Technical Reports Series

Provides data for use in assessments of routine discharges of radionuclides to terrestrial and freshwater environments. Some of the data may also be useful for assessing the impacts of accidental releases and releases in the future.

This publication is an update of Technical Report Series No. 318, Compendium of Neutron Spectra and Detector Responses for Radiation Protection Purposes (1990), that takes into account the major changes in the recommended energy dependence of risk related quantities, the increased importance of high neutron energies, the increased use of boron neutron capture therapy, promising new developments in detector design, new measured workplace spectra and improved calibration facilities. It includes the fluence to dose equivalent conversion coefficients for the recently recommended radiation protection quantities and a large number of fluence response functions for recently developed or improved detectors, as well as over 200 new spectra.

This Code of Practice, which has also been endorsed by WHO, PAHO and ESTRO, fulfils the need for a systematic and internationally unified approach to the calibration of ionization chambers in terms of absorbed dose to water and to the use of these detectors in determining the absorbed dose to water for the radiation beams used in radiotherapy. It provides a methodology for the determination of absorbed dose to water in the low, medium and high energy photon beams, electron beams, proton beams and heavy ion beams used for external radiation therapy.

This handbook provides generic parameter values for estimating the transfer of radionuclides from environmental media to wildlife for the purpose of assessing potential radiation exposure under equilibrium conditions. These data are intended for use where site specific data are either not available or not required, and to parameterize generic assessment models. They are based on a comprehensive review of the available literature, including many Russian language publications that have not previously been available in English. The publication addresses the limitations of the parameter values and the applicability of data. Some general background information on the assessment of potential impacts of radioactive releases on wildlife is also included. It complements the existing handbook in the same IAEA series with parameter to assess the radiological impact to humans.