**Acknowledgements**

priorities including value for money, affordability, technical maturity and the protection of

For Low Level Waste, disposal will be in fit for purpose facilities that reflect the nature of the wastes to be managed. Within this overall framework our priority is to achieve risk reduction by dealing with waste in ageing storage facilities and placing it into safer modern storage conditions. Diverse radioactive waste management and disposal solutions will be pursued where these offer benefits over previous arrangements. New waste management approaches will often require different transport arrangements and will be a matter of great interest to

Some general ideas about the underpinning strategies are showed in Figure 2, the basic steps for effective management of radioactive waste are part of a global system, ranging from waste generation to final disposal are: minimization of radioactive waste, pretreatment, characteri‐ zation, treatment, conditioning, transport, storage and disposal (IAEA, 1970). All of these ideas

Radioactive materials are extensively used in industrial and research activities into medical, agricultural and environmental applications, and in various other areas. During the produc‐ tion and use of these materials, radioactive waste will inevitably arise; this must be managed with particular care owing to its inherent radiological, biological, chemical and physical

Producers and users of radioactive materials must be sure that a waste management strategy exists prior to the start of waste generation. A well-developed waste management strategy should consider the entire sequence of waste management operations, from the waste's production until its final disposal, including the various regulatory, sociopolitical and economic issues. The identified goal of radioactive waste management can be met with reasonable cost and resource use by implementing a carefully planned waste management

Waste containing long lived radionuclides must be treated, conditioned, stored and disposed of at a repository specifically designed for this purpose. Sample storage capacity is needed for the decay of short lived radionuclides and for storing long lived waste prior to, and after, the treatment and conditioning steps. Decay is the only natural way of reducing radioactivity (the process of transmutation of some long lived radionuclides is not considered viable at this time). Since radionuclides have decay rates ranging from days to thousands of years, proper segregation of wastes depending on their half-lives, and separate treatment and conditioning of these wastes, is an important factor in the overall scheme of radioactive waste management. Treatment of waste involves operations intended to benefit safety and/or economy by changing the characteristics of the waste. There are different procedures to the treatment of radioactive

health, safety, security and the environment.

418 Environmental Risk Assessment of Soil Contamination

**6. Conclusions**

strategy using appropriate technologies.

hazards.

waste, like:

planning authorities and people living close to the sites involved.

with the intention to reduce the volume of radioactive wastes.

The authors would like to thank to Consejo Nacional de Ciencia y Tecnología de los Estados Unidos Mexicanos (CONACyT) with the project 193883 of projects and thematic networks strengthening research, L'Oreal, United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organi‐ zation (UNESCO), Academia Mexicana de Ciencias (AMC), Fundación México – Estados Unidos para la Ciencia (FUMEC). V. Valdovinos is grateful to CONACyT for her scholarship.
