ML23062A702
| ML23062A702 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Issue date: | 10/02/2000 |
| From: | Office of Nuclear Material Safety and Safeguards |
| To: | |
| Shared Package | |
| ML23062A719 | List: |
| References | |
| Download: ML23062A702 (241) | |
Text
1 1 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 2 NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION 3
4 5 *****
6 7
8 OAS MEETING 9
10 11 *****
12 13 14 15 Stono Ballroom 16 Doubletree Hotel 17 Charleston, North Carolina 18 19 20 21 22 Monday, October 2, 2000
2 1 P R O C E E D I N G S 2 [8:30 a.m.]
3 MR. BAILEY: Good morning, everyone. I'm very happy 4 to have all of you turn out here today. I think those of you 5 who have been here for a few hours realize that this is 6 probably one of the best sites we've ever had for one of these 7 meetings.
8 Within walking distance, there's plenty to eat and 9 drink and if you don't want to do those two things, then 10 there's historical things to go through [inaudible] where the 11 war and regression started.
12 [Laughter.]
13 MR. BAILEY: I learned something, sort of reading 14 about [inaudible] like this. That wasn't the first time South 15 Carolina had defeated the Union. They did it one time 16 previously and they just couldn't get anybody to go along with 17 them. So that's two tries, and that may be what we do a lot of 18 here today.
19 I would like to recognize that South Carolina put 20 together [inaudible] plenty of time to enjoy the town. I hope 21 you take the time to do that.
22 We've also made some changes in the agenda. You'll
3 1 notice we're not having the business meeting right at 5:00 at 2 night. It's usually starting at 6:00, until everybody 3 [inaudible.] We're going to have it in the morning and we 4 [inaudible] to get it over with.
5 We're going to the top of the agenda, moving right 6 along. We're going to go straight to Chip Cameron, the 7 facilitator, and if you're talking too long, that's my problem.
8 And we do control these mics down here. [Inaudible.] So we're 9 going to make this move.
10 I think we're [inaudible] majority of the work 11 putting the program together [inaudible] all over.
12 There's one thing, though, I've got to tell you.
13 There is [inaudible.] At the [inaudible,] you're just going to 14 have to back off, because I've seen things here I've never seen 15 before in my life. He brought me into a bachelorette party 16 because [inaudible] I was here and I saw plenty there 17 [inaudible.] And you're going to have to get off [inaudible.]
18 [Inaudible.]
19 Less than a block from here is a sushi and 20 [inaudible] place. So we'll all go down there, if you want.
21 I'm going to go ahead and sit down and we're going to 22 do this all along. We're going to get up here [inaudible] and
4 1 sit down, and I'm going to [inaudible,] who is our host, and 2 I'll say right up front, [inaudible.] Make his life 3 [inaudible.]
4 Pearce?
5 MR. O'KELLEY: Good morning. Payback is hell and not 6 only did you give me a hard time, but you stole half my lines I 7 was going to talk about this morning.
8 But I do want to welcome you all here and hope you 9 all have a very good time. There is a whole lot to do and all 10 within relative short walking distance. [Inaudible] also one 11 of the nice places [inaudible] just a few short miles out of 12 the city.
13 I want you to know that Charleston is a unique place 14 in the State of South Carolina. [Inaudible] local [inaudible]
15 have a way of describing Charleston, several ways. One of them 16 is being the [inaudible.]
17 As anybody who has looked at the maps, they know that 18 Charleston is surrounded by two rivers [inaudible] to form the 19 Atlantic Ocean.
20 And I also want to thank all of you people for having 21 the, I guess, courage or maybe [inaudible] to come to South 22 Carolina during hurricane season. [Inaudible] clean house at
5 1 the NRC.
2 [Laughter.]
3 MR. O'KELLEY: But I really do appreciate you all 4 coming. And remember, it's not you all, it's "y'all," one 5 syllable, y-apostrophe-a-l-l. That may help you get around and 6 converse with the locals.
7 If you do have time, really take advantage of the 8 market over here. There's a lot of junk you can buy and 9 there's some nice stuff there, as well. I hope you do enjoy 10 it.
11 Just a little housekeeping. There are restrooms 12 right outside the door here, if the urge hits you later on.
13 I want to introduce [inaudible] my staff, who have 14 really helped put this all this together. Audio/visual, we 15 have Andrew Roxburgh. In the back over here on the wall we've 16 got David King. Jim Peterson, who is over our radioactive 17 materials program. [Inaudible] still manning the registration 18 desk.
19 If you need anything, ask any one of these 20 individuals and they can hopefully get [inaudible.]
21 Tonight we're going to have a cocktail social, 22 reception down in the courtyard. We're going to treat you guys
6 1 to a little South Carolina [inaudible] with a dish called 2 Baltimore Stew. I'll hold off what's in it and let you see.
3 It's not all [inaudible.]
4 But I really do appreciate it. Y'all enjoy and if 5 you have any questions, please let us know. Thank you.
6 [Applause.]
7 MR. BAILEY: I see how this meeting is going, get 8 applauded here.
9 One of the real benefits of being Chairman of this 10 organization is that I guess [inaudible] several years, as most 11 of you are aware, the places, the name places were put in 12 alphabetical order. That was back when NRC [inaudible.] And 13 as a result, it sort of has to be in proper order.
14 Greta and I got to sit by each other, as many of you 15 [inaudible,] had the courage, I guess, to do it one more time.
16 I'm not sure that it's totally [inaudible] if she'd like to sit 17 by me while she was up here.
18 But anyway, I think most of you know Greta. For many 19 years, was head of the Arkansas [inaudible] state program, and 20 she took a job and went to [inaudible]. But you know what? I 21 was talking to her last night when we were out having a little 22 dinner and unlike some people who have left the state and gone
7 1 to the Federal Government, Greta can still spell state.
2 I think we are very fortunate to have someone like 3 Greta as an NRC Commissioner. And without further ado, I would 4 like to introduce Greta Dicus.
5 [Applause.]
6 COMMISSIONER DICUS: Now, you'll see how organized I 7 am that I can [inaudible.] Can everyone hear me okay?
8 Thank you very much. He's only told half the story.
9 See, I had to sit next to California and then on the other side 10 of me was Alabama, when Aubrey was Alabama, and talk about 11 fighting over the microphone. It was difficult to just get a 12 word in, but we did manage somehow to [inaudible.] [Inaudible]
13 sit next to Ed again. I appreciate that.
14 Well, good morning, everyone, and welcome to this, 15 the 32nd annual meeting of the Organization of Agreement 16 States. Can you believe 32 years? Really a remarkable record.
17 And this is actually the fourth year -- it didn't say fourth, 18 but it is the fourth year that the NRC was not involved in the 19 planning, and I think it's going very, very well and 20 [inaudible] accomplished [inaudible] on that, and I always look 21 forward to these [inaudible] because I see my friends and join 22 my friends and I get to meet [inaudible] and I can take that as
8 1 people change, organizations change over time.
2 And it's wonderful to be here in Charleston, it's 3 beautiful, and we appreciate all that South Carolina has done 4 to make this meeting so successful.
5 This year, I am very pleased to say I'll be able to 6 stay throughout the entire meeting. Last year, I whizzed in 7 and whizzed out. I had some commitments that I couldn't get 8 out of. But this year, I'll be here spending time with you and 9 [inaudible] and listening to the issues, listening to your 10 concerns and [inaudible] NRC.
11 And hopefully [inaudible] any of you [inaudible] as I 12 can while I'm here and [inaudible.]
13 I think another wonderful part of my attendance here 14 is that yet another state has become an agreement state. One 15 state who has a high attendance at these meetings two years in 16 a row, it's a good [inaudible] states, we had Ohio came in last 17 year and [inaudible] and this year we have Oklahoma.
18 So I'm taking credit for that, all right? That being 19 said, I would like to recognize Oklahoma as the 32nd agreement 20 state and I understand that this agreement became effective 21 September the 29th. So it's brand new, and I'm sure they'll do 22 a good job.
9 1 And it covers the responsibilities for licensing, 2 rulemaking, inspection and enforcement, but it will also allow 3 the state to regulate the land disposal [inaudible.]
4 So having been chairman of the Central Interstate Low 5 Level Radioactive Waste Compact, I'm very pleased to hear that 6 maybe Oklahoma [inaudible.]
7 [Laughter.]
8 COMMISSIONER DICUS: That's the 32nd state.
9 [Inaudible] like this other [inaudible] and state regulation of 10 radiation and radioactive materials, and it also helps us focus 11 on the upcoming agenda and the many issues that we have before 12 us in the next few days.
13 I'm looking at your [inaudible] manual. There's a 14 number of issues which interest all of us. The national 15 materials program, we're going to hear a lot about that this 16 morning.
17 Relationships with other organizations, like the 18 National Council on Radiation Protection Management and the 19 Health Physics Society, which I'm very pleased that we do have 20 a working relationship with them.
21 And I'd like to take a moment, a personal moment, 22 Cindy Jones, who is on my staff in my materials program, was
10 1 recently elected to the Board of the Health Physics Society and 2 I'm very pleased [inaudible.]
3 [Applause.]
4 COMMISSIONER DICUS: That's great. Current 5 rulemaking issues, [inaudible] issues dealing with 6 decommissioning and, of course, the panel on the NRC and OAS 7 working groups, which we have those groups working, I think, 8 very well.
