RADIOLOGICAL AND TECTONIC INFORMATION ARE USE IN THE SYSTEM OF COMPREHENSIVE ENVIRONMENTAL MONITORING OF TECHNOLOGICALLY LOADED FOR SOUTHEAST REGIONS OF UKRAINE

Abstract

The existing environmental monitoring system in Ukraine does not fully take into account the radioecological factor on the territories near many nuclear objects on the southeast of country (including enterprises for the extraction and primary processing of uranium raw materials, low-level waste storage and the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant), where the current radioecological situation can be characterized as pre-crisis. That is why it was here in the mid-1990s that the creation of a regional system for comprehensive environmental monitoring – SEM «Prydniprovya» on the territory of Dnipropetrovsk region, which has one of the highest man-made loads in Ukraine, was started as a pilot project with further expansion to the entire territory of the country. But at the same time, a significant drawback of this system is insufficient attention to radiological problems, which are connected with the fact that a radioecological situation has developed in the territory of Kirovohrad, Dnipropetrovsk and Zaporizhzhia regions, which, due to its complexity and danger to the biotic components of the environment and the population health including future generations, has no analogues in Ukraine. This is due to the fact that since the middle of the 20th century, radiation-hazardous industrial and technological processes related to the extraction and processing of uranium raw materials, the production and use of radioactive radiation sources, the handling of radioactive waste, and the activities of the Zaporizhia NPP have been taking place in these regions. Therefore, the further development of the radio-ecological unit during the modernization of the specified SEM «Prydniprovya» is still relevant. At the same time, one of the essential factors determining both the ecological state in general and the radiation state in particular of any region are the peculiarities of its fault-block structure. The presence of a significant amount of geological and geophysical information about the tectonic structure (in particular, the system of Precambrian faults of the earth’s crust, characterized by the single planetary regularities of the placement of tectonic structures) can be one of the bases for forecasting specific directions of dangerous natural and man-made radiological impact of nuclear fuel cycle objects in the conditions of man-made busy regions of Ukraine. Using the example of the territories adjacent to the Zaporizhzhia NPP, the main energy-producing enterprise in the south-east of Ukraine, it is shown the need to involve data on radionuclides of natural origin (Ra226, Th232), which allow for a more detailed study of tectonic (fault-block) information for further planning and interpretation of monitoring data radiological studies. The results of radiological data analysis (in particular, maps of the specific activity of Ra226 and Th232) indicate the possibility of their involvement in the refinement of tectonic zoning maps, constructed based on the results of the interpretation of gravity and magnetic fields based on geological survey wells.