To assist the metal industry and regulatory bodies with the control and safety of the people from radioactive materials, the IAEA has launched online tools – a knowledge platform called “toolkit” and a complementary e-learning course on the control of radioactive material inadvertently incorporated into scrap metal or semi-finished products of the metal recycling industries.
“With the increase in recycling worldwide, the metal recycling industry has become vulnerable to receiving sources inadvertently incorporated into scrap metal. We need to prevent any potential health, environmental and economic effects caused by the presence of radioactive material in scrap metal,” said Ronald Pacheco, Head of the IAEA Control of Radiation Sources Unit.
Scrap yards handle not only industrial but also household waste such as old kitchen appliances, office furniture or automotive parts. If not properly disposed, products containing a small amount of radioactive material can sometimes end up in a scrap yard.
Items with a small amount of radioactive material such as radioactive lightning rods can then be inadvertently recycled together with non-radioactive items – they can be melted, refined and cast to shape by metal works and foundries worldwide, which buy and re-use scrap metal.
Occasionally and unintentionally, such items are also transported across national borders. Incidents with sources in scrap yards happen a few times a year, and some of them are well documented.
As one of the toolkit case studies describes, an increased radiation level was detected at a border crossing in a rail car. The country’s radiation experts found a caesium-137 source and transported it to a waste management facility. Thanks to monitoring devices, the responsible authority was able to identify and trace the source back to a mining company, which used the source in a device for conducting measurements in mines. The device had been put out of service, forgotten and mistakenly transferred to a scrap metal facility, which later shipped it abroad.
