88. Interpreation

“High Court” means the High Court of Sri Lanka, holden in the Judicial Zone of Colombo designated by the Minister with the concurrence of the Chief Justice, by Order published in the Gazette;

“incident” means any unintended event including operating errors, equipment failures, initiating events, accident precursors, near misses or other mishaps or unauthorized act malicious or non-malicious, the consequences or potential consequences of which are not, negligible from the point of view of protection or safety from ionizing radiation;

“ionizing radiation” means radiation capable of producing ion pairs in biological material;

“irradiating apparatus” means any system in which charged particles are accelerated in a vacuum through a potential difference of more than five kilovolts (whether in one or more steps), except an apparatus in which the only such generator is a cathode ray tube or visual display device, which under normal operating conditions, does not cause an instantaneous absorbed dose rate of more than 5 micro gray per hour at a distance of 50 millimeters from any accessible surface. All type of X-ray machines and charged particle accelerators are considered to be irradiating apparatus;

“irradiation installation” means a structure or an installation that houses a particle accelerator,

X-ray apparatus or large radioactive sources and that can produce high radiation fields properly designed structures providing shield-ing and other protection and are equipped with safety devices such as inter-locks which pre-vent inadvertent entry into the high radiation field and includes installations for external beam radiation therapy, installation for steril-ization or preservation of commercial prod-ucts and some installations for industrial ra-diography;

“licence” means a licence issued by the Council granting authorization to conduct of a practice, which is not a practice exempted under section 19 of this Act;

“licencee” means the holder of a licence;

“Minister” means the minister to whom the implementation of the provisions of this Act is assigned;

“nuclear material” means any source, material or any special fissionable material;

“nuclear or radiological emergency” means an emergency in which there is or is perceived to be a hazard, due to :-

Sri Lanka Atomic Energy

“nuclear weapons” means an explosive device that derives its destructive force from nuclear reaction, either fission or combination of fission or fusion;

“over exposure” means any exposure of a person to ionizing radiation so as that the dose received by that person is in excess of the relevant dose limits as are prescribed;

“practice involving ionizing radiation” means any human activity that introduces additional sources of exposure or exposure pathways or extends exposure to additional people or modifies the network of exposure pathways from existing sources, in a way that increases the exposure or the likelihood of exposure of people or the number of people exposed;

“radiation protection” means the protection of people from the effects of exposure to ionizing radiation and the means for achieving this;

“radiation worker” means any person who is employed full time or part time or in a temporary capacity, for an employer who is responsible for ensuring the protection of such person from radiation, while being so employed;

“radioactive material” means any material emitting ionizing radiation which is subject to the regulatory control of the Council;

“radioactive source” means radioactive material that is permanently sealed in a capsule or closely bounded in a solid form and which is not exempted from regulatory control and also means any radioactive material released if the radioactive source is leaking or broken;

“radioactive waste” means material in whatever physical form, remaining from practices or interventions that contains or is contaminated with radioactive material and has a radioactivity or radioactivity concentration higher than the level set for clearance from regulatory requirements and for which no further use is foreseen;

“Safeguards Agreement” means the Agreement between the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka and the International Atomic

Energy Agency for the application of safeguards in connection with the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, which entered into force on 06th August 1984

and any protocol thereto;

“safety” means the protection of people and the environment against ionizing radiation risks and the safety of facilities and activities that give rise to radiation risks;

“security” means the prevention and detection of and response to, theft, sabotage, unauthorized access, illegal transfer or other malicious acts involving nuclear or other radioactive material or their facilities;

“source” means anything that may cause radiation exposure by emitting ionizing radiation or releasing radioactive material;

“source material” means uranium containing the mixture of isotopes occurring in the nature, uranium depleted in isotope 235, thorium and any of the foregoing in the form of metal, alloy, chemical compound or concentrate, any other material containing one or more of the foregoing in such concentration as determined by the Council from time to time;

Sri Lanka Atomic Energy

“special fissionable material” means plutonium-

239, uranium-233; uranium enriched in the isotopes 235 or 233, any material containing one or more of the foregoing and such other fissionable material as the Council shall determine from time to time, but shall not include source material; and

“uranium enriched in the isotopes 235 or 233”

means uranium containing the isotopes 235

or 233 or both in an amount such that the abundance ratio of the sum of these isotopes to the isotope 238 is greater than the ratio of the isotope 235 to the isotope 238 occurring in the nature.