ML20029C000
| ML20029C000 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Issue date: | 08/13/1990 |
| From: | Carr K NRC COMMISSION (OCM) |
| To: | Schrag P SACRAMENTO BEE SACRAMENTO, CA |
| Shared Package | |
| ML20029B990 | List: |
| References | |
| FOIA-90-415, FRN-53FR49886, RULE-PR-CHP1 NUDOCS 9103220197 | |
| Download: ML20029C000 (3) | |
Text
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NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION 2. '. 3 j
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%l Au9ust 13, 1990 CHAIRMAN Mr. Peter Schrag Editoiial Page Editor the Sacramento Bee P. O. Box 15779 Sacramento, California 95852
Dear Mr. Schrag:
I want to clarify the Nuclear Regulatory Commission's policy on exempting slightly radioactive materials that are below regulatory concern, which you addressed in your July 1 editorial.
The NRC's goal is to protect the public health and safety and the environment and I am contident our recent policy accomplishes our goal.
When the NRC implements this policy, we will ensure that any levels of radiation from exompted activities will be comparable to the low levels that most of us encounter in routing activities such as the use of smoke detectors in our homes today.
Let me give you a frame of reference with respect to radiation.
We each get about 360 milliroc per year of radiation dose from outer space, air, food, drink, soils, building materials, and medical exams.
In fact, our policy is basically consistent with the recommendations of the Nationa', Council on Radiation Protection and Measurements and the latest scientific assessments on the risk of ra(' Mon by scientists in national and international groups, includa'q
.e National Academy of Sciences and the United Nations scientific Committee on the Effects of Atomic Radiation.
For example, a recent National Academy of Sciences report noted no increase in health effects has been documented in populations residing in areas of high natural background radiation.
I want to emphasize that most of the radiation levels used by the eminent scientists who wrote this study as a basis for risk estimates are a thousand times higher, that is 10 rJun (not 10 millirem), than the levels in the NRC's policy statement.
The assessments of these internationally recognized scientific
-odies were used by the International Commission on Radiological Protection in formulating their recommendations to limit radiation
- doses, which are also thousands of times greater than those associated with potential exemptions.
l I want to point out that it is not NRC's responsibility to come up with safe disposal methods for radioactive waste.
That is the responsibility of the people who generate the waste, such as hospitals, research facilities, utility companies, and other 9103220197 910314 PDR FOIA BECKER 90-415 PDR
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Mr. Schrag industries who use these materials as well as the State and Federal agencies specifically charged with that responsibility.
- However, l
we are responsible for ensuring that the vaste generators safely dispose of their radioactive vastes in a manner that protects the public and the environment.
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" Ignoring" radioactive waste is not our intent.
Nothing could be further from the truth.
The Commission has a demonstrated track record of developing and enforcing tough regulations to ensure the public is protected from radioactive waste.
Our Below Regulatory concern policy is an attempt to tailor the amount of regulatory control to the potential risks posed by such vaste.
Safety is our responsibil!,ty, and it is a matter that we at the NRC take most sericusly.
The NRC's goal is to protect the public health and safety and we are confident that regulatory decisions based on current and sound scientific information will do just that.
A sincerely, Kenneth M. Carr
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nneth Carr, chairman of the Nuclear ful. But 'that's one of several aspects of Carr's Regulgtory Commission, has come up proposal that the Environmental Protection with a nifty idea for gettinz rid of nearly Agency considers Notally inappropriate."
.one. third of the nation's lo6 level nuclear Dere may indeed be safe attematives for wastesin one easy step: Ignore it.
disposing of some of this matedal more eco-Carr proposes to treat these slightly radio-nomically than it is being handled today, active materials just like any other kind of Certainly it's an issue the government should trash, and although he has won the backing pursue. But is the NRC the appropriate agen.
of nuclear power plant operstors, what he cy to determine how much radioactivity is has in mind isn't going over so well with the safe enough? Some of the criticism of Carr's
, other public agencies resporsible for public proposal from other experts suggests that it health and safety, is not.
It's easy to understand the nuclear power industry's enthusiasm. De NRC's continu-E PA contends that the level of radioactiv.
ing failure to come up with a safe, reliable L ity that the NRC has decided is low
means of nuclear waste disposalis one of the enough not to regulate anymore is roughly
. major stumbling blocks to the expansion of five times higher than it ought to be for pub-atomic power. Even if no new nuclear plants lic safety. The National Council on Radiation ever open in this country, the industry is fac.
Protection, which sets the standards for ex.
, ing potentially enormous costs over the next
'posure that most radiologists follow, sug.
- 20 years as the facilities that are already in gests that the limits should be set even lower
- operation reach the end of tt#; useful life still. And those estimates were all drawn t,ip
- . span and have to be closed and dismantled.
before the International Commission on Ra.
gjf Under the NRC's plan, all sorts of dispos.
diological Protection, which recommends
, ables from the plants that are currently standards for riuclear exposure in the work-l treated as hazardous - gloves, air filters, place, announced recently that the risks of I used machinery, dead animals from labora-radiation are roughly three times greater j tory expedments - could be sent directly to than scientists have calculated in the past.
sanitary landfills. Some of it, Carr suggests, Carr may be on the right track, but he ap.
could even be recycled into something use.
pears to have a verylong way to go,
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