HOW THE ASSAULT ON RADIATION STANDARDS TIES TOGETHER: OR WHY THE NUCLEAR INDUSTRY DESPERATELY WANTS RADIOACTIVE "RECYCLING"

There is one reason, and one reason only, for the current assault on radiation protection standards.

That reason is money. Money the nuclear power industry would rather not spend to fully clean up its contaminated nuclear reactor sites. Money the Department of Energy would rather not spend to fully clean up its contaminated nuclear weapons sites. Money the Nuclear Regulatory Commission would like to save for its licensees. Money some members of Congress would rather see in utility pockets rather than ratepayer wallets.

And if there is one reason for this assault, there is one underlying prerequisite for the assault to work. That is that the federal government will determine that a significant portion of what is now considered radioactive waste will no longer be considered as such. Instead, this radioactively contaminated material, under this scheme, could be considered non-radioactive and "recycled" into consumer products or treated as normal garbage. It’s a long-sought nuclear industry goal (see BRC sidebar) but one that is taking on particular urgency as the decommissioning of the atomic age is beginning in earnest.

Some radioactive waste has been getting out--"released" or "cleared" from nuclear facilities for years. Neither the nuclear industry nor the government really know how much has gone out and if they know where it went, they are not telling. What is certain is that there will be tremendous increases in the amount of contaminated material released into general commerce, ordinary waste and "recycling" as hundreds of nuclear reactors and fuel chain facilities age and close.

Specific examples of closed nuclear power reactors whose owners want to crumble the contaminated concrete and dump in ordinary landfills and/or leave onsite are Big Rock Point in Michigan and Maine Yankee (a concept called "rubblization," see decommissioning article).

Consumers Power is applying to NRC for permission to dump materials from Big Rock Point in local landfills and the company is in discussions with landfill operators and the Michigan Dept. of the Environmental Quality. This is despite a state law calling for continued regulatory of control of radioactive waste in Michigan.

The Department of Energy has released materials comprising half of the buildings at its Santa Susana site in Los Angeles to regular landfills. Asbestos and lead-containing buildings were donated to a school for classrooms, with no radioactive screening. The buildings are being returned after opposition and concern was expressed from local groups up and Senator Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.).

Radioactive metal and other materials from operating and closed nuclear reactors and weapons sites are being sent to radioactive processors (like GTS Duratek in Tennessee) for eventual release into normal metal, steel and other raw materials for general commerce. Examples include much of the decommissioning volume of the Big Rock Point reactor, the steam generators from the operating Kewaunee reactor in Wisconsin and decommissioning waste from dismantlement of buildings at the Santa Susana site. British Nuclear Fuels Ltd (BNFL) has a $284 million contract with DOE to release 126,000 tons of metal from massive Oak Ridge uranium enrichment buildings and has a contract to decommission Big Rock Point.

The ongoing releases are occurring under highly questionable provisions and misuse of old regulatory guidance. Both the NRC and DOE use 1974 Atomic Energy Commission regulatory guidance (Reg. Gd. 1.86) for terminating operating nuclear licenses to justify letting contaminated materials into unrestricted commerce. Even nuclear advocates concede that radioactive elements "released" at low concentrations can reconcentrate to higher concentrations in incinerator ash, slag and dust at metal processors or as a result of environmental processes.

In addition, the computer models used to calculate doses have many variables that can be changed to make releases appear to lead to different doses. Nationally and internationally, the proposed "standards" or allowable "dose criterion" of 1 millirem/year or 10 microsieverts/year "per practice" is only a hypothetical number that is used to justify allowing radioactive contamination. It is not verifiable or enforceable and it is not a limit.

Any number of "practices" or releases would be allowed to occur-- each giving that theoretical dose. The definition of a "practice" can be broad. Each type of metal, each type of material, all the shipments of each material from any number of facilities per year can be considered a "practice," with no limit on the number of practices and no accounting for long-lasting exposures that will continue to give doses for years to come.

The projections are claimed to be "conservative" because they are calculated for workers at facilities receiving the radioactive material such as steel mills or recycling centers. The assumption is that the front line workers get a millirem or less a year (from each generator or each practice of each generator sending them waste) so everyone else will get less.

An NRC Commissioners/ Staff meeting is expected on this the first week of May 2000.

NRC, DOE and the Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation claim the current releases are based on the concentrations (in the range of 20 to 15,000 disintegrations per minute per square centimeter for various radionuclides) in the old 1974 guidance. Since that guidance suggests allowable surface contamination, extrapolations are done to allow materials out that are contaminated through and through. If NRC makes a rule, it is expected to dramatically increase the amount of surface and volumetric radioactive materials deregulated.

