Radiological and hygienic approaches to solving the problem of environmental safety of radioactive waste storages

The paper presents general approaches to solving the problems associated with the radioecological safety of radioactive waste (RAW) storages. It considers the influence of climatic factors on the possible release of radionuclides into the environment. The authors have made as follows: analysis of the significance of main scenarios for radionuclide release into the environment and the natural and climatic conditions of the existing areas of near-surface RAW storages in the Russian Federation; conditional zoning of the Russian Federation according to the balance of atmospheric precipitation. The zoning of RAW storage locations is of importance for choosing the likely scenarios of radionuclide migrations.