Australia: Regulation and Management of Naturally Occurring Radioactive Material (NORM)

Radiation, NORM, and Definitions

Radiation is a term used to describe the movement or transfer of energy through space or through a medium. It occurs when unstable atoms give off energy in the form of radiation to move to a lower energy state. These unstable atoms are known as “radionuclides” and naturally occur in human plants, animal soils, water, and air and are responsible for much of the naturally occurring radiation known as “background radiation.” Naturally occurring background radiation is variable and causes radiation exposure to people everywhere. Exposures result in a dose, which is a standardized way of measuring the impacts to people taking into account different chemical, biological, and mechanical aspects of the exposure. Dose has the units of sieverts (Sv), and generally people all around the world receive on average 2–3 mSv per year from natural background, although this can be one or two orders of magnitude higher in some places.

Essentially, all materials are...