Decommissioning Operations

DOE-STD-1136-2004

Guide of Good Practices for Occupational Radiation Protection in Uranium Facilities

b. the intended use of the site and components (e.g., Will the site be released for unrestricted or

restricted use?),

c. the site characteristics (e.g., demography, accessibility, meteorology),

d. the CBA results, and

e. the resource considerations.

10.3.3.5 Decommissioning Operations

Decommissioning operations shall be conducted according to the approved decommissioning

project plan. Significant deviations from the decommissioning project plan should be approved by the

responsible field organization in consultation with the appropriate program office.

During decommissioning operations, remediation control surveys (Berger 1992) should be conducted

to guide the cleanup in the real-time mode. This will ensure that the decommissioning workers, the public,

and the environment are all adequately protected against exposures to radiation and radioactive materials

arising from the decommissioning activities.

The volume of waste and the associated cost of decommissioning the waste will be greatly reduced if

equipment can be cleaned up and disposed of as either non-radioactive waste or as non-TRU waste.

Numerous techniques have been developed for decontamination of equipment and materials. Established

techniques and the latest technology should be considered in minimizing the quantity of contaminated

equipment that requires disposal and the waste generated from the decontamination processes. These

techniques are described in Section 10.4.2.

In establishing a radiological control program for decommissioning operations, the scope of the

decommissioning effort should be identified. Factors to be considered in program development include:

a. the type of facility or land area to be cleaned up,

b. the type and amount of radioactive contaminated material, hazardous waste, and mixed waste,

c. the radiological and hazardous material cleanup levels, and

d. the decommissioning methods being used.

The extent of the radiological control program will depend on the selected decommissioning

alternative. For the SAFSTOR alternative, the radiological control program would be minimal following

deactivation (i.e., surveillance activities) until the decontamination phase is initiated, at which time a full

radiological control program would be necessary. For the DECON alternative, a fully staffed radiological

control program would be needed from the start of decontamination. Typically, this program would be

similar to the program conducted during normal operations. Entombment is not a viable alternative for

decommissioning of uranium-contaminated facilities.

Also, the hazardous and radioactive contaminants present and the specific decontamination

techniques (e.g., mechanical methods, high- pressure water, abrasive cleaning, vibratory finishing,

ultrasonics, electro-polishing, decontamination foams, strippable decontamination coatings, and dry ice

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