mass balances were mainly associated with the deposition scenario and assumptions about sulfate adsorption and soil mass. Estimated base cation (BC) release rates (weathering) varied in a relatively narrow range of 47–62 or 42–47 meq m⁻² year⁻¹, depending on assumptions made about soil cation exchange capacity and base saturation. By varying aluminum solubility or introducing a dynamic weathering feedback that allowed BC release to increase at more acidic pHs, a systematic effect on predicted changes in acid neutralizing capacity (ΔANC ca. 10–41 μeq l⁻¹) and pH (ca. ΔpH = 0.1–0.6) at all sites was observed. More robust projections of future changes in pH and ANC are dependent on reducing uncertainties in BC release rates, the timing, and extent of natural acidification through BC uptake by plants, temporal changes in soil element pools, and fluxes of Al between compartments.     

Integrated biological responses of zebrafish (Danio rerio) to analyze water quality in regions under anthropogenic influence

This study analyzed water quality in regions around Patos lagoon (Southern Brazil) that are under anthropogenic pressure. Water samples were collected from five different sites, including one used as a source for human consumption (COR) and others known to be influenced by human activities (IP). Danio rerio (Teleostei, Cyprinidae) organisms were exposed for 24 h to these water samples, plus a control group. It was observed that: (1) reactive oxygen species levels were lower in COR and IP than in the control group; (2) glutamate-cysteine ligase (catalytic subunit) expression was higher in COR than in other sites; (3) exposure to all water samples affected long-term memory (LTM) when compared to control group. Thus, some water samples possess the ability to modulate the antioxidant system and to induce a decline in cognitive functions, as measured by LTM. The obtained results indicate that a combination of variables of different organization level (molecular, biochemical and behavioral) can be employed to analyze water quality in impacted regions.     

Implications of geographic variability on Comparative Toxicity Potentials of Cu, Ni and Zn in freshwaters of Canadian ecoregions

Current methods of estimating potential environmental impacts of metals in hazard and Life Cycle Impact Assessment (LCIA) do not consider differences in chemistry and landscape properties between geographic sites. Here, we developed and applied a model for regional aquatic impact characterization of metals using an updated method for estimating environmental fate factor (FF), bioavailability factor (BF) and aquatic ecotoxicity factor (EF). We applied the model to analyze differences in Comparative Toxicity Potentials (CTPs) of Cu, Ni and Zn for 24 Canadian ecoregions. The combined impacts of regional variability in ambient chemistry (in particular DOC, pH and hardness) and landscape properties (water residence time) can change the CTPs of these metals for freshwater by up to three orders of magnitude and change the relative ranking of metal hazard between ecoregions. Variation among Canadian freshwater chemistries and landscape characteristics influence the FFs within two orders of magnitude, BFs within two orders of magnitude for Ni and Zn and four orders of magnitude for Cu, and EFs within one order of magnitude. Sensitivity of metal FFs to environmental parameters alone spans three orders of magnitude when a constant water chemistry was used for all ecoregions. These results indicate that application of regionalised metal CTPs can have a significant influence in the analysis of ecotoxicological impacts in the life cycle assessment of products and processes.