In-situ Characterization of Active Process Equipment at Gentilly-1: Data Quality Objectives

Abstract

The Data Quality Objective (DQO) process, established by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), provides a logical planning structure to optimize environmental data collection with defensible decision making. The process presents a seven-step procedure to define the decision the collected data must answer and provide, as an output, the data collection strategy and tolerable level of decision errors. The DQO process is the industry standard for planning radiological surveys.

The DQO process is applied to the survey planning for the in-situ characterization of active process equipment in the Gentilly-1 (G-1) Service Building. The intent of the survey is to define an appropriate disposal pathway for the process equipment to prepare the G-1 site for decommissioning activities. The framework for management of the equipment as uncontaminated (conventional), radiological, hazardous, or mixed (both radiological and hazardous) waste is complex. Ultimately, the DQO process needed to resolve multiple decisions.

The DQO process is intended to be iterative. However, multiple data collection surveys may not be possible; a single survey may be required to resolve all the decisions. This was the case for the survey of the G-1 Service Building process equipment. This paper presents the outputs for the DQO process for the survey of the G-1 Service Building process equipment.