Ambient office  =  91 nanosieverts per hour

Ambient outside = 131 nanosieverts per hour

Soil exposed to rain water = 133 nanosieverts per hour

Broccoli from Central Market = 86 nanosieverts per hour

Tap water = 100 nanosieverts per hour

Filter water = 86 nanosieverts per hour

Dover sole – Caught in USA = 119 nanosieverts per hour

       Both the U.S. and the Soviet Union contaminated a lot of research and production sites in their development of nuclear weapons. While the U.S. sites are inside the U.S., many of the Soviet sites were in member states of the Soviet Union such as Ukraine, Kazakhstan, Georgia and others. The Soviet nuclear weapons development left radioactive sources, radioactive materials and sites contaminated by radioactive substances in Georgia.
       Georgia currently uses radioactive sources for medical and industry applications. It also managed radioactive waste facilities. A research reactor called the IRT-M was operated between 1959 and 1989. The IRT-M was decommissioned in 2016 with the support of the International Atomic Energy Agency. Since 2007, a centralized storage facility has been in operation. The facility manages radioactive waste from the decommissioning of IRT-M and other radioactive materials from activities in Georgia. An older facility at Saakadze contains a significant quantity of radioactive wastes and is considered to be a storage facility. The Georgian Ministry of Defense also keeps some low activity disused radioactive sources.
       A campaign was carried out in the early 2000s to identify and collect the radioactive waste in Georgia. Georgia began work in 2013 on complying with fundamental international requirements for handling nuclear materials and waste. One such requirement is the legal framework for nuclear safety and radiation protection.
        Georgia created an independent government agency and an organization that will be responsible for dealing with radioactive waste. The new Georgian regulatory agency developed a national strategy for managing all of the radioactive waste and the Georgia government formally adopted it in 2016.
        Now that Georgia has achieved compliance with fundamental international requirements, the EU has approved a million dollars in funding for the Georgian cleanup project. The money will be spent to site and develop a preliminary design for a new processing facility and an interim storage site for radioactive waste in Georgia.
       Now the Swedish Radiation Safety Authority (SRSM) has embarked on an international procurement process to design facilities to manage the legacy radioactive wastes in Georgia from the Soviet era. The SRSM will be coordinating the two-year European Union project. SRSM will also provide one sixth of the one million dollar funding. Christopher Walden from the SRSM’s Office for International Relations said that it is novel for a nuclear regulator to lead this type of project. He also said, “Apart from project management and facilitating, our experts are assisting as advisers and support for Georgia’s radiation safety authority.”
       The location of all the radioactive waste in Georgia has been mapped. A proposal has been made to site an interim storage facility and a processing facility. Hearings have been held for the public and stakeholders to discuss and comment on the proposal. SRSM is now working on the procurement process for the design of the interim storage facility and processing facility.
        The final goal of the SRSM Georgian project will be a preliminary design for a future waste storage site. There will also be a decision in principle from the government that will demonstrate its commitment to proceed with the construction of this site.

