The behaviour of 137 Cs in the North Atlantic Ocean assessed from numerical modelling: Releases from nuclear fuel reprocessing factories, redissolution from contaminated sediments and leakage from dumped nuclear wastes.

A Lagrangian model which simulates the dispersion of ¹³⁷ Cs in the North Atlantic has been developed. The model includes water/sediment interactions. It has been tested comparing calculated and measured ¹³⁷ Cs concentrations in water and sediments of the European Shelf resulting after the releases from the nuclear fuel reprocessing plants of Sellafield and La Hague. Some additional numerical experiments have been carried out. First, the redissolution of ¹³⁷ Cs from contaminated sediments after the reduction in releases from the reprocessing plants has been studied. This allowed to calculate effective half-lives of ¹³⁷ Cs in several sub-basins. Later, potential leakage of ¹³⁷ Cs from dumped nuclear wastes in several locations of the Atlantic has been investigated. Even in worst-case scenarios, these leakages should not lead to any radiological implications.
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