ML20050A412
| ML20050A412 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Site: | Midland |
| Issue date: | 01/25/1982 |
| From: | Traxler B HOUSE OF REP. |
| To: | Kammerer C NRC OFFICE OF CONGRESSIONAL AFFAIRS (OCA) |
| Shared Package | |
| ML20050A407 | List: |
| References | |
| NUDOCS 8204010270 | |
| Download: ML20050A412 (2) | |
Text
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iL BOB TRAXLER' '
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1 January 25, 1982 Mr. Carlton Xemerer. Director Office of Congressional Affairs Nuclear Regulatory Commission 1717 H Street, NW Washington, D. C. 20555
Dear Mr. Kemerer:
Enclosed is a copy of a letter I recently received from a resident of my district. He is concerned about recent evidence showing that current standards for release of radioactivity from nuclear plants may be too lax.
Could you please inform me what steps, if any, are being taken to reeval-uate the amount and type of regularly released radioactivity from the Midland, Michigan nuclear plant? Please send your reply to my Washington.
office, 2448 Rayburn House Office Building.
Your assistance in this matter would be greatly appreciated. With kind regards I remain rely, r b
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E:08 TRAXLER Member of Congress BT:dr 2/24..To OCA for Direct Reply.. Suspense: Mar 22.. Docket.82-203 i
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Dear Representative Traxler,
h a v e b e e n.nMAli DOWIPAYL %
rngcu Since 1977 I concerned with the potential harm from radioactive elements that are to be regularly released by the Midland Nuclear Plant. While the Nuclear Regulatory Agency maintains that there are safe amounts of radioactivity that one i
may absorb with out danger an increasing amount of information suggests that the dangers of" low levels of radioactivity have been greatly underestimated.
As early as 1963 an American. Medical Association publication, Archives of Pathology, stated that the danger of cancer caused by ionising radiation increased for residents living around nuclear plants.
In July of 1978, Dr. Eula Bingham of the Occupational Health and Safety Administration said that "Results of recent research have demonstrated that, as with chemical carcinogens, no safe level or threshold can be established for radiation."
In March of 1979 Newsweek magazine reported leukemia rates six times higher than normal among workers at Maine's Portsmouth Naval Shipyard, where nuclear ships are repaired under stringent safety rules.
Most recently a very disturbing report by a German scientist suggests that " legally allowable amounts of radiation leaking from U.S.
reactors may endanger the health of some Americans because federal dose limits are too lax." The scientist, biologist Bernd Franke of Heidelberg, says that even normal j
releases from atomic facilities can lead to overexposure because current dose limits are based on unrealistic data.
The exposure limit for radioactive iodine 131, for example,is based on the risk to milk-drinking infants.
But Franke says the same ceiling could permit a person recovering from a bone fracture to absorb 100 times as much iodine. This report is supported by Dr. Ernest Sternglass who found a cancer increase of 58% in the Waterford Community where the Millstone reactor is located.
Before licensing, Consumers Power Company, builder of the
'Hidland nuclear plant, was requirred by law to file an Environmental Sta tement.
The 1977 Statement indicated that 42 radioactive elements would be regularly released into the air or into the water of the Tittabawassee River.
A partial list includes iodine-131, strontium-89 and 90, and cesium-134,136, 137.
In light of the most recent research on the effects of low level radiation and growing evidence of increased cancers in and around nuclear facilities, ghal stens Ari beine taken 1A E111AlRA11 ihi ARARA1 And 1121 af ERARlAELL E11AAAAA radiometivfM from thg Midinnd Proisett Sincerely, t
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Terr R. Miller
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3329 Glendora Bay City, Mich.
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