Joint clarification of contaminant plume and hydraulic transmissivity via a geostatistical approach using hydraulic head and contaminant concentration data

Takai, Shizuka; Shimada, Taro; Takeda, Seiji; Koike, Katsuaki*

Mathematical Geosciences, 56(2), p.333 - 360, 2024/02

https://doi.org/10.1007/s11004-023-10084-8

To enable proper remediation of accidental groundwater contamination, the contaminant plume evolution needs to be accurately estimated. In the estimation, uncertainties in both the contaminant source and hydrogeological structure should be considered, especially the temporal release history and hydraulic transmissivity. Although the release history can be estimated using geostatistical approaches, previous studies use the deterministic hydraulic property field. Geostatistical approaches can also effectively estimate an unknown heterogeneous transmissivity field via the joint data use, such as a combination of hydraulic head and tracer data. However, tracer tests implemented over a contaminated area necessarily disturb the in situ condition of the contamination. Conversely, measurements of the transient concentration data over an area are possible and can preserve the conditions. Accordingly, this study develops a geostatistical method for the joint clarification of contaminant plume and transmissivity distributions using both head and contaminant concentration data. The applicability and effectiveness of the proposed method are demonstrated through two numerical experiments assuming a two-dimensional heterogenous confined aquifer. The use of contaminant concentration data is key to accurate estimation of the transmissivity. The accuracy of the proposed method using both head and concentration data was verified achieving a high linear correlation coefficient of 0.97 between the true and estimated concentrations for both experiments, which was 0.67 or more than the results using only the head data. Furthermore, the uncertainty of the contaminant plume evolution was successfully evaluated by considering the uncertainties of both the initial plume and the transmissivity distributions, based on their conditional realizations.

Evaluation of external dose exposure of workers during house demolition and dose reduction work in a difficult-to-return zone

Sanada, Yukihisa; Tokiyoshi, Masanori*; Nishiyama, Kyohei*; Sato, Rina; Yoshimura, Kazuya; Funaki, Hironori; Abe, Tomohisa; Ishida, Mutsushi*; Nagamine, Haruo*; Fujisaka, Motoyuki*

Nihon Genshiryoku Gakkai Wabun Rombunshi (Internet), 22(2), p.87 - 96, 2023/04

https://doi.org/10.3327/taesj.J22.011

Since the accident at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant, many decontamination works have been carried out, but it is difficult to say that much data on workers' exposure has necessarily been analyzed in detail. In this paper, based on the GPS location information carried by the workers together with their personal dosimeters, the air dose rate in the work area and the characteristics of each type of work were analyzed. The results showed that more than 50% of the measured actual doses were more than twice the median planned dose calculated from the air dose rate and actual working hours. Furthermore, as a result of the analysis by work type, it was found that the exposure doses of demolition workers tended to be high, and that this was due to the fact that most of the work was carried out before the work was carried out to reduce the dose at the work site. In addition, when the conversion from air dose to effective dose was taken into account, there were many cases of underestimation where the planned values were lower than the measured values, and it is considered important for management to set appropriate working factor.

Uncertainty and sensitivity analyses for the reduction factor of sheltering for radiation exposures

Hirouchi, Jun; Takahara, Shogo; Komagamine, Hiroshi*

Journal of Radiological Protection, 42(4), p.041503_1 - 041503_12, 2022/12

https://doi.org/10.1088/1361-6498/aca0ff

Sheltering is one of the countermeasures against radiation exposure during nuclear accidents. The effectiveness of sheltering for inhalation exposure is often expressed by the reduction factor, which is defined as the ratio of the indoor to the outdoor cumulative radioactivity concentrations or doses. The indoor concentration is mainly controlled by the air exchange rate, penetration factor, and indoor deposition rate. Meanwhile, the air exchange rate depends on surrounding environmental conditions: the wind speed, leakage area normalized by the floor area of the house, and gross building coverage ratio. In this study, the ranges of the uncertainty of the reduction factors for particles and I were investigated under various environmental conditions, and sensitivity analyses were conducted to understand the parameter with the most influence on the uncertainty of the reduction factor. From the results of the uncertainty analyses, the calculated reduction factor was highly variable depending on the environmental condition and the airtightness of the houses. The uncertainty ranges of the reduction factor for particles and I were up to 0.9 and 0.3, respectively, and were smaller for newer houses. From the results of the sensitivity analyses, the wind speed was the most influential parameter on the reduction factor. Additionally, the wind speed was less influential for the reduction factor in newer houses.

