Radiation protection challenges in the upgrade, autopsy and disposal of the LHC beam dump

Abstract

The upgrade of the Large Hadron Collider spare beam dumps (Target Dump External, TDE) and the autopsy of the old operational TDE required to perform several activities in a high-radiation environment posing significant radiation protection challenges due to the residual activation of the equipment. To ensure high safety standards and to respect the ALARA principle, these challenges were addressed using the advanced Monte Carlo techniques to predict the residual ambient dose equivalent rate and the radionuclide inventory at different steps of the interventions. The CERN HSE-RP group makes extensive use of the FLUKA and ActiWiz codes to produce accurate estimates. This work aims to provide an overview of the radiation protection studies to optimise the interventions (ALARA) and to reduce the radiological risk for personnel and environment.