Safe Transport of Radioactive Material Fourth Edition VIENNA, 2006 TRAINING COURSE SERIES VIENNA 2002 1 IAEA SAFETY RELATED PUBLICATIONS IAEA SAFETY STANDARDS Under the terms of Article III of its Statute, the IAEA is authorized to establish or adopt standards of safety for protection of health and minimization of danger to life and property, and to provide for the application of these standards. The publications by means of which the IAEA establishes standards are issued in the IAEA Safety Standards Series. This series covers nuclear safety, radiation safety, transport safety and waste safety, and also general safety (i.e. all these areas of safety). The publication categories in the series are Safety Fundamentals, Safety Requirements and Safety Guides. Safety standards are coded according to their coverage: nuclear safety (NS), radiation safety (RS), transport safety (TS), waste safety (WS) and general safety (GS). Information on the IAEA’s safety standards programme is available at the IAEA Internet site http://www-ns.iaea.org/standards/ The site provides the texts in English of published and draft safety standards. The texts of safety standards issued in Arabic, Chinese, French, Russian and Spanish, the IAEA Safety Glossary and a status report for safety standards under development are also available. For further information, please contact the IAEA at P.O. Box 100, A-1400 Vienna, Austria. All users of IAEA safety standards are invited to inform the IAEA of experience in their use (e.g. as a basis for national regulations, for safety reviews and for training courses) for the purpose of ensuring that they continue to meet users’ needs. Information may be provided via the IAEA Internet site or by post, as above, or by e-mail to [email protected]. OTHER SAFETY RELATED PUBLICATIONS The IAEA provides for the application of the standards and, under the terms of Articles III and VIII.C of its Statute, makes available and fosters the exchange of information relating to peaceful nuclear activities and serves as an intermediary among its Member States for this purpose. Reports on safety and protection in nuclear activities are issued in other publications series, in particular the Safety Reports Series. Safety Reports provide practical examples and detailed methods that can be used in support of the safety standards. Other IAEA series of safety related publications are the Provision for the Application of Safety Standards Series, the Radiological Assessment Reports Series and the International Nuclear Safety Group’s INSAG Series. The IAEA also issues reports on radiological accidents and other special publications. Safety related publications are also issued in the Technical Reports Series, the IAEA-TECDOC Series, the Training Course Series and the IAEA Services Series, and as Practical Radiation Safety Manuals and Practical Radiation Technical Manuals. Security related publications are issued in the IAEA Nuclear Security Series. TRAINING COURSE SERIES No. 1 Safe Transport of Radioactive Material Fourth Edition INTERNATIONAL ATOMIC ENERGY AGENCY, VIENNA, 2006 The originating Section of this publication in the IAEA was: Radiation Safety Section International Atomic Energy Agency Wagramer Strasse 5 P.O. Box 100 A-1400 Vienna, Austria SAFE TRANSPORT OF RADIOACTIVE MATERIAL IAEA, VIENNA, 2006 IAEA-TCS-01/04 ISSN 1018–5518 © IAEA, 2006 Printed by the IAEA in Austria August 2006 FOREWORD Since 1957, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has exerted efforts towards developing and maintaining its Regulations for the Safe Transport of Radioactive Material. The IAEA’s Transport Regulations are used worldwide as the basis for the safety requirements of relevant international organizations (including the United Nations Economic and Social Council, International Civil Aviation Organization, International Maritime Organization, UN Economic Commission for Europe, Universal Postal Union, and MERCOSUR/MERCOSUL) as well as the national transport regulations of many IAEA Member States. Indeed, Member States recognized at the IAEA General Conference in 1998 that “compliance with regulations which take account of the Agency’s Transport Regulations is providing a high level of safety during the transport of radioactive materials”. Meeting its statutory obligation to foster the exchange and training of scientists and experts in the field of peaceful uses of atomic energy, the IAEA has developed a standardized approach to transport safety training as a means of helping Member States to implement the Transport Regulations. Under this approach, and compatible with a train-the-trainer concept, the IAEA provides training at the international level on the full requirements of its Transport Regulations to Member States’ competent authorities responsible for regulating the safe transport of radioactive material in their respective countries. In turn, those that have been trained by the IAEA are expected to disseminate their knowledge at a national level on applicable aspects of the Transport Regulations. This training manual is an anchor of the standardized approach to training: it contains all the topics presented in the sequential order recommended by the IAEA for the student to gain a thorough understanding of the body of knowledge that is needed to ensure that radioactive material — ranked as Class 7 in the United Nations’ nomenclature for dangerous goods — is transported safely. The explanations in the text refer, where needed, to the appropriate requirements in the IAEA’s Transport Regulations; additional useful information is also provided. Thus, this training manual — in addition to the Transport Regulations and their supporting documents — is used by the IAEA as the basis for delivering all of its training courses on the safe transport of radioactive material. Enclosed with the training manual is a CD-ROM that contains the text of the manual as well as the visual aids that are used at the IAEA’s training courses. The visual aids are presented in modules that are keyed to the chapters of the training manual. IAEA training courses are mainly intended for national competent authorities for radioactive material, and address the full requirements of the Transport Regulations. However, training is also needed at courses not usually organized by the IAEA: for regulatory staff needing only certain aspects of the Transport Regulations (e.g. non-nuclear fuel cycle requirements) or for non-regulatory personnel (e.g. consignors and carriers, emergency first responders and drivers); visual aids for such courses are also available on the CD-ROM. Training courses for Member States’ national purposes may be based on these other sets of visual aids, the contents of which need only be expanded to address applicable national requirements. This edition of the training manual is based on the IAEA’s Regulations for the Safe Transport of Radioactive Material (TS-R-1, 2005 Edition). It includes the updated training manual for the comprehensive training programme (duration 2 weeks), and two annexes –one relating to a new training manual for a short training programme for public authorities other than competent authorities (duration half day) and the other, a new training manual for a short training programme for cargo personnel including cargo handlers and vehicle crew (duration half day). This edition features exercises that have been included at the end of every chapter to help students gauge their own understanding of the topics addressed in each chapter. Prepared answers can be obtained by training course administrators from the IAEA on request. The Secretariat wishes to express its gratitude to all experts who have contributed to the preparation of this manual. Information about the IAEA’s transport safety training programme may be obtained from: M.E. Wangler, Head, Safety of Transport of Radioactive Material Unit, Div. of Radiation Transport and Waste Safety, IAEA, P.O. Box 100, A-1400 Vienna, Austria Tel.: (+43 1) 2600 Ext. 21262 Fax.: (+43 1) 26007 e-mail: [email protected] EDITORIAL NOTE The use of particular designations of countries or territories does not imply any judgement by the publisher, the IAEA, as to the legal status of such countries or territories, of their authorities and institutions or of the delimitation of their boundaries. The mention of names of specific companies or products (whether or not indicated as registered) does not imply any intention to infringe proprietary rights, nor should it be construed as an endorsement or recommendation on the part of the IAEA. CONTENTS 1. INTRODUCTION............................................................................................................. 1 1.1. Objectives ........................................................................................................... 2 1.2. Course overview................................................................................................. 3 1.3. The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) ............................................ 5 1.3.1. Statute.................................................................................................. 5 1.3.2. Mission and functions ......................................................................... 6 1.3.3. Roles and responsibilities.................................................................... 6 1.3.4. Services and information..................................................................... 9 1.4. Uses of radioactive material ............................................................................