9 Now, as I've noted in the past, and more frequently 10 of late, there continues to be a very high level of cooperation 11 between the NRC and the agreement states staff in addressing 12 our common regulatory issues. I can't tell you how pleased and 13 proud I am of this continuing relationship and I think it's 14 probably the best it's ever been.
15 This is part of the spirit of the agreement states 16 program and the relationship areas I've mentioned and making it 17 the best it's ever been.
18 Although I won't go into all of the issues outlined 19 above, I would ask you to pay particular attention to the 20 National Materials Working Group and the tabletop exercise that 21 is scheduled for later this morning, and I'd like to applaud 22 Kathy Allen and everyone working on that, both for the state
11 1 level programs and [inaudible,] for the great job that you are 2 doing.
3 As you all are aware, the working group was created 4 at the direction of the NRC Commissioners under what we call a 5 staff requirements memorandum.
6 For those of you who are interested about [inaudible]
7 you can find out more about it on our Commission paper, which 8 is SECY-99-256.
9 Commissioners cannot give a talk unless we throw in 10 advertising. So anyway, that's where you can read about it.
11 Part of the more troubling [inaudible] is that 12 agreement states currently regulate 75 percent of the licensees 13 in this country. By the year 2003, we anticipate they're going 14 to regulate 80 percent of the licensees in this country. So, 15 clearly, we are the focus and we're the regulators.
16 In addition to these startling numbers, the NRC is 17 placing more emphasis on activities that support what we call 18 national infrastructure, specifically, which would include, for 19 example, rulemaking, [inaudible] development, information 20 technology systems, [inaudible] on my case about, technical 21 support, event follow-up, and the integrated materials 22 performance evaluation program, the IMPEP program, which I
12 1 think is going rather well.
2 If you don't think so, you'll have an opportunity to 3 [inaudible] about that.
4 But unfortunately, there is no clear definition of 5 what a national materials program should look like or how it 6 should work. That's what we're trying to do now.
7 That is why this working group was created and why 8 it's very important to discuss and describe what you would like 9 the national program to look like.
10 Although it consists of your fellow colleagues from 11 the Organization of Agreement States and the TLC CRCPD, as well 12 as staff in NRC, [inaudible] later this morning to see not only 13 if the theory of cooperation and development support are valid, 14 but to shape the future of this country's materials program, 15 because you are the people who will be regulating [inaudible]
16 licensees [inaudible.]
17 Looking back every year, we [inaudible] agreement 18 state over year, but [inaudible.] So it's very important that 19 you make a decision on what this program should look like.
20 I'm going to enjoy working and watching the 21 interaction.
22 In closing, I would offer that of the items that are
13 1 of significant interest to the states, there are such things as 2 CRCPD, OAS [inaudible] agreement states and [inaudible.]
3 [Inaudible] recognition of the contributions to be 4 made by the NRC and the OAS joint working relationship. The 5 clearest rule, release of solid material, and I don't want to 6 go there much further, and stakeholder involvement [inaudible]
7 and rulemaking, which many of you have come up and briefed us 8 and were involved with us on these issues.
9 These are also very important to us, because together 10 we can effectively [inaudible] programs, sharing our 11 experiences, and work together to increase the public's 12 confidence in the national regulatory program.
13 Establishing and maintaining public confidence is, of 14 course, one of the goals that the NRC has, which I think you 15 have, as well.
16 I certainly wish you a wonderful discussion. Again, 17 thank you very, very much for your kind invitation for me to be 18 here and for the support you show to the Nuclear Regulatory 19 Commission. We very much appreciate it.
20 Now, before I turn this back over to Ed, I would like 21 to ask Mike [inaudible] and anyone else from the Oklahoma 22 organization to please come forward.
14 1 We'd like to make a presentation to you from the 2 Nuclear Regulatory Commission and it is a start and it says 3 Congratulations to the State of Oklahoma, Department of 4 Environmental Quality, Radiation Management Section, on the 5 occasion of Oklahoma becoming the 32nd Agreement State, and 6 this is from the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, dated 7 September the 29th, in the year 2000.
8 [Applause.]
9 COMMISSIONER DICUS: Now, I'm going to [inaudible]
10 Oklahoma just a little bit, because 20 years ago, I went to 11 work for the State of Arkansas. I can't believe it's been 20 12 years. And as I always say, I'm where I am today, in large 13 measure, because [inaudible.]
14 But I went to work for the State of Arkansas 20 years 15 ago and they were talking about we're getting ready to get a 16 new agreement state, it's going to be Oklahoma. Well, you 17 finally made it.
18 Thank you very much. It's a pleasure to be here, and 19 we'll be here till Wednesday morning, and I'll try to speak to 20 as many of you as I possibly can.
21 [Applause.]
22 MR. BAILEY: Having lived in Texas at one point in my
15 1 life, I find it real difficult not to tell some Okie jokes, but 2 [inaudible.]
3 Moving right along, as they say, what I would like to 4 do [inaudible] ask if there are any questions for Greta or 5 comments for Greta. Are you all awake out there? No. Okay.
6 Well, the next five or so minutes will wake you up.
7 I'll just take a second and say that in Oklahoma, we found the 8 OST staff and the [inaudible] board staff were very cooperative 9 with us in working on this agreement. [Inaudible] very, very 10 helpful and supportive and we appreciate that.
11 SPEAKER: Thank you.
12 MR. BAILEY: I will say, Greta, one of the ways you 13 can assure that [inaudible] is this is in all SES performance 14 criteria that [inaudible] a new agreement state each year.
15 [Laughter.]
16 COMMISSIONER DICUS: [Inaudible] do that. Get ready.
17 MR. BAILEY: Okay. Now, let's start [inaudible]
18 likely. I'm going to give a sort of an overview of some of the 19 things that OAS has done and with this particular year and I 20 think it needs a little background.
21 One of the things that we did early in the year was 22 have a planning meeting and having moved to California a few
16 1 years ago and being thrown into all of this [inaudible,] at the 2 beginning, it was management by teaching [inaudible.] Anyway, 3 I've been in more training than I could possibly [inaudible.]
4 But one of the things that has come out to me that's 5 important is some sort of planning meeting. We leave this 6 meeting and we sort of go into limbo, or we have, in the past, 7 gone into limbo for about six months.
8 We got together. We roughed it to lake Tahoe, had to 9 go through the snow to get there, about two feet of snow. We 10 couldn't get a meeting room. We had the meeting in Kathy 11 Allen's bedroom. [Inaudible] talking to her husband.
12 But I want to thank, and if I don't do it 13 [inaudible,] thank NRC for their continued support of OAS 14 activities throughout this year. In each of these activities, 15 NRC has been very supportive, if not with [inaudible,] at least 16 with attendance and participation.
17 We have a joint OAS/NRC conference call, roughly, 18 every month and many of you dial up and listen in on it. In 19 fact, it got to the point where one of them, I couldn't get it 20 on the bridge because there were 37 of you on there.
21 But anyway, we didn't start off the year too well, 22 because the one in January had to be cancelled because there
17 1 was only -- I think Paul was the only staffer at NRC that made 2 it to work that day, and so we finally cancelled that call. So 3 we have these calls almost every month.
4 One of the great steps forward, as far as I was 5 concerned, was that [inaudible] took it upon themselves to type 6 up notes of -- create notes from each of these conference 7 calls. [Inaudible] worked together to put out notes and they 8 will consist of [inaudible] notes. They are not minutes and 9 you're talking on the telephone and working on the computer and 10 you don't get everything.
11 I think it's a practice that we will continue to do, 12 because it gives some people a monthly update on what we're 13 doing, what we will be doing and so forth. You don't have to 14 wait for disclosure down.
15 We have been able to send those out relatively 16 quickly after each meeting and we've gotten quite a bit of 17 feedback from you all on how those notes are received.
18 The other thing that we've done that -- I don't know 19 where this tradition started, three or four years ago, the OAS 20 briefing to the Commission. This year, they added the computer 21 streaming access so that some of you could actually sort of 22 watch it, in addition to those that were there.
18 1 I would say I was really impressed with the briefing 2 this year because all the Commissioners were there for the 3 entire briefing. Some came early and some stayed late. It was 4 a very -- I felt it was very warmly received and the 5 Commissioners took the briefing as something that was 6 [inaudible.]
7 And the other thing is [inaudible] having our 32nd 8 annual agreement states meeting and I want to correct one thing 9 that Greta said. There was NRC involvement in getting the 10 program together and if we hadn't had NRC, we would have a very 11 slim program and we could have had more time off.
12 [Laughter.]
13 MR. BAILEY: Okay. Next slide. One of the things 14 that has really blossomed over the past few years is the 15 discussion of agreement state personnel with the NRC working 16 groups and steering committee, and at this particular meeting, 17 we will hear from the state people and the NRC people that are 18 actually on those working groups, and won't be somebody 19 standing up here summarizing what some third party did. It 20 will be actually the people that were there.
21 As has been mentioned, we will have a workshop 22 tabletop on the national materials program. That is just to
19 1 mention the insights [inaudible.]
2 The next bullet is the agreement state participation 3 in the IMPEP team, review team, and, also, the Management and 4 Review Board meeting. [Inaudible] a few years ago [inaudible]
5 a very worthwhile endeavor.
