Comparative Experiences in Environmental Remediation of LLR Waste Sites in Diverse Canadian Environments

Author(s):  
G. G. Case ◽  
R. L. Zelmer

A variety of sites contaminated with legacy low-level radioactive (LLR) waste materials have been identified across Canada. Many of these sites, associated with former radium and uranium refining and processing operations, are located in urbanized areas of southern Ontario. However, other sites have been discovered at more remote locations in Canada, including northern Alberta and the Northwest Territories. The diversity of waste froms, ranging from pitchblende ore and processing wastes, to discarded luminescent products, combined with construction and transportation logistical issues encountered at these sites, present ongoing challenges for the Low-Level Radioactive Waste Management Office (LLRWMO) to overcome in meeting its mandate to resolve these legacy problems. Since its establishment in 1982, the federal government’s LLRWMO has operated programs to characterize and delineate contaminated historic waste sites across Canada. These programs have included undertaking property decontaminations, waste consolidation and interim storage projects at many sites, and participating with federal and provincial government departments and local communities to consider long-term storage and disposal opportunities. This paper compares four specific environmental remediation programs conducted by the LLRWMO within diverse Canadian settings found at Port Hope and Toronto (southern Ontario), Fort McMurray (northern Alberta), and Vancouver (west coast of British Columbia). Contaminant characterization and delineation, and remediation plan design and implementation aspects of these individual programs span the time period from the early 1980s through to 2002. The individual programs dealt with a variety of legacy waste forms that contained natural radioactive materials such as radium-226, total uranium, total thorium and thorium-230, as well as coincidental inorganic contaminants including arsenic, barium, cadmium, cobalt, lead, mercury, vanadium and zinc. Application of the lessons learned during these individual programs, as well as the development of new and innovative technologies to meet the specific needs of these programs, have enabled the LLRWMO to effectively and efficiently implement environmental remediation solutions that address the variety of Canada’s legacy LLR wastes.introduction.

Author(s):  
R. L. Zelmer ◽  
G. G. Case

Canada’s Low-Level Radioactive Waste Management Office (LLRWMO) continues to make significant progress toward the remediation of orphan sites contaminated with historic Low Level Radioactive (LLR) waste. Since its establishment in 1982, the LLRWMO, which is operated by Atomic Energy of Canada Limited, has acted as the agent of the federal government in this area, taking policy and priority direction from the federal department of Natural Resources Canada. The LLRWMO has investigated and decontaminated structures and properties at many sites across the country. It has removed contaminated soil, debris and radioactive artifacts to interim storage or interim, in situ containment. It has worked with communities and regulatory agencies to develop locally acceptable waste management solutions for the short- and long-term. This paper provides an update on the progress of environmental remediation programs and projects of the LLRWMO made since the last reporting at the Sixth ICEM Conference in Singapore in 1997. Emphasis is placed upon the areas of sustained interim waste management and community problem solving in this period. In addition, comment is provided on the future of the program. On behalf of the federal government, the LLRWMO was appointed in 2000 July to act as the proponent for the Port Hope Area Initiative (PHAI), a ten-year $260 M undertaking that will see historic LLR wastes currently found in various community locations consolidated into safe, long-term management facilities, yielding environmental benefits for present and future generations. This activity is breaking new ground in the implementation of community recommended solutions and signals the way forward in Canada’s historic waste program.


2006 ◽  
Vol 932 ◽  
Author(s):  
Damien Féron ◽  
Digby D. Macdonald

ABSTRACTThe corrosion resistance of container materials in underground repositories is an important issue for the safe disposal of High Level Nuclear Waste (HLNW). The reliable prediction of container degradation rate and engineering barrier integrity over extended periods, up to several thousands years or even several hundreds of thousands of years, represents one of the greatest scientific and technical challenges. The first and the second International Workshops on Prediction of Long Term Corrosion Behaviour in Nuclear Waste Systems, which were held in 2001 (Cadarache) and 2004 (Nice), sought to compare the scientific and experimental approaches that are being developed in various organisations worldwide for predicting long term corrosion phenomena, including corrosion strategies for interim storage and geological disposal. The lessons learned during these Workshops, include the necessity of developing two approaches based on semi-empiricism and determinism in a complementary manner for effective prediction. The use of archaeological artefacts to demonstrate the feasibility of long term storage and to provide a database for testing and validating modelling work was also emphasized.


