Board of Research in Nuclear Sciences Coordinated Research Project (BRNS-CRP)
BRNS in the year 2014 sanctioned a Coordinated Research Project (CRP) titled “Standardization of techniques for 14C and tritium measurements in environmental matrices and evaluation of population doses in the vicinity of PHWR power plant” to CARER. This research project involves a systematic effort on the measurement of 14C and tritium in the environmental matrices around PHWR plants in India.
The CRP comprises of three projects - Project 1 is aimed at (i) standardizing a method for sampling and measuring of 14C in the environmental matrices, (ii) estimation of excess 14C in the environmental matrices, and (iii) establishing a database on population doses around the PHWR power plant in Kaiga. Knowledge on the release rates of 14C from nuclear facilities is essential because of its long half-life, environmental mobility, and ease of assimilation into living matter. Through this project, methods and standard protocols would be developed for the measurement of 14C in the environmental matrices, and a reliable data on the release of 14C from PHWR during normal operations would be generated.
Project 2 of this CRP aims at developing and standardizing methods for (i) long-term continuous sampling of air for tritium measurements, and (ii) measurement of OBT and TFWT in the environmental matrices.
Project 3 aims to (i) establish a calibration centre for radon/thoron measuring devices for the benefit of different research groups of India, (ii) to develop a uniform protocol for measurements of radon/ thoron and progeny, (iii) evolve regional coordinated research projects for the measurements of radon, thoron, and their progenies, and (iv) conduct a large scale study on equilibrium factor distribution and lung dose due to radon, thoron, and their progenies.
On its successful completion, this CRP will prove to be of immense help in convincing the public that radiation exposure from nuclear reactors forms an infinitesimal component of the total radiation exposure and is within the variability of natural radiations itself.