6 My only complaint about [inaudible] at this point is 7 the [inaudible] is that they don't come visit us often enough 8 and that sounds funny, but I would really like [inaudible] 18 9 years instead of four.
10 Another key point that primarily Kathy Allen and 11 [inaudible.] Kathy is going to be the chairman, she is the 12 chairman-elect or chair-elect, for the establishment of RADRAP 13 and I think I've heard from most of you on RADRAP. It's 14 something that was [inaudible] at virtually no cost, a lot of 15 effort.
16 Kathy and Jim Myers initially were involved in this 17 and I think it's working quite well. It's getting a lot of 18 participation. We're getting questions, we're getting 19 solutions to regulatory questions, and I think it's been a good 20 sharing effort for all of us.
21 And this slide, I put the slide in and then I got the 22 letter from the Commissioners saying, hey, you dummy, you
20 1 [inaudible.] During the information briefing, there was a 2 request to define radioactive material and how do states define 3 it and, as all of you here are aware, sent out an e-mail and it 4 was rather late, but within 24 hours2.777778e-4 days <br />0.00667 hours <br />3.968254e-5 weeks <br />9.132e-6 months <br />, we had a majority of the 5 states respond.
6 And unlike most surveys, we got 100 percent 7 participation [inaudible.] That's one of the [inaudible] you 8 can do it, you don't have to worry about somebody, you don't 9 have to prove [inaudible.]
10 Future activities. We've talked quite a bit this 11 year on the board about establishing a virtual office. What we 12 mean by that is that OAS is sort of [inaudible] organization.
13 We have no bylaws, we have no dues, we have no office.
14 So if a Congressional committee wants to find out 15 what a state thinks about something NRC is doing or is thinking 16 about doing, they really don't quite know how to get in touch 17 with us, unless they go to the NRC and ask the NRC.
18 We have been discussing the establishment of a 19 commercial office, which would allow Congress staffers and so 20 forth to have a place that they could go and write to whoever 21 happens to be chair in that bureau [inaudible] to a program 22 director in each state. So that, I'm hoping, will still come
21 1 about.
2 The second bullet there, which I'm sure we'll discuss 3 some in the business meeting, is the incorporation of OAS. The 4 only problem with [inaudible] was that we had some money left 5 over from last year's meeting and now these [inaudible] don't 6 like to take money from people unless you've got some sort of 7 number associated with it and in order to get a tax ID and so 8 forth, you've got to have a whole bunch of stuff.
9 So we're looking at whether incorporation would allow 10 us to do that, so that we could carry a small amount of money 11 in the [inaudible,] forward it from year to year, and outside 12 the Commissioners' hearing, we'd also like to be able, in the 13 future, if we're incorporated, to get some sort of small grant 14 to fund some of our activities [inaudible.]
15 I think another [inaudible] involved in is providing 16 greater input to Congressional committees. When I was in 17 Texas, as an attorney, I often described how [inaudible.] And 18 I'm afraid that Congress maybe even larger and every once in a 19 while, [inaudible] local people put some input into these 20 [inaudible.]
21 The next bullet is the establishment of a closer 22 relationship with [inaudible] and HPS. You'll notice on the
22 1 agenda [inaudible] to talk to us about the NRCP committees, the 2 approach [inaudible] NCRP meeting this year, and if there is 3 some way that they could get some input from the state as to 4 what reports the NCRP needs to be working on. Mike will be 5 here later.
6 ADPS, for the past three years, I think, we've had 7 the president-elect or president or now the past president of 8 ADPS [inaudible.] Greta mentioned that Cindy is on the board 9 and when I look out there, we've got three board members, 10 executive board members [inaudible] sitting in the audience 11 [inaudible.]
12 How did I miss you? I'm sorry. You're talking about 13 Cindy and her [inaudible.]
14 [Laughter.]
15 MR. BAILEY: Okay. Next is the providing increased 16 support for NRC in establishment of a national materials 17 program. Mentioned the [inaudible] we've done with 18 participation on the committee and I think it's very important 19 that states do continue to work with the NRC on this program, 20 because it's going to be what you're going to have to live 21 with.
22 Here's a personal note. It's been a busy year.
23 1 Hopefully, it's been a productive and beneficial year. One of 2 the things I would note is that if you have any doubt, in your 3 mind, electronic mail has become the communication media of 4 preference.
5 Friday morning, I went into my computer and I said 6 I'm just going to look in the folder that says overhead and 7 [inaudible.] This year, there were 1,541 messages in the OAS 8 folder and that doesn't include when I sent out an e-mail to 9 all of you. That just counted as one.
10 A lot of stringers, if they came in close enough 11 together, I erased the old one, but I think that shows that 12 there's a lot of communications going on. I don't know whether 13 it's all transfer of information.
14 The other thing is RADRAP, which is fairly new.
15 [Inaudible] 126 in the folder. So the electronic media is the 16 way we're going to be communicating on these things in the 17 future and I hope that all of you are taking advantage of it.
18 Right now, I'm working on e-mail [inaudible] phone 19 call. [Inaudible] all of my tasks come down pretty much by 20 e-mail. So I would encourage all of you to do that.
21 I'm going to stop now and we're only running about 22 five minutes behind and we only have one more speaker to get in
24 1 before that five minutes [inaudible.] It's Chip, who is going 2 to tell us the ground rules of sort of how the meeting is going 3 to go.
4 We, as always, and I hate to do this, encourage 5 people to ask questions and make comments and to participate.
6 Some of you need no encouragement.
7 If anybody's got a question or a comment, I'll try to 8 take it. Here we go.
9 MR. LOHAUS: Excuse me. Paul Lohaus, NRC. I wanted 10 to use this opportunity. Ed touched on a number of 11 accomplishments and really I think these accomplishments not 12 only go over the past year, but over the past four years with 13 the establishment of the Organization of Agreement States.
14 And I wanted to know, it's really a credit to the 15 organization, it's a credit to each of you and your staff, have 16 stepped forward, have volunteered, and that have really helped 17 focus on bringing some of our common problems to resolution.
18 And I want to let you know that the executive team, 19 Ed, Kathy, Stan, Alice and Richard, they've just done a super 20 job over the past year in representing you. A lot of hard work 21 that they've put in. I think just looking at the number of 22 e-mail exchanges, the number of phone calls, the use of RADRAP,
25 1 there's a lot of hard work that they've put in that has really 2 made this what it is.
3 They deserve the recognition on that. Thank you.
4 MR. BAILEY: Chip?
5 MR. CAMERON: Good morning, everyone. My name is 6 Chip Cameron. I'm the Special Counsel for the Public Liaison 7 at the Commission. It's a real sincere pleasure to be back 8 with you to help out in this facilitation again at this year's 9 meeting.
10 I think that we all know that almost anything could 11 happen at a meeting that's hosted by Pearce and chaired by Ed 12 Bailey. I don't know how that happened. I think it's all part 13 of the new millennium.
14 But I'm assuming that things that are going to be 15 relatively normal and that --
16 SPEAKER: It's called affirmative action.
17 MR. CAMERON: And that my role as a facilitator will 18 be to assist you in a number of ways. One is to keep the 19 discussion relevant to whatever is on the agenda at the time, 20 and we do have a parking lot for Greta and others, but we'll 21 keep track of issues that come up that we might want to discuss 22 later on in the program.
26 1 Secondly, I would like to try to help us keep on 2 schedule so that we can cover all of the many topics that we 3 have on the agenda. Thirdly, to make sure that we have as much 4 time for discussion as possible and we have already asked the 5 speakers to try to be as concise and economical as they can be, 6 so that we can leave a lot of room for comments and discussion 7 from you.
8 And I'm also going to keep track of action items, 9 certain things that the NRC may be tasked with or certain 10 things that the OAS or others may be tasked with, so we have a 11 record of that.
12 Kirk always tells me that he's going to get me a big 13 hook for speakers that go on too long and people said we're 14 going to cut the mic off. But we really will make an effort to 15 try to keep the speakers moving on in time.
16 In terms of ground rules, I think the easiest way to do this is 17 if you have a comment or a question that you want to make, just 18 turn your name tent up and we'll keep track of it that way and 19 you won't have to keep raising your hand.
20 We are keeping a transcript of the meeting and that 21 means that we're going to have to try to use the mics as much 22 as we can. I think that they're sensitive enough that they're
27 1 picking up. You don't have to have it right in front of you, 2 but if you could try to get it sort of close to you and speak 3 into the mic, that would be helpful for the transcript.
4 Also, I don't think our stenographer is going to be 5 able to keep track of where everybody is. So even though it's 6 a little bit of a nuisance, if you could just say your name and 7 your state when you make your comment or ask your question, and 8 then we'll have that on the record.
9 This is the first time I've heard the story that poor 10 Greta was stuck between Aubrey and Ed. I can't imagine being 11 in that situation.
12 COMMISSIONER DICUS: It was an interesting time.
13 MR. CAMERON: At any rate, before we -- I think it 14 would be good to do a quick introduction of everybody around 15 the table, but I want to make sure that we all -- I think that 16 we've had a little bit of a change and, Ed and Kathy, please 17 correct me if this isn't right, but what we're going to do, 18 we're going to do introductions and then Pearce wants to make 19 an announcement.