Variation of internal doses caused by differences in physical characteristics between the average Japanese and the ICRP's reference man which is based on the standard data of Caucasians in the dosimetric methodology in conformity to the 2007 Recommendations

Manabe, Kentaro; Sato, Kaoru; Takahashi, Fumiaki

Journal of Nuclear Science and Technology, 59(5), p.656 - 664, 2022/05

https://doi.org/10.1080/00223131.2021.1997663

It is known that internal doses depend on the physical characteristics of an evaluation subject. Internal dose coefficients provided by the International Commission on Radiological Protection (ICRP) are evaluated using the characteristics of the standard Caucasian. It is important to grasp the variations of doses due to the differences in characteristics between Japanese and Caucasian when the dose coefficients of ICRP are applied to Japanese. This study evaluated dose coefficients using specific absorbed fraction (SAF) data based on the average adult Japanese physique which was developed by modification of the existing Japanese SAF data with additional calculations to make the existing data fit to the current dosimetric methodology of ICRP and compared them to those provided by ICRP. As a result, the discrepancies in dose coefficients were smaller than plus or minus 10% in most intake conditions. However, some intake conditions indicated varieties over 40% due to the differences in organ masses, amount of adipose tissues around the thoracic cavity, and so on. This information is useful in application of ICRP's dose coefficients to population of which physical characteristics are different from those of Caucasian. Further, the Japanese SAF data is published as an appendix of this paper.

Initial sintering kinetics of non-stoichiometric CeO

Watanabe, Masashi; Seki, Takayuki*

Materials Science & Engineering B, 272, p.115369_1 - 115369_6, 2021/10

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.mseb.2021.115369

The effect of oxygen non-stoichiometry on the initial sintering behavior of CeO was investigated. It was found that the initial sintering of the stoichiometric and hypo-stoichiometric composition was controlled by the grain boundary diffusion. The activation energies of cation diffusion were derived from initial sintering data. Moreover, it is suggested that the cation diffusion was caused by a vacancy mechanism.

Evaluation of the mass transfer coefficients for the minor actinide separation; Evaluation by the single drop method

Sakamoto, Atsushi; Kibe, Satoshi*; Kawanobe, Kazunori*; Fujisaku, Kazuhiko*; Sano, Yuichi; Takeuchi, Masayuki; Suzuki, Hideya*; Tsubata, Yasuhiro; Ban, Yasutoshi; Matsumura, Tatsuro

JAEA-Research 2021-003, 30 Pages, 2021/06

JAEA-Research-2021-003.pdf:1.81MB

Japan Atomic Energy Agency has been developing a solvent extraction process called SELECT to recover minor actinides (MA) from spent nuclear fuel. In the SELECT process, TDdDGA, HONTA, and ADAAM are used as the extractants for MA + Ln corecovery, MA/Ln separation and Am/Cm separation, respectively. These extractants do not contain phosphorus (P), and consist of carbon (C), hydrogen (H), oxygen (O), and nitrogen (N). In this study, in order to give beneficial information for designing flowsheet, the mass transfer coefficients of Ln between HNO solution and TDdDGA or HONTA / n-dodecane solvent were evaluated by the single drop technique. Prior to the evaluation of mass transfer coefficient, we had optimized the structure of the single drop apparatus to improve accuracy of the measurement. Based on the mass transfer coefficients obtained in HNO / TDdDGA-n-dodecane system, Ln behaviors in the counter-current extraction and back-extraction using mixer-settlers and centrifugal contactors were estimated by simple calculation, and they had a good agreement with our previous experimental results. We also confirmed the mass transfer coefficients of Ln in HNO / HONTA - n-dodecane system are under 10 m/s.

