EPA ensures public’s safety amid increased use of radioactive substances

With several companies, mainly in the Oil & Gas sector, applying for the use of radioactive substances in their respective fields of work, many concerns have been raised surrounding the public’s safety.
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has, however, asserted that its officers are ensuring that the public is not exposed or harmed by any radioactive substance.

During a recent episode of the EPA’s broadcast programme, titled “Environment Matters”, Tashana Redmond, a member of the EPA’s Technical Services Department, explained that companies applying for the use of radioactive substances must follow requirements before being given authorisation to use such materials.
“We ensure that adequate systems are put in place, that the sources are handled properly: proper storage, proper training for those who handle them, proper security, so they are not stolen and end up in the wrong hands,” she said.
“We do require a submission of an application, and that application can be found on the agency’s website. It’s titled ‘An Application for Radioactive Sources’, and within it, it deals with nuclear safety as well as radiation protection,” she explained.
“A critical (requirement) is that they have to share with us their inventory of sources, so we did the initial inventory in 2017, and we continue to build on that inventory. The inventory allows (us) to know where the sources are, who are the responsible persons for the sources, the activity level of the sources; and as result of that, we can categorize them,” she further explained.
Redmond has said that Guyana has several sources of radiation from different sectors: such as the medical, construction, oil & gas, mining, and beverage manufacturing sectors; and each source is categorised according to the level of radiation.
“There are five categories of sources, ranging from category 1 to category 5; and in this case, category 1 is the strongest source. In the country now, we do not have any category 1 sources; a nuclear power plant tends to be a category 1,” she explained.
“There are category 2 to 5 sources in the country. Category 2, which is the second one, is in limited quantities, and this source, while it is staged as category 2, it does not pose a risk to persons outside of 100 metres from where the source is,” she further explained.
She said that most of Guyana’s sources of radiation fall in the brackets from category 3 to category 5, which are not known to have a significant impact on the health of persons who are less than 100 metres away.
Further, Redmond noted that the EPA does have the necessary equipment, such as the radiation backpack among other things, to routinely monitor radiation levels, to ensure companies that are authorised do not exceed the required limit.
Apart from monitoring, companies that are authorised to use radioactive substances are also required to notify the EPA when they are transporting such substances.
“The agency is notified of any movement in sources from one location to the other.
Our recent detection exercises have confirmed that the radiation…is not above the allowable limit,” Redmond related.