Standards Development

Scope

This document specifies approaches for the determination of plutonium isotopes (238Pu, 239Pu and 240Pu) in urine using alpha spectrometry and inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (ICP-MS).

It is applicable to the measurement of plutonium isotopes at levels which are appropriate to:

— workers handling plutonium in occupational settings, where detection limits should be sufficient to determine compliance with dose limits

— workers, members of the public and emergency responders in accident situations, where required detection limits may be much higher, and results should be reported in a short timescale.

This document does not provide information on when monitoring should be carried out or the interpretation of the results in terms of dose or biological effects.

This document specifies requirements used to the analysis of plutonium (238Pu, 239Pu, and 240Pu) contents in urine samples of occupational and rescue workers under emergencies. The mass concentrations obtained can be converted into activity concentrations of the different isotopes.

The detection limit depends on the efficiency of chemical separation and the performance of the measurement device.