Expert Group on the CRPPH Collective Opinion (EGCO)
Ongoing

In 1993, the CRPPH held a workshop entitled Radiation Protection on the Threshold of the 21st Century. This followed the development and issuing of ICRP Publication 60, and was at the beginning of a period of adaptation, implementation and change. As such, the CRPPH felt that it would be useful to scan the horizon and see what types of issues could arise in the near-term future, and to study their possible implications. The intention of this effort was to help member country governments to be better prepared to guide their national policy and application through this period of flux. As a result of this workshop, the CRPPH published, in 1994, a summary document titled, Radiation Protection Today and Tomorrow: An Assessment of the Present Status and Future Perspectives of Radiation Protection. In addition to the value that this work brought to member countries of the NEA, it also served as a list of issues and areas to be further studied by the CRPPH. The collective opinion, in effect, became the blueprint of the committee’s programme of work for almost ten years. Since its publication, the CRPPH has worked to address the topics and areas that were identified, and has published reports and studies in all the major areas that were identified.

The ICRP will issue new recommendations in 2006. In this context the CRPPH has decided to identify topics and areas that in the mid- to long-term future will (or could) have significant influence on radiological protection policy, regulation and application. To this end the Expert Group on the CRPPH Collective Opinion (EGCO) sought to build on the issues raised during the topical session held during the meeting of the CRPPH in March 2004. These discussions took in radiological protection, science, policy, regulation and implementation. In addition, in collaboration with the EGIR, the expert group assessed any possible impacts that new ICRP recommendations could have on these areas.The EGCO finished its report in 2007, thereby completing its mandate.