1986 ◽  
Vol 21 (3) ◽  
pp. 344-350 ◽  
Author(s):  
Barry G. Oliver ◽  
Klaus L.E. Kaiser

Abstract The concent rat ions of hexachloroethane (HCE), hexachlorobutadiene (HCBD), pentachlorobenzene (QCB), hexachlorobenzene (HCB) and octachlorostyrene (OCS) in large volume water samples show that the major sources of these chemicals to the St. Clair River are Dow Chemical Company effluents and, to a lesser degree, Sarnia’s Township ditch which drains one of Dow’s waste disposal sites. Tributaries entering the river on both sides of the Canada/United States border contain measurable concentrations of these chemicals indicating low level contamination throughout the area. The degree of water/suspended sediment partitioning of the chemicals (Kp) was studied. Kp values for the individual chemicals changed in a manner consistent with changes in their physical-chemical properties.


Energies ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 14 (3) ◽  
pp. 539
Author(s):  
Maria Taljegard ◽  
Lisa Göransson ◽  
Mikael Odenberger ◽  
Filip Johnsson

This study describes, applies, and compares three different approaches to integrate electric vehicles (EVs) in a cost-minimising electricity system investment model and a dispatch model. The approaches include both an aggregated vehicle representation and individual driving profiles of passenger EVs. The driving patterns of 426 randomly selected vehicles in Sweden were recorded between 30 and 73 days each and used as input to the electricity system model for the individual driving profiles. The main conclusion is that an aggregated vehicle representation gives similar results as when including individual driving profiles for most scenarios modelled. However, this study also concludes that it is important to represent the heterogeneity of individual driving profiles in electricity system optimisation models when: (i) charging infrastructure is limited to only the home location in regions with a high share of solar and wind power in the electricity system, and (ii) when addressing special research issues such as impact of vehicle-to-grid (V2G) on battery health status. An aggregated vehicle representation will, if the charging infrastructure is limited to only home location, over-estimate the V2G potential resulting in a higher share (up to 10 percentage points) of variable renewable electricity generation and an under-estimation of investments in both short- and long-term storage technologies.


2021 ◽  
Vol 22 (2) ◽  
pp. 935
Author(s):  
Federica Fazzini ◽  
Liane Fendt ◽  
Sebastian Schönherr ◽  
Lukas Forer ◽  
Bernd Schöpf ◽  
...  

Massive parallel sequencing technologies are promising a highly sensitive detection of low-level mutations, especially in mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) studies. However, processes from DNA extraction and library construction to bioinformatic analysis include several varying tasks. Further, there is no validated recommendation for the comprehensive procedure. In this study, we examined potential pitfalls on the sequencing results based on two-person mtDNA mixtures. Therefore, we compared three DNA polymerases, six different variant callers in five mixtures between 50% and 0.5% variant allele frequencies generated with two different amplification protocols. In total, 48 samples were sequenced on Illumina MiSeq. Low-level variant calling at the 1% variant level and below was performed by comparing trimming and PCR duplicate removal as well as six different variant callers. The results indicate that sensitivity, specificity, and precision highly depend on the investigated polymerase but also vary based on the analysis tools. Our data highlight the advantage of prior standardization and validation of the individual laboratory setup with a DNA mixture model. Finally, we provide an artificial heteroplasmy benchmark dataset that can help improve somatic variant callers or pipelines, which may be of great interest for research related to cancer and aging.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Xing Zhao ◽  
Feng Hong ◽  
Jianzhong Yin ◽  
Wenge Tang ◽  
Gang Zhang ◽  
...  

AbstractCohort purposeThe China Multi-Ethnic Cohort (CMEC) is a community population-based prospective observational study aiming to address the urgent need for understanding NCD prevalence, risk factors and associated conditions in resource-constrained settings for ethnic minorities in China.Cohort BasicsA total of 99 556 participants aged 30 to 79 years (Tibetan populations include those aged 18 to 30 years) from the Tibetan, Yi, Miao, Bai, Bouyei, and Dong ethnic groups in Southwest China were recruited between May 2018 and September 2019.Follow-up and attritionAll surviving study participants will be invited for re-interviews every 3-5 years with concise questionnaires to review risk exposures and disease incidence. Furthermore, the vital status of study participants will be followed up through linkage with established electronic disease registries annually.Design and MeasuresThe CMEC baseline survey collected data with an electronic questionnaire and face-to-face interviews, medical examinations and clinical laboratory tests. Furthermore, we collected biological specimens, including blood, saliva and stool, for long-term storage. In addition to the individual level data, we also collected regional level data for each investigation site.Collaboration and data accessCollaborations are welcome. Please send specific ideas to corresponding author at: [email protected].


