Radiation protection aims to ensure safety of workers and population exposed to ionizing radiation arising from  industrial contexts or environment. Fismeco’s, Professionals (Qualified Experts) are actively committed to ensuring all kind of support in compliance with the national regulations.

In particular:

• All legal procedures and fufillments regarding radioactive sources management
• Occupational radiation protection through the support of his Experts/Qualified Experts
• Individual and environmental dosimetry for all workers and people potentially exposed at ionizing radiation
• Design of dedicated sites for radioactive sources detention
• Procedures and protocols to evaluate environmental radioactivity levels (also including Radon)
• Radioactive waste disposal
• Development of specific emergency plans in conjunction with the use of radioactivity sources
• Accomplishments foreseen for the radioactive materials transportations : authorized carriers;

RADON MEASUREMENTS

Radon (physical symbol Rn-222) is known to be the main cause of the radiation doses to people arising from natural environment.Radon is a colorless and odorless radioactive gas that is produced in the natural radioactive decay chain of uranium (U-238), see aside, thus developing itself within solid matrices or containing solid particles.Due to its gas nature, Radon tends to escape from its matrix and contaminate the environment,it mixes with the air we breathe and radioactively decaying inside our lungs, where the particles emitted determine more damage.

Particular attention is paid to the measurements regarding Radon contamination, both environment and matrices. Matrices contaminated with radon (water, building materials, …) are analyzed by Gamma Spectrometry, (please see the related section). The aerial Radon contamination, instead, is treated in a particular way depending on the scope:

1. Investigation on environmental Radon pollution with the aim to solve the problem
2. Few days sampling of places with suspected Radon contamination
3. In risk assessment due to long stay of people in rooms with presence of radon

SCRAP METAL

Qualified experts are professional operating into the field of ionizing radiation measurement and evaluation of their exposure consequences, they are fully involved in the measurement and management processes in order to identify any possible trace of irregular radioactivity in the scrap metal or in materials cargo destined to the landfill and / or incinerators. Among the roles:

Identification of irregular radioactivity and its related sources, the management of contamined materials and relations with the supervisory authorities in order to define the procedures for the recovery of the sources and their securing.

All these activities require the involvement of Qualified Expert and in many circumstances are his responsibility, even in collaboration with public authorities.

LAW ACCOMPLISHMENTS IN RADIOACTIVE MATERIALS TRANSPORTATION : AUTHORIZED CARRIERS

• The Italian legislation establishes that the transport of radioactive and special fissile materials should be made , unless special exemptions, by authorized carriers (art . 5 Law 31.12.1962 , n . 1860 as amended by the Presidential Decree 12.30.1965 , n . 1704) . On the basis of Article . 21 paragraph 3 of Legislative Decree no . 230/95 all Carriers licensed to transport radioactive materials, have to mandatorily provide ISPRA with a Summary of carriages performed including data on substances transported.
• The Ministerial Decree of 18/10/2005 of the Ministry of Productive Activities , published in Gazzetta Ufficiale . n ° 252 of 28/10/2005 and issued in implementation of art . 21 paragraph 3 of Legislative Decree no . 230/95 , establishes the application criteria and the summary reports containing data on the transport made. Article . 2 of the above mentioned Ministerial Decree also states that the ISPRA, on its website, provide specific guidelines for the preparation and submission of data.

CHARACTERIZATION RADIOACTIVE AND NORM

(NORM: NATURALLY OCCURRING RADIOACTIVE MATERIALS)

This acronym indicates the materials considered non-radioactive but containing natural radionuclides in concentrations higher than average values on  earth ‘s crust . The NORM can be the raw material , the product or the remainder of the processing in many industrial activities, in which the radiation hazard is generally incidental respect to the process, and not higher than that arising from chemicals exposure. It is therefore necessary to identify and put under surveillance these industrial processes.

The environmental pressure sources related to NORM (human actions altering the environmental situation) are those work activities involving the use , storage or production of materials and / or compounds that cause an increase in the exposure of the population due to the natural radioactivity content .

These activities have recently been focused by the Italian law on protection against ionizing radiation , as described in Schedule A ( Legislative Decree no . 230/95, as amended by Legislative Decree no . 241/00 ) . In particular , Legislative Decree 26 May 2000 n . 241 includes the performance of checks on exposure to ionizing radiation for a certain category of work activities involving the use or production of NORM.

These activities are identified in Attachment I- bis of D.L.vo 241/2000 (invoked article 10 ter ):

• phosphate minerals processing and warehouses for fertilizer wholesale trade
• mineral processing in the extraction of tin , iron – niobium from pyrochlore and aluminum from bauxite
• processing of zircon sands and the production of refractory materials
• processing of rare earths
• manufacturing and use of the thorium compounds (electrodes for welding, lenses production, mantles for gas lamps)
• production of pigment with titanium dioxidE
• extraction and refining of oil and gas extraction