ML19322E047
| ML19322E047 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Site: | Crane  |
| Issue date: | 02/28/1980 |
| From: | Harold Denton Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation |
| To: | Landau E AFFILIATION NOT ASSIGNED |
| References | |
| NUDOCS 8003170070 | |
| Download: ML19322E047 (3) | |
Text
c FEBRUARY 2 8 1990 l
Ha. Erica Landau 5215 Sepulveda Blvd.
Unit 19A Culver City, CA 90230
Dear Ms. Landau:
I am writing in response to your letter to President Carter regarding your views on nuclear power and safety.
I regret that this answer to your letter has been delayed. The accident and its consequences have created a substantial increase in the agency's workload, which has prevented me from responding to you as promptly as I would have liked to.
l I appreciate your concern regarding nuclear safety; however, it should be noted that when the accident occurred at IMI, the plant did shut down and emergency cooling systems did turn on automatically. An operator later took
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a wrong action by turning off the cooling system. After the cooling system was turned off, damage occurred to the fuel, but only a small enount of radia-tion was released to the environment.
The very small dose of radiation that was received by people in the area came from radioactive gases that escaped from the auxiliary building. The average dose of radioactivity received by the population within 50 miles of Three Mile Island was approximately 4 millirens. The marhun exposure to any individual was less than 100 millirens, which is less than the yearly dose each person receives as a result of natural background radiation. Doses at these levels result in less than one health effect over the lifetime of all people in this area. Natural background radiation received by people in the Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, area is approximately 125 millirens per year. To put these doses into perspective, it should be noted that a traveler flying round : rip in a jet between New York City and Los Angeles receives 5 millirens from cosmic rays in the natural background.
I appreciate your concerns and assure you that every effort is being made to ensure the continued protection of the health and safety of the public, not only at the Three Mile Island Station, but also at all nuclear power plants.
60031700 70 l
FEBRUARY 9 8120 I am enclosing summaries of two reports concerning the Three Mile Island acci-dent that may be of interest to you.
Sincerely, i d C;1: n. 5;;cd kg I
E G. Cae -
' Harold R. Denton, Director Encl: Stanmary of NUREG-0558 Summary of NUREG-0600 OFFICE.. M1[UI
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P 5215 Sepulveda Boulevard Unit 19A Culver City, California 90230 April 4, 1979 James Earl Carter, President United States of America The White House
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Dear Mr. President:
As an eighteen year old in high school in Culver City, Cali-fornia.
I am very concerned with the nuclear reactor accident near Harrisburg", Pennsylvania.
When I first heard about it, it really scared me.
I feel that they should stop building nuclear reactor plants.
California can do without nuclear power with relative ease.
Only five percent of its electricity is generated by nuclear reactor plants.
What really frightens me is what about the future.
Harrisburg is the end of an era of technological innocence.
Nuclear partisans say that there was no loss of life at Harrisburg and that a plant that cost one billion dollars may never run again.
I would like to know the truth about energy.
What could really happen if the nuclear core did not cool off?
Could it cause our first nuclear power ~ Eat adr5phe?
Thank you for reading my letter and I would appreciate a,n answer.
Respectfully, b'icc( hek Erica Landau L._
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