20 We're going to go to a break, which was scheduled 21 originally for ten, but then originally, again, for 9:30, but I 22 think we'll be able to break earlier than that.
28 1 We're going to take a half-hour break. Then we're 2 going to come back and we're going to go to the national 3 materials program overview, Carl Paperiello, Kathy Allen and 4 Jim Myers, and we'll have some question-answer right after 5 those three, and then we're going to have Bob Walker talk, give 6 us an introduction to the tabletop exercise that's going to 7 occur later on.
8 The goal is to, by 11:00, at the latest, get to the 9 presentations from Ray Johnson from the Health Physics Society 10 and Mike Ryan from NCRP and then we'll break for lunch, and 11 that's the way I understand it now.
12 Half-hour break and then we're going to come back and 13 do basically an hour of national materials program and then an 14 hour1.62037e-4 days <br />0.00389 hours <br />2.314815e-5 weeks <br />5.327e-6 months <br /> of Ray Johnson, Health Physics Society, and Mike Ryan, 15 NCRP.
16 Okay. Well, why don't we start with introductions, 17 going from my left, go to Paul Lohaus. This will also allow us 18 to check out the microphones, too, to see how well they pick 19 up.
20 MR. LOHAUS: Paul Lohaus, Office of State and Tribal 21 Programs with NRC.
22 MR. RATLIFF: Richard Ratliff, Texas Department of
29 1 Health, Bureau of Radiation Control.
2 MS. ROGERS: Alice Rogers, Texas National Resource 3 Conservation Commission.
4 MR. MARSHALL: Stan Marshall, Nevada State Health 5 Commission.
6 MR. BRODERICK: Mike Broderick, Oklahoma Department 7 of Environmental Quality.
8 MR. PASSETTI: Bill Passetti, Florida Bureau of 9 Radiation Control.
10 MR. GAVITT: Steve Gavitt, New York State Department 11 of Health.
12 MR. SNELLING: Dave Snelling, Arkansas Department of 13 Health.
14 MR. COOPER: Vick Cooper, Kansas Bureau of Radiation 15 Control.
16 MR. GOFF: Bob Goff, Mississippi State Department of 17 Health.
18 MR. MANNING: Abe Manning, [inaudible] State Division 19 of Radiological Health.
20 MR. JACOBI: Jake Jacobi, Colorado Department of 21 Health.
22 MS. HADEN: Robin Haden, North Carolina Division of
30 1 Radiation Protection.
2 MR. GODWIN: Aubrey Godwin, Arizona Radiation 3 Regulatory Agency.
4 MR. DUNDULIS: Bill Dundulis, Radiation Control 5 Program, Rhode Island Department of Health.
6 MR. FLETCHER: Roland Fletcher, Maryland Department 7 of Environment, Radiological Health Program.
8 MR. HILL: Tom Hill, Georgia Department of Natural 9 Resources, Radioactive Materials Program.
10 MR. LOHR: I'm Ed Lohr, Kentucky Radiation Health 11 Branch.
12 MR. SCHMIDT: Paul Schmidt, Wisconsin Section of 13 Radiation Protection, Department of Health and Family Services.
14 MR. FITCH: Stan Fitch, New Mexico Department of 15 Environment, Radiation Protection Program.
16 MR. VINCE: Michael Vince, Louisiana Department of 17 Environmental Quality.
18 MR. SUPPES: Roger Suppes, Ohio Department of Health, 19 Bureau of Radiation Protection.
20 MR. SINCLAIR: Bill Sinclair, Utah Department of 21 Environmental Quality.
22 MR. LEOPOLD: My name is Bob Leopold. I'm from
31 1 Nebraska Department of Health and Human Services.
2 MR. ERICKSON: My name is John Erickson, State of 3 Washington Department of Health.
4 MS. TEFFT: Diane Tefft, New Hampshire Bureau of 5 Radiological Health, Department of Health and Human Services.
6 MR. EASTVOLD: Paul Eastvold, Illinois Department of 7 Nuclear Safety.
8 MR. PARIS: Ray Paris, Oregon Health Commission.
9 MR. SEELEY: Shawn Seeley, Maine Radiological Health 10 Program.
11 MR. WHATLEY: Kirk Whatley, Alabama Department of 12 Health. [Inaudible.] I'm stuck between Massachusetts and 13 Maine and I can't understand either one.
14 [Laughter and applause.]
15 MR. WALKER: Bob Walker, Radiation Control Program, 16 Massachusetts Department of Public Health.
17 SPEAKER: Well, that's one reason we kind of mixed it 18 up, so we could let you guys experience a little different 19 culture.
20 MR. O'KELLEY: I'm Pearce O'Kelley, South Carolina 21 Department of Health and Environmental Control.
22 COMMISSIONER DICUS: Greta Dicus, Arkansas.
32 1 [Applause.]
2 MR. BAILEY: And I'm Ed Bailey, from the great State 3 of California.
4 MR. CAMERON: All right. Thank you. I think since 5 we do have a lot of people that you might want to know out 6 here, we'll do a real quick [inaudible] and when we come back 7 up to the table, I don't think you need to have that mic 8 directly in front of you and I'll try to help them out by 9 taking the cordless mic around.
10 So if you could just state your name and tell us who 11 you are.
12 MS. JONES: Cindy Jones, NRC.
13 MR. RYAN: Mike Ryan, from the NCRP.
14 MR. PAPERIELLO: I'm Carl Paperiello, NRC.
15 MR. GREEVES: John Greeves, NRC.
16 MR. HOUSE: Bill House, Chem-Nuclear Regulatory 17 Affairs.
18 MR. WINGARD: Rodney Wingard, State of South 19 Carolina.
20 MR. PORTER: Henry Porter, South Carolina.
21 MR. LITTON: John Litton, also with South Carolina.
22 MR. MOODY: Bob Moody, with NRC.
33 1 MS. MIOTLA: Sherri Miotla, NRC.
2 MS. BISHOP: Pam Bishop, Oklahoma.
3 MR. COX: Charlie Cox, NRC.
4 MR. GALLAGHAR: Bob Gallaghar, Massachusetts.
5 MR. DAKUBU: Salifu Dakubu, Massachusetts.
6 MS. HOWELL: Linda Howell, NRC.
7 MR. THOMPSON: Jared Thompson, Arkansas.
8 MS. POOLE: Brooke Poole, NRC.
9 MS. DETILLIER: Kimberly Detillier, Louisiana.
10 MR. WALKER: Bob Walker, Massachusetts.
11 MR. McCANDLESS: Gary McCandless, Illinois.
12 MR. TATE: Arthur Tate, Texas Department of Health.
13 MR. SOLLENBERGER: Dennis Sollenberger, NRC.
14 MS. ABBOTT: Carol Abbott, NRC.
15 MR. COMBS: Fred Combs, NRC.
16 MS. MAUPIN: Cardelia Maupin, NRC.
17 MR. CAMPER: Larry Camper, NRC.
18 MS. HOLAHAN: Trish Holahan, NRC.
19 MS. CAMPBELL: Vivian Campbell, NRC.
20 MS. McLEAN: Linda McLean, NRC.
21 MR. O'BRIEN: Tom O'Brien, NRC.
22 MR. MYERS: I'm Jim Myers. I'm with State and Tribal
34 1 Programs.
2 [Laughter.]
3 MS. YOUNGBERG: Barb Youngberg, New York State.
4 MR. MANLEY: Ray Manley, Maryland.
5 MR. JACOBSON: Alan Jacobson, State of Maryland.
6 MR. HSUEH: Kevin Hsueh, NRC.
7 MR. CALEB: Paul Caleb, Wisconsin.
8 MR. KLINGER: Joe Klinger, State of Illinois.
9 MR. COLLINS: Doug Collins, NRC.
10 MR. WOODRUFF: Richard Woodruff, NRC.
11 MR. BOLLING: Lloyd Bolling, NRC.
12 MR. WALTER: David Walter, Alabama.
13 MR. EMORY: Bob Emory, University of Texas, Houston 14 Health Center, not the NRC.
15 MR. LYNCH: Jim Lynch, NRC.
16 MR. OWEN: Bob Owen, Ohio Department of Health.
17 MS. PEDERSON: Cindy Pederson, NRC Region III.
18 MR. COOL: Donald Cool, NRC.
19 MR. COLLINS: Steve Collins, Illinois.
20 MR. STEPHENS: Mike Stephens, Florida.
21 MS. McBURNEY: Ruth McBurney, Texas Department of 22 Health.
35 1 MR. JOHNSON: Ray Johnson, Health Physics Society.
2 MR. KIRK: Bill Kirk, Pennsylvania Bureau of 3 Radiation Protection.
4 MS. ROGERS: Cheryl Rogers, Nebraska Health and Human 5 Services.
6 MR. FRAZEE: Terry Frazee, Washington Department of 7 Health.
8 MR. HACKNEY: Charles Hackney, NRC Region 4.
9 COMMISSIONER DICUS: I have to tell you, Chip, I 10 think I'm going to look at my [inaudible.]
11 [Laughter.]
12 MR. CAMERON: I put that up there as an action item.
13 SPEAKER: Greta, that's the reason we don't think you 14 ought to vote.
15 MR. CAMERON: I was just going to say that we do have 16 a lot of people here from the National Materials Working Group 17 and I think that Kathy will probably introduce them later.
