565 



The Murmansk Maritime Shipping Line halted LRW dumping at sea in 1984, but the Navy 

 continues to this day, although in lesser amounts. 



The location of officially designated areas for disposal of SRW in northern seas has been 

 shown in Fig. 4. Characteristics of the main disposal areas are presented in Table A3 of the Ap- 

 pendix. None of these SRW disposal areas complies with a single international requirement for 

 this kind of activity (either in depth, or in distance from shore, or in location on the globe). 



In terms of volume, the majority of the SRW dumped in northern seas is low- and intermedi- 

 ate-level RW produced during the operation of Naval nuclear-powered surface vessels and NS's 

 and the nuclear icebreaker fleet, and at the corresponding shipyards. Fig. 4 showed the location of 

 the main sources of SRW in northern Russia. 



As a rule, low- and intermediate-level SRW sunk in northern seas was enclosed in metal 

 containers. Large pieces of RW were sunk separately or within specially designated 

 ships — barges, lighters, or tankers (Table A4 in Appendix). This SRW comprised mainly: 

 • contaminated film coverings, tools, personal protective devices, uniforms, fittings, 

 pipelines, activity filter boxes, pumps, steam generators, and various contaminated 

 objects produced during ship repair work. The total activity of sunken intermediate- 

 and low-level SRW, according to available data, was over 15 5 kCi (574 TBq) in the 

 Kara Sea and 40 Ci (1.5 TBq) in the Barents Sea. The most SRW in terms of vol- 

 ume was dumped in the Kara Sea, in Area 1 (Novaya Zemlya Depression), and in 

 terms of total activity, in Area 2 (Sedov Inlet, Novaya Zemlya) (Table A4 of Ap- 

 pendix, Fig. 6, and Table 2). 

 The largest number of dumpings of low- and intermediate-level SRW was in the years 1967 

 and 1982, and the greatest activities of SRW dumped was in 1983 and 1988 (see Fig. 5). 

 Since 1986, the Murmansk Maritime Shipping Line has halted disposal of SRW at sea. 



Table 2. Summary Data on Low- and Intermediate-Level 

 Solid Radioactive Waste Dumped in the Kara and Barents Seas 



Key to Remarks: C — containers; LO — large objects; K— vessels. 



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