Ambient office  =  79 nanosieverts per hour

Ambient outside = 123 nanosieverts per hour

Soil exposed to rain water = 125 nanosieverts per hour

Avocado from Central Market = 88 nanosieverts per hour

Tap water = 86 nanosieverts per hour

Filter water = 72 nanosieverts per hour

      I have written in the past about the French utility company EDF and the problems they have had with welding on nuclear components at the nuclear reactor under construction in Flamanville, France.
      Construction of the Unit 3 nuclear reactor at Flamanville began in December of 2007. It is based on the Areva European Pressurized Reactor design and will have a one thousand six hundred and fifty-megawatt capacity. There have been many problems with the project, and it is way over budget and way behind schedule.
       In January of 2018, it was discovered that some of the welds in the secondary cooling circuit did not meet the necessary specifications. The French Nuclear Safety Authority (ASN) requested that EDF check other components and systems for substandard welds. This caused a delay in hot testing of the reactor until early 2019.
       The Institute for Radiological Protection and Nuclear Safety (IRSN) is the French public service expert in nuclear and radiation risks and its activities cover all the related scientific and technical issues. The IRSN has recommended that EDF repair all the faulty welds that have been discovered at Flamanville. This could cost EDF hundreds of millions of dollars and further delay the completion of Unit 3. The ASN will issue a ruling on this recommendation as early as June of this year. It is likely that they will follow the IRSN recommendations.
       A statement released by the IRSN said, “Given the importance of the identified defects, the IRSN has concluded that EDF, rather than trying to justify that the weldings are fit for service in their current state, should proceed to repair the weldings.”
       The ASN issued a statement in which they said that a group of independent nuclear experts has also recommended that EDF either redo all the faulty welds at Flamanville or improve the design of the Unit 3 reactor so that it could withstand the rupture of the welds.
       EDF released a statement to the effect that if the recommendations of the expert are implemented, it could have a serious effect of Unit 3’s commissioning schedule and ultimate cost. In July of 2018, EDF said that the welding problems increased the total estimated cost by four percent to about twelve billion dollars. The original cost estimate before construction began was about three billion three hundred million dollars.
       EDF planned on redoing fifty-three of the bad welds in the reactor’s secondary circuit. They hoped that they could convince the ASN that ten other welds in question were actually sufficient and did not need to be redone. ASN said in January of 2019 that they had questions about the quality of eight other welds on pipes that run between the Unit 3 reactor building and the turbine building.
       The Flamanville Unit 3 reactor has also been criticized because there is too much carbon in the steel of the reactor containment vessel which makes it more brittle and about half as strong as it needs to be to meet ASN standards.
       It is simply unacceptable that reactors built by EDF cannot meet industry standards and specifications. Nuclear component and reactor manufactures must be held accountable for their shoddy work and, if they are unable to comply with regulations, they should go out of business.

Ambient office  =  110 nanosieverts per hour

Ambient outside = 102 nanosieverts per hour

Soil exposed to rain water = 102 nanosieverts per hour

Crimini mushroom from Central Market = 136 nanosieverts per hour

Tap water = 142 nanosieverts per hour

Filter water = 128 nanosieverts per hour

        The siting and licensing of a nuclear power plant is a lengthy, complicated and expensive process. In the U.S. it can take up to ten years to make all the preparations necessary for the construction of a nuclear power plant. Each nation that utilizes nuclear power has its own licensing process although there has been work on standardizing the process across the globe.
        Nuclear power reactors around the world are being modernized and having their licenses lifetimes extended. Now, more than ever, it is critical than ever for the nuclear industry to be able to utilize and rely on standard high-quality components being used in other industries that required a high level of safety and reliability. Finland has a well-deserved reputation for high safety standards and continuous improvement in nuclear power plant safety and efficiency. Currently, Finland is trying to streamline the process of nuclear licensing.
       Finland’s nuclear industry as well as other related companies in European countries are intent on creating an efficient and reliable supply chain of structures, systems and components that can be used to maintain and modernize their nuclear reactor fleets. They also believe that the long and difficult licensing process for nuclear power reactors and their components needs to be made more efficient. They want to retain their current high level of safety and efficiency in the nuclear industry while making the licensing process more efficient, shorter and less expensive. A three-stage solution has been proposed with the name KELPO.
       The first phase would involve a change to the scope of supervision. Authority supervision will be concentrated on higher safety classes and on plant and system levels. The license holder’s responsibility would focus more on the equipment level in the lower safety classes.
       The second phase would reduce the overlap between the work done by separate license holders while cooperation between license holders would be supported. National approvals would be introduced in the Finnish nuclear industry.
       The third phase would introduce new methods to change practices in the nuclear industry so that they would be closer to practices on other industries. The requirements for equipment suppliers and manufactures would be clarified. Methods and standards similar to those in other industries would be utilized.
       Pilot projects are being planned to test out the new methods which will be developed and placed in practices with cooperation between the license holders and the Finnish regulatory agency STUK. A pilot project for dealing with the licensing and qualification of mechanical equipment is already in operation. Similar projects involving electrical and information and control equipment are scheduled to begin soon. These pilot projects will help identify needed changes to the methods, legislation, regulation and existing practices.
       The Finns also intend to share the results of their program with other European nations. Initiatives similar to the KELPO project are being developed in other European countries. FORATOM, the European nuclear trade association in assisting in these projects. These new programs to streamline the nuclear licensing process are also aimed at making it easier to license and construct the new small modular reactors (SMR) that are under development. One important goal is to standardize licensing across multiple nations to enable components for the new SMRs to be licensed and built in several different countries before final assembly.