2021 ◽  
Vol 41 (5) ◽  
pp. e17-e25
Author(s):  
Deborah Hurley ◽  
Sarah M. Gantz ◽  
E. Kate Valcin ◽  
Tara L. Sacco

Topic The development of the Critical Care Beacon Collaborative to achieve meaningful recognition. Clinical Relevance Recognizing nurses for contributions to their work environment and care delivery is important for their professional and personal fulfillment, job satisfaction, and retention; such recognition can occur at the individual, unit, or organizational level. The American Nurses Credentialing Center’s Magnet Recognition Program acknowledges nursing excellence at the organizational level. It would, however, be difficult for an organization to achieve Magnet designation without nursing excellence at the unit level. To recognize excellence at the unit level, the American Association of Critical-Care Nurses developed the Beacon Award in 2003. Objective To describe one academic medical center’s journey toward winning Beacon Awards across 8 units within the adult critical care service. Content Covered The Critical Care Beacon Collaborative resulted in a Beacon Award for each unit and important staff outcomes. This article describes the organization, the process before the Critical Care Beacon Collaborative convened and the desired state, and the methods used to achieve our goal. It also discusses unit- and service-level stakeholder involvement. The successes, lessons learned, sustainability, and growth of the Critical Care Beacon Collaborative are shared to assist readers who aspire to pursue a Beacon Award.


2014 ◽  
Vol 18 (1) ◽  
pp. 29-34 ◽  
Author(s):  
Naomi Boycott ◽  
Justine Schneider ◽  
Michael Osborne

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to draw out the lessons learned from the implementation of the Individual Placement and Support (IPS) approach to supported employment in two contrasting adult mental health teams; one “standard” CMHT, and one early intervention in psychosis (EIP) team. Design/methodology/approach – These inferences are based on the evidence from a four-year study of IPS in one mental health care provider in the UK, which began by setting up a new service, and went on to run a RCT looking at the impact of psychological input as an adjunct to IPS alone. Findings – In attempting to introduce IPS to mental health teams in Nottingham the authors came across numerous barriers, including service reorganisation, funding cuts and the wider context of recession. Differences were observed between mental health teams in the willingness to embrace IPS. The authors argue that this variability is due to differences in caseload size, recovery priorities and client profiles. The authors have learnt that perseverance, strenuous efforts to engage clinical staff and the use of IPS fidelity reviews can make a positive difference to the implementation process. Practical implications – The experience suggests that setting up an IPS service is possible even in the most challenging of times, and that EIP services may be a particularly fertile ground for this approach. The authors also discuss potential barriers to implementing new services in mental health teams. Originality/value – This paper will be of value to service development and the science of implementation in mental health.


Author(s):  
Marwa M. Hafez

This chapter includes discussions pertaining to the role of culture in influencing electronic business diffusion in developing countries. In this chapter, the author discusses specific cultural factors and their influences on the individual components required for Internet rollout and use in developing countries. Cases from developing countries are also presented to illustrate the effects culture produces on the levels of electronic business technology usage. The discussions of the lessons learned from those cases along with the theoretical foundations presented throughout the chapter, culminate in the author’s provision of recommendations to the reader, deemed necessary for effectively increasing the diffusion of electronic business in developing countries as well as for reaping the potential benefits generated from its use.


Author(s):  
Shane T. Spiker

Sex-related behavior can present challenges in the community and present serious impacts on individuals with special needs. When considering sex offender types of behavior, special considerations are made for supervision, prevention, and education for the individual and the community at large. William is an elderly gentleman who presents with inappropriate sexual behavior resulting in both child and adult victims. The following chapter discusses his history along with some unique challenges related to his sexual behavior, interventions considered as part of his treatment plan, and some lessons learned from working with William and his unique considerations.


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