WSC at the International Conference on Radioecology
The WSC team on board the 3-masted barque ‘Statsraad Lehmkul'
A team from Environmental Science (L-R above: Prof. Steve Jones, Dr's. Paul McDonald, Sarah Watts, Jordi Vives and Philippe Gleizon) has just returned from a conference organised jointly by the Norwegian Radiation Protection Authority (NRPA) and the Institut de Radioprotection et de Sûreté Nucléaire (IRSN).
The 3-yearly cycle of meetings gives scientists from across the world the chance to review and discuss recent achievements and promote continued development in these wide-ranging subject areas. This years conference was a key forum for researchers, industry, regulators and experts for whom radioactivity in the environment is of interest.
The main conference themes were:
- Emergency Preparedness and Rehabilitation
- TENORM/NORM including Radon
- Radioecology (general, Arctic and speciation)
- Risk Assessment
- Radiation in Society
- Radioactive Waste
- Environmental Protection
The WSC team was well represented with an oral keynote lecture by Dr Paul McDonald presenting the results of an IAEA international collaboration on modelling of naturally occurring radioactive material (NORM).
WSC also gave five poster and associated oral presentations:
- Allometric modelling of transfer parameters in the marine environment
- Dynamic model for the assessment of radiation impacts on marine biota, and related extensions of the ERICA assessment methodology
- Scoping assessment of groundwater doses to biota at the Sellafield site
- Modelling the long-term dispersion of radioactive liquid effluent and dose from marine pathways using a grid model
- Sea to land transfer of radionuclides in Cumbria and North Wales: updating of previous investigations
In addition to presenting talks and posters, the team also delivered demonstrations of the dynamic model software for doses to biota and extensions to the ERICA tool developed in-house at WSC; presenting the results of our work to interested scientists and developing ideas for further research with other participants.
Dr. Jordi Vives discussing factors affecting allometric scaling
Dr. Sarah Watts explaining Westlakes' approach to the biokinetic modelling of doses to biota
WSC were also involved in work presented by other organisations, namely, findings of the IAEA Biota Working Group, delivered at the meeting by the Centre for Ecology and Hydrology (Lancaster), impacts to biota at a coastal dune system (University of Liverpool) and predictions of the environmental impact of radionuclides from a deep geological ground repository, delivered by Enviros, in collaboration with WSC and the NDA.
Further information on the conference can be found in the following document:
http://www.radioecology.info/Bergen2008/graphics/EnvConf_programme_web.pdf