18 And you've already been introduced, but why don't you 19 introduce yourself?
20 MR. PETERSON: Jim Peterson, South Carolina.
21 MR. CAMERON: Okay. Thank you. Pearce, do you want 22 to something before we break?
36 1 MR. O'KELLEY: Yes. I was very rude earlier and 2 forgot to introduce the people that are also involved with the 3 South Carolina program of regulating radioactive materials. If 4 they would please stand, Rodney Wingard, Henry Porter, and John 5 Litton, from our radioactive waste program.
6 I know Dr. Ryan said he was from the NCRP, but he is 7 also the Chairman of our Technical Advisory Council and we 8 really appreciate all the work he's done, helping us out.
9 I also wanted to clear up a possible 10 misunderstanding. I noticed that when people were coming up 11 the stairs, Jim Lynch was saying "welcome to Charleston." And 12 contrary to popular belief, he is not from the State of South 13 Carolina.
14 [Laughter.]
15 MR. O'KELLEY: But y'all have a good time at the 16 break.
17 MR. CAMERON: All right. Thank you, Pearce, and 18 thank all of you. Let's take a half-hour break and come back 19 at 10 to 10:00 and we're get started with national materials 20 program.
21 [Recess.]
22 MR. CAMERON: Besides the speech by Commissioner
37 1 Greta Dicus this morning, our first substantive topic is going 2 to be the national materials program that Greta had mentioned 3 her talk.
4 We're going to have a series of presentations, 5 starting with Dr. Carl Paperiello, from the NRC, and I think 6 most of you know Carl. He's the Deputy Executive Director for 7 Materials Research and State Programs at the NRC, and he is 8 going to give us an idea of the genesis of the national 9 materials program.
10 Then Kathy Allen and Jim Myers, Kathy Allen from 11 Illinois, Jim Myers from the NRC, are going to tell us what the 12 status of the national materials program is. They are both on 13 the National Materials Working Group.
14 Then we'll have a little discussion period before we 15 go to Bob Walker from the State of Massachusetts, who is also 16 on the National Materials Working Group, to tell us -- to set 17 up the tabletop exercise for us.
18 We have about an hour to do this and it seems like 19 this is one of the most important issues on the NRC/Agreement 20 State agenda these days. So I think we can begin to do it 21 justice in that time period.
22 And I'm just going to turn it over to Carl at this
38 1 point. Carl, you may want to use the Lavaliere, or you can use 2 this.
3 MR. PAPERIELLO: Okay. Can people hear me? I have 4 some handouts here which I want to supply, but I don't think I 5 have enough for everybody. I think I have the table covered, 6 but beyond that, I don't. I think I have about 50-55 copies 7 with me.
8 What I want to talk about, I'm going to sum it up.
9 I'm going to sum it up as what we're trying to do is 10 consciously think about what the materials program is going to 11 be, when essentially all the states are agreement states.
12 We're asymptotically approaching that point and we have a 13 national materials program.
14 The thing is nobody has ever written it down on 15 paper. We've evolved into it. That summarizes that I have to 16 say today.
17 Next slide. I think we ought to start this by 18 looking at what Section 274 of the Atomic Energy Act says. It 19 gives the purpose of this. It states six purposes and if you 20 summarize them, you can summarize them as cooperation and 21 coordination on national radiation protection standards.
22 Section 274 of the Atomic Energy Act also established
39 1 the Federal Radiation Council, something I didn't realize until 2 I was preparing this presentation, which, of course, has been 3 subsumed in into the EPA. But there is a big focus of 274 in 4 establishing a program based on cooperation and coordination 5 for national radiation protection standards that provides for 6 the states to assume regulatory control over listed material 7 and it states, at the end of the purpose, as the states get 8 more experience and greater capabilities, there may be need for 9 -- it may be desirable for additional legislation.
10 So there's a concept that the states are going to 11 learn how to regulate those materials and whenever that 12 happens, we may do something else.
13 I'm proposing we're at the point in time to do 14 something else. I don't know what that something else. I've 15 been trying to paint a picture.
16 Next slide. Other provisions provide for how a state 17 becomes an agreement state. It talks, again, about cooperation 18 on radiation standards. In fact, I want to read this, it's so 19 important. "The Commission is authorized and directed to 20 cooperate with the states in the formulation of standards for 21 protection against hazards of radiation, to assure that states 22 and Commission programs for protection against hazards of
40 1 radiation will be coordinated and compatible."
2 So there is a major focus in the legislation and it 3 provides for the Commission to periodically review the 4 agreement with each state for compatibility and adequacy.
5 Next slide. What is the program? I think, and this 6 is my definition, the components of the program range from its 7 technical basis, why do we need to protect people from 8 radiation, through legislation, regulation, permitting.
9 I don't want to get hung up on words, because if we 10 register a gauge, is that really licensing. My position is 11 it's so close that I don't really want to -- the lawyers will 12 put words, but as a scientist, I'm not going to put them.
13 I know who has the material. It's not anybody can do 14 whatever they want to do. Inspection, confirming that people 15 follow the rules, enforcement, whatever that may be, 16 redemption, and feedback.
17 After you've done all this stuff, what is your 18 operational and scientific experience that says everything is 19 okay and if it isn't okay, you start at the top and it's sort 20 of a loop.
21 Next slide. We have defined the program, but the 22 program can't run in a vacuum. The program, words on paper,
41 1 will not work unless you have people and the people have the 2 right tools.
3 So infrastructure support is incredibly important.
4 Now, we are undergoing or have undergone a second revolution or 5 change in addition to what we consciously proposed to think 6 about in a national materials program, and that is the United 7 States Government preeminence in uses and knowledge about the 8 use of radioactive material is gone.
9 I would support, and I don't have all the technical 10 data to support this, that in 1959, when we wrote the law, most 11 of the knowledge about radioactive material and how to handle 12 it and the like resided in the United States Government, 13 through the Atomic Energy Commission's own facility.
14 Today, I would assert that is not true. In a paper I 15 gave the Commission in 1993 on the medical program, I pointed 16 out that since 1975 up to that date, there has been a major 17 change in medicine. You have a large infrastructure in the 18 medical community that knows one hell of a lot about 19 radioactive material and radiation that did not exist in 1975.
20 We had certification programs for medical physicists.
21 We had American colleges of various types of nuclear medicine.
22 So we had a large infrastructure which did not exist in an
42 1 earlier era. And, in fact, if you look at the old AEC records, 2 you actually find the AEC scientists doing dose calculations 3 for diagnostic nuclear procedures and they license somebody to 4 practice even imaging before doing the dose calculation.
5 We don't do that now. This is a package insert. I 6 mean, so we have two things going on here. We're trying to 7 change what we do and think about where we're going, but the 8 industry that we regulate has become sufficiently mature that 9 the need for us to do things that we used to do has changed, 10 plus the fact that we have legislation that says we ought to be 11 using consensus standards.
12 But we also have people out there who know how to do 13 it. So this infrastructure support is incredibly important.
14 It's a major thing that the NRC up to now has done. It's an 15 issue that the NRC itself is changing for its own purposes, and 16 so we have two changes going on at the same time.
17 Next slide. Where are we? From now on in, 18 everything I'm going to say you've already heard this morning.
19 I hate to say this, but I can fully endorse what Ed Bailey said 20 this morning.
21 The fact is that we have a program. We have most 22 licensees are in agreement states, somebody said that this
43 1 morning. Most programs are wholly supported or at least 2 partially supported by fees. The IMPEP works, and I would 3 say in the last several years, certainly in the '90s, the 4 cooperation and coordination that the law, the Atomic Energy 5 Act, envisioned is certainly far better than it has been in the 6 past, in my experience.
7 So now where we are going? The punch line. Where 8 are we going in the national program? I don't know. I want to 9 just outline what needs to be done.
10 One, it has to be taken from the approach that all or 11 almost all states will be agreement states. We are 12 asymptotically approaching that condition.
13 What is the NRC required to do? What does the law 14 require us to do, no matter how many agreement states there 15 are? What is desirable for the NRC to do? Which means I'm 16 giving you my selfish viewpoint, but what should the agreement 17 states be doing? What should the various consensus standards 18 bodies, the professional organizations do? What's this program 19 going to look like? What is it going to cost? Who is going to 20 pay for it? And recognize that the NRC will not, even if it 21 had no agreement states, will has a major role to play in 22 radiation protection because we do still have the reactors and
44 1 the fuel facilities for reactors, for high level waste programs 2 and the like, and that will require us to do a number of 3 things.
4 We would have to maintain a Part 20. What 5 legislation might be needed? Did the law envision perhaps 6 legislation? We all recognize that at the time Congress wrote 7 the law 40 years ago, a lot of things have happened that they 8 may not even have envisioned.
9 I guess I'm going to wrap it up on this. I think 10 it's very important for states to recognize, I think they do, 11 but do something with it, the fact that they regulate and are 12 responsible for far more radiation sources than the Federal 13 Government.
14 Besides materials, you have your X-rays, you have 15 high energy X-rays, accelerators, whether they're used for 16 medical purposes, whether they're used for industrial, whether 17 they're used for research. You have NARM. So you have far 18 more sources of radiation than the Federal Government has and 19 it is my belief that you need to assert what Congress gave you 20 as your authority over these things vis--vis the Federal 21 Government.
