Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-2brh9 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-27T22:44:04.585Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Recent trends and explanation for airborne 137Cs activity level increases in France

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  06 June 2009

J. Barescut ,
O. Masson ,
D. Piga ,
G. Le Roux ,
J. Mary ,
A. de Vismes ,
R. Gurriaran ,
Ph. Renaud ,
L. Saey  and
P. Paulat
O. Masson*
Affiliation:
IRSN/DEI/SESURE/LERCM, Centre de Cadarache, Bâtiment 153, BP. 3, 13115 Saint Paul-lez-Durance Cedex, France
D. Piga
Affiliation:
IRSN/DEI/SESURE/LERCM, Centre de Cadarache, Bâtiment 153, BP. 3, 13115 Saint Paul-lez-Durance Cedex, France
G. Le Roux
Affiliation:
IRSN/DEI/SESURE/LERCM, Centre de Cadarache, Bâtiment 153, BP. 3, 13115 Saint Paul-lez-Durance Cedex, France
J. Mary
Affiliation:
IRSN/DEI/SESURE/LERCM, Centre de Cadarache, Bâtiment 153, BP. 3, 13115 Saint Paul-lez-Durance Cedex, France
A. de Vismes
Affiliation:
IRSN/DEI/SESURE/LERCM, Centre de Cadarache, Bâtiment 153, BP. 3, 13115 Saint Paul-lez-Durance Cedex, France IRSN/DEI/STEME/LMRE, Bâtiment 501, le Bois des Rames, 91400 Orsay, France
R. Gurriaran
Affiliation:
IRSN/DEI/STEME/LMRE, Bâtiment 501, le Bois des Rames, 91400 Orsay, France
Ph. Renaud
Affiliation:
IRSN/DEI/SESURE/LERCM, Centre de Cadarache, Bâtiment 153, BP. 3, 13115 Saint Paul-lez-Durance Cedex, France
L. Saey
Affiliation:
IRSN/DEI/SESURE/LERCM, Centre de Cadarache, Bâtiment 153, BP. 3, 13115 Saint Paul-lez-Durance Cedex, France
P. Paulat
Affiliation:
IRSN/DEI/SESURE/LERCM, Centre de Cadarache, Bâtiment 153, BP. 3, 13115 Saint Paul-lez-Durance Cedex, France
*
[email protected]
Get access

Abstract

Airborne 137Cs level in France is not decreasing significantly anymore (mean yearly value around 0,25 µ Bq.m-3 contrarily to what was noticed in the past decades. This observation points out the role of processes that delay the atmospheric cleaning and participate to the persistence of radionuclide in the air at ground-level after a deposit, in the frame of medium as well as long-dated post-accidental contexts. The current background level also yields to consider 137Cs in the atmosphere as a tracer of atmospheric processes like resuspension and re-emission from biomass burnings. This allows us to explain 2/3 of the peaks observed over the last six years. The remaining 1/3 is mainly noticed in winter when spreading of pollutants in the atmosphere is often weak due to temperature gradient inversion. On average, continental air masses are responsible for increases by a factor of 3 while oceanic air masses are characterised by levels 3 times lower, compared to the mean value. Feeding of 137Cs in air at ground-level is the result of both local resuspension that signs 137Cs activity levels in soils to which is added a remote contribution from time to time (resuspension of Saharan dust or re-emission from fires occurring in eastern territories with high 137Cs deposition level). Finally, 137Cs activity levels in air masses crossing over France can be described on average by a longitudinal gradient.

Type
Research Article
Information
Radioprotection , Volume 44 , Issue 5: ECORAD 2008 - Radioecology and Environmental Radioactivity , 2009 , pp. 327 - 332
Copyright
© EDP Sciences, 2009

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Jasiulionis R. and Rozkov A. 137Cs activity concentration in the ground-level air in the Ignalina NPP region. Lithuanian Journal of Physics, (2007) Vol.47, N°2, pp. 195–202.
Masson O. and Cautenet G. Radioecological impact of Saharan dust fallout. Study of a major event over south part of France in February 2004. First Accent Symposium: The changing chemical climate of the atmosphere, Urbino, 12–16/09/2005
Goyal S.K. and Chalapati Rao C.V. Assessment of atmospheric assimilation potential for industrial development in an urban environment: Kochi (India). Science of the Total Environment 376 (2007) 27–39.
Baklanov A., Joffre S.M., Piringer M., Deserti M., Middleton D.R, Tombrou M., Karppinen A., Emeis S., Prior V., Rotach M.W., Bonafè G., Baumann-Stanzer K. and Kuchin A. Towards estimating the mixing height in urban Areas. Recent experimental and modelling results from the COST-715 Action and FUMAPEX project. Scientific Report 06-06. Digital ISBN: 87-7478-540-0 ISSN: 1399–1949
Paliouris G., Taylor H.W., Wein R.W., Svoboda J. and Mierzynski B. Fire as an agent in redistributing fallout 137Cs in the Canadian boreal forest. The Science of the Total Environment 160/161(1995) 153–166.
Amiro, B.D., S.C. Sheppard, F.L. Johnston, W.G. Evenden and D.R. Harris (1996), Burning radionuclide question: What happens to iodine, caesium and chlorine in biomass fires?, Sci. Total Environ., 187, 93–103.
Johansen, M.P., T.E. Hakonson, F.W. Whicker and D.D. Breshears. 2003. Pulsed redistribution of a contaminant following forest fire: Cesium-137 in runoff. Journal of Environmental Quality 32(6): 2150–2157.
Dusha-Gudym S.I. Transport of radioactive materials by wildland fires in the Chernobyl accident zone: How to address the problem. International Forest Fire News (IFFN) n°32 January - June 2005,119–125.
Wotawa G., De Geer L.-E., Becker A., D'Amours R., Jean M., Servranckx R. and Ungar3 K. Inter- and intra-continental transport of radioactive cesium released by boreal forest fires, Geophys. Res. Lett., 33, L12806, doi:10.1029/2006GL026206. CrossRef
Lujaniene G., Šapolaite J., Remeikis V., Lujanas V. and Jermolajev A. Cesium, Americium and Plutonium Isotopes in ground level air of Vilnius. Czechoslovak Journal of Physics, Vol. 56 (2006), Suppl. D.
Blake, N.J., et al. (1999), Influence of southern hemispheric biomass burning on midtropospheric distributions of nonmethane hydrocarbons and selected halocarbons over the remote South Pacific., J. Geophys. Res., 104(D13), 16,213–16,232.
Pazukhin E.M., Borovoi A.A. and Ogorodnikov B.I. Forest fire as a factor of environmental redistribution of radionuclides originating from Chernobyl accident. Radiochemistry, Vol. 46, No. 1, 2004, pp. 102–106.
Strebl F., Gerzabek M.H., Bossew P. and Kienzl K. Distribution of radiocaesium in an Austrian forest stand. The Science of the Total Environment, (1999) 226, 75–83.
Hus M., Kosutic K. and Lulic S. Radioactive contamination of wood and its products. Journal of Environmental Radioactivity 55 (2001) 179–186.