r/Radiation • u/N_Geenir • Jul 29 '26

Questions How does your country regulate outsourced/third-party Radiation Safety Officers (RSO / RPO / RPS)?

Hey everyone,

I’m a Radiation Protection Supervisor (SPR) in Brazil, and I’m curious to learn how the legal and regulatory framework for radiation safety roles works in other countries.

Some context from Brazil:

Recently, our national regulatory body (ANSN) established a requirement for outsourced/third-party SPRs. They now mandate that contracted SPRs must physically visit the facilities they supervise at least once a month, accumulating a total of 8 hours on-site per month.

I’d love to get an international perspective on a few questions:

  1. Outsourcing: Does your local legislation allow facilities to hire third-party / external radiation safety consultants, or must the officer be a direct employee of the facility?
  2. Mandatory Hours/Visits: If third-party officers are allowed, does the law specify a mandatory frequency of physical visits or required hours on-site? Or is the time spent on-site left to the officer’s professional judgment based on a risk assessment?

I'd really appreciate any insights into how your country handles this! Thanks in advance for sharing your experiences.

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u/Early-Judgment-2895 Jul 29 '26

The U.S. has two codes of federal regulations and systems in place. 10 CFR 835, this governs the DOE side of things. And a side note they don’t fall under the executive branch for secret/top secret clearance but specifically fall under congress.

You also have 10 CFR 20 which follows the NRC side of things, think active power plants sending power to the grid and not making special material.

Both systems have very similar rules/requirements for radcon.

Another side note the DOE side has a lot more interesting work for CA/HCA/ARA potential depending on the scope form simple lab work to full on demolition of highly contaminated facilities and almost every isotope you can think of. For example untold millions of alpha on a tech smear where you offscale your meter to the point you have to take a dose rate on it and convert it back to DPM.