22 And you say, well, you're from the Feds, why are you
45 1 doing this. I think, from what I have met among the state 2 regulators, too many of the Federal regulators are fairly 3 myopic. We regulate a small portion and you regulate a larger 4 portion and you see far more things than we do, and I think you 5 have a more balanced view than we may have.
6 Not to say we're not trying, but I think that's what 7 the case may be.
8 So I have not given you an answer. I'm not giving 9 you -- telling you how or what the national materials program 10 ought to look like, although Ed Bailey made some remarks that I 11 like a lot, I think, in terms of where OAS is going.
12 So I'm looking forward to the working group steering 13 committee to bring out a program. But the thing is where are 14 we going and consciously thinking about explicitly what we're 15 going to do, what the components are going to look like, and 16 how they're all going to fit together.
17 Thank you.
18 [Applause.]
19 MR. CAMERON: Thank you, Carl. We're going to have 20 Kathy and Jim talk and then open it up to all of you for 21 questions to Carl, Kathy and Jim, and comment.
22 Jim, are you going to go first?
46 1 MR. MYERS: I'm here.
2 MR. CAMERON: All right.
3 MR. MYERS: All right. It's my pleasure to come and 4 talk to you just very quickly and I'm going to cover a lot of 5 this stuff, just touch on it, and then we're going to -- so we 6 can have more time to go into some detail on things you think 7 would be a little bit more important to you.
8 An apology. The dog ate our homework. We have some 9 handouts. Unfortunately, somehow they got messed up, a lot of 10 them, in the copying. So Jim is going to run out to a copy 11 center and we'll get some more and we'll have them out by later 12 this afternoon.
13 First of all, let's talk about how this working group 14 came about. Not quite a year ago, the Commission issued a SECY 15 paper, which is kind of a direction to the staff, and it says 16 to form a working group and basically to look into this issue 17 of a national materials program.
18 The national materials program, and this is the 19 caveat in this, does not have a definition. We have not 20 defined it, but yet it seems to take on a definition the more 21 you talk about it.
22 So what we're talking about here is national
47 1 materials program, all small letters.
2 The focus in the Commission paper was to look at, 3 have the working group look at functional and not necessarily 4 organizational changes, but it's not limited to just functional 5 change. It says that if there's organizational changes at the 6 Commission that we were suggesting.
7 It's also not limited to Atomic Energy material, that 8 we should also look at all of the things that all the states do 9 out there in regulating all of those radiation hazards.
10 Additionally, there was a steering committee added to 11 the working group and we've gotten great advice and counsel 12 from them throughout our process.
13 MS. ALLEN: Okay. I'm it. I didn't introduce myself 14 earlier. I'm Kathy Allen, from Illinois. Jim and I are 15 co-chairs for the working group, so we're tag-teaming it.
16 So we're trying to figure out what this national 17 materials program is supposed to look like. Well, rather than 18 starting from the top down, we decided to start from the bottom 19 up, start at ground level. That's how you build a building, 20 that's how you build the structures at the labs.
21 So we looked at what are the core things that a 22 radiation protection program needs. Start at the bottom and
48 1 work your way up. We define the essential elements of a 2 program and we looked at the CRCPD, looked at Los Alamos, and 3 we looked at IMPEP.
4 We took a look at things like licensing, inspection, 5 guidance development, every which way to develop those types of 6 things. Those are the foundation of how our program will go.
7 We need to do all this stuff in order to have a fully 8 operational program and on a national basis, all these things 9 will be in place, as well.
10 So we took a look at that. Then we looked at each 11 one of those little building blocks, the licensing program, the 12 inspection program, and said how are we implementing these 13 things now, how can we change them, let's start brainstorming 14 some options.
15 And it was wide open. Just figure out other ways of 16 doing licensing, other ways of doing the inspections, including 17 things like contracting out with other states or, you know, 18 having specialists that were good at cooler radiators just go 19 around and do all the cooler radiators.
20 I mean, just open it up and try to figure out the 21 best way to use the research that we have to accomplish those 22 particular tasks.
49 1 MR. MYERS: Okay. It's my turn. All right. As 2 Kathy said, we had a screening process and, basically, the 3 options that we developed were screened against the six 4 criteria that you will find in our charter.
5 It's a rather deliberative process and it took quite 6 a lot of time to get to that point. What happens then is that 7 after we have done the screening, we went back and looked at 8 some what we called common attributes for any program that 9 would be in effect.
10 And I'm going to kind of read these, it's a little 11 bit tedious, but I think it will make more sense. First, that 12 there be shared goals and a shared direction set; a national 13 program for the regulation of the use of radioactive materials 14 should have a basic level of consistency with regard to 15 regulatory goals and a framework for accomplishing those goals.
16 This will ensure a consistent level of protection for 17 public health and safety.
18 Both the NRC and agreement states have strategic 19 plans or missions describing these goals. Both agreement 20 states and the NRC should equitably contribute to identifying 21 common goals and creating the framework for each of them.
22 There is something in this called a consensus
50 1 process. It's decision-making that is reached through a 2 cooperative effort, keeping the mutually agreed upon in sight 3 or in mind, and the consensus also does not mean necessarily 4 that everyone would agree.
5 But it does provide an opportunity for all the 6 parties to bring issues, ideas and concerns to the table for 7 consideration. More or less that we call horizontal 8 communications.
9 There is the establishment of priorities. Both NRC 10 and agreement states should jointly, through a consensus 11 process, determine regulatory priorities, and that includes 12 things such as rulemaking, guidance development and other 13 issues that are common to the regulatory program.
14 There is a recognition of current successes and, 15 frankly, looking at what everyone does, there are a tremendous 16 number of successes that we found and I think there is a high 17 comfort level in keeping that success going and funding to fund 18 those successes.
19 So those programs and elements that are working 20 successfully should work more successfully with modifications 21 along with alternative things.
22 In other words, if it's working well now, we would
51 1 continue to use it. It may be that we would add more features 2 to the program or more issues to the program as the regulatory 3 process or regulatory agenda-setting develops and we would then 4 continue to play off of those.
5 There is also a recognition of individual legal and 6 jurisdictional parameters. Despite the need for consistency, 7 which agreement states and the NRC both have legal and 8 jurisdictional obligations that must be met, that these 9 obligations must not be impeded by a national materials 10 program.
11 There are shared resources. A national materials 12 program would identify and use centers of excellence or 13 expertise. Agreement states and NRC regions have, over time, 14 developed specific and considerable experience and expertise in 15 specific areas; for example, well logging industrial 16 radiography, IBD and others.
17 These centers of excellence and expertise would be 18 identified and utilized in the future.
19 These centers of excellence and expertise may change 20 and I think that's part of our process, that we would develop 21 an organization or a structure that would deal with and keep 22 track of those changes feeding them as they occur.
52 1 That we would use alternative available resources and 2 what we mean by that is that these resources could include 3 consensus setting organizations or listing the cooperation of 4 professional industrial organizations and the public in setting 5 standards, developing new rules and a lot of other things.
6 So there has to be kind of a plug-in in the structure 7 for those kinds of things.
8 Establishment of communications clearinghouse. A 9 centralized clearinghouse of regulatory documents should be 10 established. It would be a centralized source for information 11 on the availability of documents and how they are to be used 12 for the state and Federal Government radiation regulatory 13 programs.
14 It would consist of probably, at the minimum, rules, 15 guidance, documents, industry and professional standards and it 16 would probably be available over the internet.
17 We anticipate that this would also reduce duplication 18 of effort. By identifying and using centers of excellence, the 19 use of alternative resources and the establishment of a 20 clearinghouse, we would be able to reduce effort and mainly 21 that this would probably play into is that you could trust that 22 someone else may be developing PEP regulations and working in
53 1 the center of excellence.
2 At some point in time, you may need those PEP 3 regulations and basically you can get a document, so you don't 4 have to spend your time and effort developing them, but you can 5 pick them up from one of the other parties.
6 I think that in the long run, we will [inaudible]
7 costs and the level of effort overall, because we don't have to 8 pick and choose. You can basically state [inaudible] how you 9 want to do it.
10 Lastly, there is a shared responsibility, resource 11 commitments, participation by all parties, the commitment of 12 resources, either in staff time or in dollars 13 Now, where we are right now is that we're in the 14 process of collecting more stakeholder input and from that, 15 we're looking for more input from the standards development 16 organizations, from manufacturers, from the public and from the 17 states.
18 OAS is here, CRCPD are all represented on our working, so we 19 can continue we've got right now, but really we want to start 20 now doing a lot more initiatives, I think, although we've done 21 quite a few things in the past to inform people about this 22 process.
54 1 We are now at a point today, I think, to kind of 2 announce a little bit of a future, if you will, what the 3 structure might look like and now is the time when we become 4 involved in getting some thoughts to us about it.
5 Lastly -- not lastly, but last on this page -- May 1 6 of 2001 is when we have to submit this plan to the Commission.
7 So we have quite a few months left to work on it.
8 MS. ALLEN: Keep going.
9 MR. MYERS: Now, let's about the structural concepts.
10 We did go through and identified some functional 11 responsibilities that were common to all of the programs and we 12 kind of focused in on something that we called 13 inter-organizational relationships.
