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Performance Evaluation of Decontamination Technologies for Dirty Bomb Cleanup – 10036
Citation:
DRAKE, J., R. R. James, AND R. Demmer. Performance Evaluation of Decontamination Technologies for Dirty Bomb Cleanup – 10036. Presented at Waste Management 2010 Symposium, Phoenix, AZ, March 08, 2010.
Impact/Purpose:
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is responsible for protecting human health and the environment from the effects of accidental and intentional releases of radiological materials, including terrorist incidents such as a radiological dispersal device (RDD) or “dirty bomb”. A primary EPA responsibility is cleanup and restoration of urban areas which would be affected if such an incident were to occur. In order to prepare for such an event, the EPA’s National Homeland Security Research Center (NHSRC) is conducting performance evaluations of commercial, off-the-shelf radiological decontamination technologies, such as those originally developed for the nuclear power industry and the U.S. Department of Energy complex. Desirable decontamination technologies must not only be effective in removing threat contaminants from typical building materials, but must do so without being destructive to building surfaces. Due to the large areas likely to be affected by such an event, the time required to perform effective decontamination and the cost of deployment are significant issues as well. In FY2009, NHSRC evaluated the performance of five candidate technologies for their effectiveness in the removal of cesium from concrete through NHSRC’s Technology Testing and Evaluation Program (TTEP). An emphasis on “low-tech” methodologies led to the selection of simple, low cost, easy to use technologies which can be transported and deployed quickly, requiring only minimal support services or infrastructure. The process and results of this testing, along with an assessment of any deployment issues associated with each technology, are being made available to the larger homeland security community for use in developing clean up guidance and to support decisions concerning the selection and use of decontamination technologies for large outdoor environments contaminated with specific radiological threat agents.
Description:
Symposium Paper