The concept is simple: some radioactive materials are so lightly radioactive—not even above background levels--that there is no significant danger to the public and thus no reason to regulate them. Some in the nuclear industry, NRC and DOE now argue that they can’t tell what’s contaminated from their own processes and what is already in the background. Thus, nuclear proponents are pushing for a "standard" to be set to allow release of nuclear waste into general commerce justifying it by claiming it isn’t too much more than what is already there.

Many of the radioactive isotopes from the nuclear power and weapons fuel chain are more toxic than naturally-occurring radioisotopes. For example, the potassium-40 found in bananas is simply not as toxic as plutonium.

Digging, concentrating, enriching, fissioning in reactors and bombs and processing uranium and waste have created and spread hundreds of types of radioisotopes that are never encountered "naturally." Just because some radiation exists in nature, and some has been released by nuclear power and weapons production and testing, does not mean we should accept more nuclear industry waste in our consumer goods and building materials, or regular landfills for that matter. If the nuclear power industry cannot tell what materials are made from and contaminated by their processes, they should not be allowed to release anything from their sites. Why should we trust them to limit their "releases" to specific levels if they can’t even identify what they have made?

Actually, specific radioisotopes can be identified, but it is very expensive and time-consuming. As usual, the burden of proof falls on the public to prove contamination and injury.

Fortunately for the public, the steel industry has equipped itself with detection equipment to prevent contaminated metal from coming into its facilities. The steel, nickel, zinc, copper and brass industries oppose any radioactive contamination of the metal supply. Some steel companies have turned back shipments that set off their alarms. But the public should not have to rely on the steel industry to protect us from irresponsible federal and state policies.

Unfortunately, it is more than metal that NRC has directed its staff to "allow quantities to be released." The rule is to be as broad as possible for solids, equipment, soils, metal, concrete. Tennessee already is permitting companies to survey and process for surface and volumetric "free release," and to release radioactive soil and other bulk materials, lead, asphalt, concrete, metal and equipment.

Some members of the U.S. House and Senate have expressed concern and opposition to the ongoing releases, and some maintain that states do not have the right to release radioactive materials into commerce. States do have the authority to be more protective, but not to be less protective than the federal government.

Allowing contamination equal to or twice background may sound persuasive to the layperson, but the reasons why this isn’t safe are legion. To state just a few: First, NRC and DOE’s proposed "release" limits always have been far above background radiation levels. Second, as noted several places in this issue, any radiation exposures, including background, pose health risks. Third, there is no reason, other than economic benefit to the nuclear power industry, for the federal government to require anything but full isolation of radioactive materials from the environment.

In fact, radioactive "recycling," or, as the commercial nuclear power industry would prefer to call it—unrestricted release of radioactive materials—is the key to the financial future of the nuclear power industry.

If the industry (and the DOE) can get away with rubblizing its sites, or "recycling" its radioactive materials, or in any other way not cleaning up its radioactive garbage, then it will save hundreds of millions—probably billions—of dollars. That might be enough to start a brand new atomic age. At the least, it’s enough to keep the stockholders of companies like AmerGen and Entergy happy—companies that intend to actually make money on decommission-ing by looting the ratepayer-supplied decommissioning funds.

The radioactive "recycle" proposals aren’t being made because the government hates you and wants to kill you. They’re being made because they would save the government billions of dollars. AmerGen and Entergy aren’t buying up nuclear reactors because they think they’re going to operate efficiently or make those companies bundles of dollars. Instead, they’re betting that "recycle-based" standards will allow them to perform perfunctory clean-ups of reactor sites, and distribute the rest of the segregated decommissioning funds to stockholders and management.

But these "recycle" proposals can’t really be instituted without scientific backing. Thus the emergence of the BEIR VII committee. And full decommissioning can’t really be done until there is an off-site place to put high-level radioactive waste. Thus the push to establish an "interim"storage site at Yucca Mountain, Nevada, and to weaken radiation standards for Yucca Mountain—without them, Yucca cannot possibly be licensed.

It’s all a shell game, with a lot of blue smoke and mirrors. Every issue depends on every other issue, but, in the end, they all depend on this: radioactive release and recycling. Without that, and the radiation standard levels that would permit that, the nuclear industry is in big trouble. With that, and the correlating weakening of radiation standards, the industry can survive and perhaps prosper.

That’s the shell game—but don’t forget, it is all our lives, and our children’s lives, and their children’s lives that are at stake. And with stakes like that—on both sides—this is one fight that won’t be pretty. –Diane D’Arrigo

and the NRC website on this rulemaking at