14 If you look at the way we do business today, we 15 characterize that as being consulted. The NRC has kind of a 16 predominant role in this process. It asks for advice and 17 counsel from the states and from the public.
18 And there are some good attributes to that, but we 19 felt that there might be some things that could be done a 20 little bit better.
21 One other aspect that we looked at or one other way 22 of doing business was, well, why don't we form an advisory
55 1 group or some kind of advisory organization.
2 After some long discussion about that, we just kind 3 of determined that it would probably be like a lot of the other 4 advisory organizations that the NRC has, in that in their name 5 alone, they are just there to provide advice. The agency does 6 not necessarily have to follow it nor does it reduce the use of 7 resources, nor does it share resources very well. So that was 8 discounted.
9 One other aspect that we talked about was one we 10 called autonomy. Well, autonomy is the free-for-all.
11 Everybody does their own thing on their own, when and where 12 they want to do it, they can make their own regs. It's just 13 really a free-for-all.
14 And we felt that that really wasn't in the interest 15 of the national program, because basically, although everyone 16 has maximum flexibility in determining the course of the 17 program, it does not lend itself to some level of consistency.
18 So lastly, we came up with something that we call the 19 alliance, which was more of the consensus process.
20 And now it's Kathy's turn.
21 MS. ALLEN: We actually did some homework and looked 22 up [inaudible] to figure out how to describe what this thing
56 1 is, and alliance is defined as a formal agreement establishing 2 an association between groups to achieve a particular end.
3 We kind of sort obviously have a formal alliance, 4 because we are agreement states, but we wanted something more.
5 Another definition of alliance is a bond, a connection between 6 families, states, parties or individuals in association to 7 further the common interest of members.
8 That sort of fits what we're looking at.
9 [Inaudible.] I'm sorry. I talk with my hands, I better do 10 this.
11 So we decided to go with the alliance concept. We 12 bantered around a bunch of words, like [inaudible] and things 13 like that, but we decided an alliance was really better 14 descriptive of what we were trying to do.
15 Bear with me as I sort of describe what this alliance 16 concept is. I mean, this working group has met many, many, 17 many, many hours and many, many meetings. This thing has taken 18 on a life of its own.
19 And if I don't get this thing across right, feel free 20 to flag me down or something, because I think this is really 21 kind of important to come up with.
22 We are looking at structures of relationships. I
57 1 mean, we have NRC and the agreement states and CRCPD and those 2 relationships are okay. But as Carl said earlier, it's time 3 for a change. We need to recognize that we have all grown 4 beyond the original organizational interrelational structure 5 that we had before, and that's what this working group is 6 trying to do.
7 Build on that and make some -- move us forward into a 8 more mature relationship. It's not parent-child anymore, guys.
9 The states have a lot of ability and we need to step 10 up to the plate.
11 So what would this alliance look like, the structure 12 of this relationship or what kind of functions would it have?
13 First, we look at the pros and cons of an alliance.
14 On the total part, if you have an alliance, there is 15 opportunity for input from everybody. So you all get together 16 and decide what together are the priorities, what are our 17 priorities for writing regulations, what are our priorities for 18 guidance development.
19 All kinds of things are important to us individually, 20 and then come up with a collective consensus that we actually 21 start working on together.
22 That meets the spirit of a true partnership, of
58 1 course, consistency. [Inaudible] savings and five different 2 states are all independently working on iridium for in vitro or 3 inter-vascular brachytherapy. Independently, they're doing a 4 fine job, but collectively, they could probably knock this 5 thing out a lot faster and cover all the bases more 6 effectively.
7 So you need to find a better way to share our 8 resources, recognize areas of expertise, get them to work on 9 something and knock something out.
10 This requires more participation among the states.
11 It diffuses the decision-making. It's not just a single entity 12 making a decision, but more of a collective joint effort.
13 There are some problems with an alliance. It may be 14 time or resource intensive. Kind of knock this out of -- have 15 a little safety of, well, I'm just going to do what my state 16 needs and I don't really need to know what everybody else 17 needs.
18 I mean, part of this is that everybody participates.
19 There are going to be changes needed on both sides, the states 20 and the NRC, as well, looking at everybody working together.
21 This alliance concept has a structure to it, if you 22 will. There is this administrative component. It provides a
59 1 clearinghouse for information. There is a guidance that's been 2 developed for information, resources, those types of things.
3 So there is an administrative component that sort of 4 coordinates all that stuff. They track and report the progress 5 of different issues that the alliance has discussed and they 6 plan and facilitate meetings of this alliance.
7 That's just what the core looks like, but the rest of 8 it would have all the states getting together, like in a 9 meeting like this, and that's part of what our tabletop is 10 going to do, seeing if we can all get together and come up with 11 a consensus on a few issues and the same [inaudible.]
12 I sort of get the feeling I haven't really made this 13 really clear, so I'm going to borrow from one of our meeting 14 fragments.
15 This is the alliance, okay? It's NRC and all the 16 states together. That's the alliance. There's a core part of 17 it. That's the administrative core. The administrative core 18 is not a decision-making core. It's just to help facilitate 19 the meeting of all representatives of this alliance. They're 20 the ones that sort of get the meetings together and get 21 information out.
22 But we don't envision an administrative core
60 1 dictating the alliance or the alliance coming up with its 2 decisions jointly. But then you see this type of [inaudible]
3 evidence. The [inaudible] evidence are individual 4 organizations having input to the alliance. Licensees, other 5 Federal agencies, the public, professional organizations.
6 They will also have a role in this, as well. Right 7 now, if somebody wants to do something, they have to approach 8 NRC and now 32 different agreement states, or maybe they can 9 toss something out to the OAS or maybe toss something out at a 10 CRCPD meeting.
11 So it's a more formalized kind of alliance. If 12 someone has an issue or wants to present some information, 13 that's a good way to do it.
14 The alliance will develop consensus on regulatory 15 issues, identify and update centers of experience or other 16 expertise. I mean, think about what you have in your states 17 now. How many of you have somebody who is really, really good 18 in norms? How many of you have somebody that's really, really 19 good in low level waste type issues, ground water protection, 20 radon, accelerators, medical, industrial uses, well monitoring?
21 If you think through it, some of you have people who 22 are very, very good in a particular area. Jointly, you put
61 1 those experts together and if they ere come up with a guide or 2 changes to regulations, and if you recognize those experts, 3 there would be more buy-in on what kinds of things they would 4 produce.
5 Identify alternative resources for specific tasks.
6 Does NRC need to go to a separate state to inspect a VA 7 hospital? Maybe not. Maybe they can use the resources in a 8 state to get at some sort of way to make [inaudible.]
9 We know state people know what they're doing when 10 they do inspections, why not use those resources? Recognize 11 the current successes, what's been going well, what kinds of 12 interactions already work. Define and make abundance and 13 evaluate the progress [inaudible.] This is the conflict 14 [inaudible.]
15 So if you look at each program and what you have to 16 offer, all [inaudible.] This [inaudible] your program, the 17 licensing and inspection, training of your staff, responding to 18 events, other programs [inaudible.]
19 This center is almost dependent on the size of the 20 licensee. If you are a very large state, you have a lot more 21 inspectors, license reviewers. If you're a small state, you 22 may find that your respective [inaudible] for your license
62 1 renewal, you have maybe a smaller group of people.
2 And there's a [inaudible] around the outside, some 3 sort of vary in size and shape. You may develop guidance. You 4 may [inaudible] other people [inaudible.] You may just 5 reference NRC or you may reference [inaudible] another state 6 and white-out the name and stick your state in there.
7 You may [inaudible] for regulations or you may have a 8 staff of people devoted to developing regs. So that's 9 [inaudible] big or small, depending on the needs of your 10 program. Accreditation, you may do environmental analysis.
11 You may contract that stuff out. You may have a full-blown 12 lab. You may contract for [inaudible] support.
13 Everybody has a different size and shaped program.
14 And I do see there's different [inaudible] size and shape 15 [inaudible] and different program [inaudible.] Isn't this 16 beautiful? But the idea is if you're a program that has like a 17 big center portion and not enough resources for all the little 18 petals around, the alliance can step in.
19 You go to where there are other areas of help to 20 support and alternate your program, especially like on a 21 national basis.
22 Chip is giving me the evil eye.
63 1 MR. CAMERON: Not when there are flowers up there.
2 MS. ALLEN: Can we have the lights up for a second?
3 This is -- it's been very difficult to get [inaudible.] We had 4 this vision and we had this hope and part of it has a lot to do 5 -- I mean, most of it deals with whether or not we're going to 6 [inaudible.] Recognize that we have abilities amongst 7 ourselves in the states and recognize that NRC doesn't 8 [inaudible] as well.
9 But together I think we can create a better way of 10 working together. This working group consists of -- well, 11 originally, during [inaudible] which made it [inaudible,] which 12 is sort of like -- I don't know -- [inaudible.]
13 And I'd to [inaudible] the people that are here, and 14 go ahead and stand, everybody from the working group. I want 15 everybody to see how many people we've got. We've got 16 [inaudible,] Carol [inaudible,] Chip Cameron, [inaudible,] Joe 17 [inaudible,] Elizabeth [inaudible,] Tom Hill, Linda Howell, 18 Jake Jacobi, [inaudible,] Dr. White, and Fred Combs.
