WSC Hosts the 25th Annual Open Meeting of COGER
The 25th Open Meeting of COGER took place at the Westlakes Research Institute, from the 3rd - 6th April 2006, with over sixty participants contributing over the four days. The main purpose of the COGER open meeting is informal discussion of active and proposed research concerning all aspects of environmental radioactivity
COGER group
For this, the 25th anniversary year, the conference was opened by Professor Nigel Bell, with a presentation on the history of COGER. This was followed over the four days by a range of presentations covering both monitoring and modelling of radioactivity in the aquatic, terrestrial and aerial environment. A prevailing topic was the interaction of radioactivity with terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems.
Westlakes Scientific Consulting presented four talks at the conference covering:
Measuring and modelling fugitive radionuclide emissions;
Impact assessment for Natura 2000 sites;
Field and lab studies for polonium and plutonium in plankton; and
Public perception of the nuclear industry
Two COGER lectures were presented this year. The first COGER lecture presented by Dr Neil Smart, NDA was entitled “Nuclear Decommissioning Authority activities supporting environmental restoration”.
The second COGER lecture was given by Dr Brenda Howard MBE, Centre of Ecology and Hydrology, Lancaster. This focused on the “The Chernobyl forum - the international consensus after 20 years”. This lecture was complemented by a range of talks on ongoing Chernobyl-related research.
In addition to the lectures the meeting was extended by one day in celebration of the fact that it was the 25th Open Meeting. Field trips were undertaken to the Sellafield nuclear site and the Ravenglass Estuary for the demonstration and discussion of field sampling and measurement techniques. This included a review of a range of in situ measurements and hand coring techniques on a local saltmarsh.
Ravenglass
The 2007 COGER conference will be held at Loughborough University, with Dr Nick Evans as the local organiser. Further details will soon be available from the COGER website.