Legal Aspects of Natural Radiation

Publisher Summary This chapter describes the principles and basic requirements for radiation protection and safety applicable to all activities due to the exposure to elevated levels of natural radiation in general and exposure to technologically enhanced naturally occurring radioactive materials (TENORM) during production, maintenance, and decommissioning in particular. Workers employed by industry working with naturally occurring radioactive materials (NORM) and members of the public exposed to TENORM in products or waste also incur radiation doses from the natural radiation environment (NRE), either through direct irradiation from outside the body or radionuclides incorporated into the body, and therefore irradiation from within. For the treatment of the predominantly large amounts of very low level NORM waste, the concept of clearance has a certain attraction. This concept foresees clearance of radioactive materials from regulatory control at or below a certain level of activity concentration. The chapter provides a survey of recommended values for exposures attributable to practices, with the exception of exposures from natural sources that cannot reasonably be regarded as being under the responsibility of any principal party involved in radiation protection.