Internal dose coefficients for various gastrointestinal absorption fractions (Contract research)

Hirouchi, Jun; Tokashiki, Yuji*; Takahara, Shogo; Manabe, Kentaro

JAEA-Research 2021-001, 284 Pages, 2021/03

JAEA-Research-2021-001.pdf:4.23MB

Doses to the public are calculated with internal dose coefficients based on the publications of the International Commission on Radiological Protection (ICRP) in OSCAAR, which is a level 3 Probabilistic Risk Assessment code developed by Japan Atomic Energy Agency (JAEA). The gastrointestinal absorption fraction, , which is one of parameters of internal dose coefficient, is given the recommended value. However, although it has been reported that has uncertainty, the uncertainty analysis of has been performed on few radionuclides. In this report, to evaluate the influence of uncertainty of on the internal dose, we calculated the internal dose coefficient with various , and derive the relationship between the coefficient and . As a result, we indicate that the relationships are expressed by a linear function for radionuclides with a half-life of more than 0.5 days and are expressed by a cubic function for radionuclides with a half-life of less than 0.5 days.

Apparent diffusion coefficients of Cs and I in hardened cement paste using mineral admixtures

Mihara, Morihiro; Harasawa, Shuichi*; Torii, Kazuyuki*

Genshiryoku Bakkuendo Kenkyu (CD-ROM), 26(1), p.15 - 23, 2019/06

https://nuce.aesj.or.jp/jnuce/vol26/Jnuce-Vol26-1-p15-23.pdf

Hardened cement pastes (HCPs) of water/cement ratio (W/C) 50% and 30% using fly ash (FA), blast furnace slag (BFS) and silica fume (SF) for 28 days were prepared. Apparent diffusion coefficients (D) of Cs and I in HCPs were obtained using electron probe microanalysis. For Cs, BFS and SF contributed to a reduction of D for W/C=50% and 30%, respectively. For I, BFS reduced D for W/C=50%, however a significant reduction in D for W/C=30% was not observed. Using SF enhanced sorption of Cs on HCP, and using BFS slightly improved sorption of Cs on HCP. It was also confirmed that the pore structures of HCP using SF and BFS were connected by fine pores. It was therefore considered that using SF and BFS contributes to the reduction of D in HCP.

Development of a function calculating internal dose coefficients based on ICRP 2007 Recommendations

Manabe, Kentaro; Sato, Kaoru; Takahashi, Fumiaki

BIO Web of Conferences (Internet), 14, p.03011_1 - 03011_2, 2019/05

https://doi.org/10.1051/bioconf/20191403011

Dose coefficients, which are committed effective dose per unit intake of radionuclides, are fundamental amounts for dose estimation and protection standards against internal exposures. In this study, we built a calculation function of dose coefficients using the latest dosimetric models and data as a part of development of internal dosimetry code in accordance with 2007 Recommendations of the International Commission of Radiological Protection (ICRP). Quality of the function was assured by comparing the results generated by the function to values recorded in a database of dose coefficients for workers provided by ICRP. In the presentation, we will report the results of quality assurance and the future plans of code development.

Evaluation of the excavation disturbed zone of sedimentary rock in the Horonobe Underground Research Laboratory

Kubota, Kenji*; Aoyagi, Kazuhei; Sugita, Yutaka

Proceedings of 2019 Rock Dynamics Summit in Okinawa (USB Flash Drive), p.729 - 733, 2019/05

During the excavation of shafts and galleries in the deep subsurface for disposing of high-level radioactive waste, an excavation disturbed zone (EdZ) or excavation damaged zone (EDZ) is developed around the shafts and galleries. Such zones could influence the transfer behavior of radioactive nuclides, and it is therefore important to understand the behavior of the EdZ or EDZ. We performed in situ experiments before, during, and after gallery excavation in galleries of 140 and 250 m in depth in an area of soft sedimentary rock in Japan. The results demonstrate that the extent of fractures induced by the gallery excavation related with EDZ was confined to about 0.45 m from the gallery wall in the 140 m gallery and to about 1 m from the gallery wall in the 250 m gallery. The extent of the unsaturated zone related with EdZ was about 1 m in the 140 m gallery, but an unsaturated zone did not appear in the 250 m gallery.