A preliminary assessment of potential doses to man from radioactive waste dumped in the Arctic sea

This report describes a preliminary radiological assessment of collective doses to the world population from radioactive material dumped in the Barents and Kara Seas in the period 1961-1991 Information on the dumped waste and the rates of
release of radionuclides have been available from Russian sources and from the International Atomic Energy Agency A box model has been used to simulate the dispersion of radionuclides in the marine environment and to calculate the contamination of seafood and the subsequent radiation doses to man Two release scenarios have been adopted The worst-case release scenario which ignores the presence of barriers between spent nuclear fod and seawater is estimated to give rise to about 10 mansieverts calculated to 1000 years from the time of release. A more realistic release scenario is estimated to cause about 3 mansieverts In both cases exposure from the radionuclide ¹³⁷Cs is found to dominate the doses.