19 [Inaudible] in this group and -- I'm sorry, I have to 20 get my top secret weapon here.
21 Part of what we wanted to do was have you think about 22 a different way of operating and we're willing to listen to
64 1 comments. We are here for outreach at this point. And one of 2 the things we're trying to do is maybe come up with some sort 3 of alliance. And so we all have a button for you that you can 4 get from members of the working group, it says Agreement States 5 and Nuclear Regulatory Commission working together.
6 At this point, they're going to hand out buttons and 7 we're going to accept any questions.
8 MR. CAMERON: Okay. Kathy, thank you. Can we get 9 you and Jim to operate from this mic over here, and we'll give 10 Carl the Lavaliere and we'll open it up for discussion.
11 I think we're going to -- Bob Walker, in a few 12 moments, is going to talk about the tabletop, but I think we'll 13 take ten minutes of the next presentation time so we can give 14 you a lot of time to comment and discuss this particular topic.
15 So let's open it up for questions and comments, as 16 the buttons are being passed out, at this point.
17 Anybody have -- okay. Kirk?
18 MR. WHATLEY: I have two questions.
19 MR. CAMERON: And could you -- I'm sorry.
20 MR. WHATLEY: Kirk Whatley, Alabama.
21 MR. CAMERON: Thank you.
22 MR. WHATLEY: I noticed that one of the things that
65 1 was not talked about was possible organizational changes that 2 might be needed.
3 One of the things that really creates problems for us 4 many, many times is our organizational changes that we really 5 need to do something about.
6 A lot it's -- I hate to use the word prohibited, but 7 that's what I heard -- from being talked about, to make this 8 thing work better, possible organizational changes that are 9 needed.
10 MS. ALLEN: I don't think we're necessarily 11 prohibited, but something that the working group sort decided, 12 we couldn't -- we didn't find it was in our ability to dictate 13 that NRC needed to change their organization. We're kind of 14 looking at -- or telling them the states how they need to 15 change their organization.
16 So recognize that we need to be able to create some 17 sort of oversight organization and that's what we're trying to 18 focus on.
19 We also recognize that CRCPD and OAS may need to 20 change or evolve to accommodate these kinds of 21 interrelationship changes.
22 Does that make sense?
66 1 MR. MYERS: Which organization are you talking about 2 changing?
3 MR. WHATLEY: Let me ask my next question.
4 MR. MYERS: Okay.
5 MR. WHATLEY: If the administrative core says to hell 6 with the right, we're going to do it our way, much like has 7 happened many times before, where does the alliance stand?
8 MR. CAMERON: Kathy and Carl and Jim, did you 9 understand Kirk's point and do you any of you want to address 10 it?
11 MR. MYERS: I do understand Kirk's point and let me 12 say I think probably in the rush of trying to get all this 13 information presented, I may have slightly mischaracterized it.
14 I don't think that the Commission SRM said that we couldn't 15 propose changes, but as I alluded to, I think that there is a 16 high comfort level with the way organizations exist at the 17 state and sometimes with NRC and the conference and OAS, they 18 exist.
19 But as we move through time and they see that there 20 will be some changes that are made, and Kathy just said that 21 it's not -- I don't think that we want to get into a position 22 of mandating or dictating, hey, you've got to do this, NRC, or
67 1 change your structure, that I think that eventually it would 2 probably evolve into [inaudible] organization.
3 But given resource constraints and maybe at the 4 direction of the Commission, based upon the kinds of 5 suggestions that we make to them.
6 So it's not prohibited to, but I think there was 7 reluctance to go there at this time.
8 MR. CAMERON: Kathy, you want to add something, and, 9 Carl, do you, after Kathy?
10 MS. ALLEN: I think we made a lot of people at NRC 11 nervous. They thought that here a bunch of states were going 12 to show up and start telling NRC where to cut their budget and 13 what kind of people to let go and what areas of their program 14 that they needed to cut.
15 So we've been very cautious and careful about to sort 16 of not go there. I mean, we're not going to dictate to NRC 17 where they need to change things, but we want to sort of -- you 18 need to change the fundamental way of thinking, first, and then 19 they should be able to figure out what kind of changes they can 20 do to their organization to match.
21 MR. CAMERON: Carl?
22 MR. PAPERIELLO: I think you shouldn't start from the
68 1 organization. You want to start from what do you want to do 2 and who is going to do it. Then you decide what kind of 3 organizational changes you need to implement the program that I 4 want to carry out.
5 I don't think you start with the organization. You 6 have to change the organization once you define what this 7 program is going to look like.
8 MR. CAMERON: Okay. Let's go to Bill and then Aubrey 9 and David. And keep in mind that this is all part of the 10 stakeholder input process, commenting on some of the options 11 and suggestions.
12 Bill?
13 MR. DUNDULIS: Bill Dundulis, Rhode Island. One of 14 the things you mentioned, Kathy, was on the whole thing of 15 regulation development and this may get into both organizations 16 or all three organizations, the Conference, the Organization of 17 Agreement States, and the NRC evolving.
18 Even though it may sometimes be applied process, the 19 whole SSR development, I think, is something that we don't want 20 to overlook or discard. Maybe there might be ways of speeding 21 it up.
22 But having worked with the Part X group on medical
69 1 accelerators, and it was kind of convoluted, but I think maybe 2 that might be one way of using, as you said, the centers of 3 expertise, where you could get people to go together.
4 And maybe this is part of what you were talking 5 about, the evolution, but I wouldn't want to get rid of the SSR 6 process, except maybe to do more of what they're trying to do 7 now, I think, with Part 35 and Part 34 of the parallel 8 rulemaking.
9 MS. ALLEN: We recognize that the SSR is one of the 10 success stories and those are the kinds of things that we would 11 not want to get rid of.
12 But if you look at a lot of the medical -- sorry --
13 the rulemakings that have to do with materials, the SSRs are 14 still reactive to what NRC has decided is the priority.
15 So we need to change the fundamental way of 16 establishing priorities and what's important, first, and then, 17 from there, maybe the SSR groups can actually be more 18 effective, because they're focusing their efforts on things 19 that we have real buy-in among the states that this is our big 20 priority; yes, this accelerator stuff is a real problem, let's 21 put our heads together and knock this one out and put this in 22 top priority.
70 1 MR. CAMERON: Aubrey?
2 MR. GODWIN: I see I was apparently running ahead of 3 my time again when I offered, some years ago, to do one of 4 these yearly inspections, which now brings up a point that I'm 5 not sure is representative of our discussions; namely, the NRC 6 staff.
7 My impression is, and I may be wrong, that a large 8 impact of the decision that came out was that some of the staff 9 was concerned that we may be able to do the inspections and 10 there would be a rule [inaudible.] I might be wrong on that, 11 but that's certainly the impression I have.
12 I'm not sure that was [inaudible] Commission. A lot 13 [inaudible.] Are you trying to tell me something, Chip?
14 MR. CAMERON: No.
15 MR. GODWIN: Along the lines of how would they review 16 the inspections and [inaudible.]
17 Secondly, the issue of [inaudible] the medical stuff, 18 right now, I'm not sure where the decision is, but it would 19 appear that people like AMA and other national organizations 20 may not want the state [inaudible] this kind of situation, 21 because right now they can go to one organization and have a 22 tremendous amount of influence on various [inaudible.]
71 1 [Inaudible] go to multiple entities to deal with it.
2 I think there's a lot of things that we would have to 3 look at, and I'd be interested in the reaction of some 4 [inaudible] national organizations issues.
5 MR. CAMERON: Carl, do you want to -- do you have 6 anything to say to Aubrey's first point?
7 MR. PAPERIELLO: I think the issue of the impact on 8 NRC staff, the NRC staff impact is going to occur no matter 9 what the process is. I want us to address it consciously, 10 because as the number of agreement states go up, but the number 11 of NRC licensees go down, and we're running [inaudible,] we 12 have got to talk to NRC staff no matter what you do.
13 Secondly, [inaudible] NRC staff is not outrageously 14 difficult, because many of us are getting quite old, including 15 myself, and in four years, I retire. There's a lot of 16 compatriots that retire, too.
17 So somebody else is going to deal with the problem 18 and I'm not saying this in a sarcastic way. I'm just saying I 19 hear what you're saying. I think that's not the way to go.
20 The approach is what we want -- we've got to start with what 21 the program is going to look like. The program is going to 22 look like what it looks like.
72 1 We've got to put that together. Then we worry about 2 this. I have had some [inaudible.] We put 15 FTE on 3 [inaudible] with DOE. That's disappeared. Those people are 4 being reassigned. Nobody is giving away [inaudible.] The 5 retirement rate in NMSS was around eight to ten percent a year.
6 Yes, we're all old. That I'm not worried about.
7 [Inaudible] structural, but that's not a problem.
8 Let me throw something out. You talked about the AMA 9 [inaudible.] Where do they go on an X-ray machine right now.
10 Where do they go on medical accelerators right now? Where do 11 they go for the rest of medicine right now?
12 MR. CAMERON: Before we go to David and then to Ed 13 and Kathy, Jim, do you have a comment on Aubrey's point?
14 MR. MYERS: Aubrey brought up a very good point as to 15 how you get this other input from standard-setting 16 organizations, the other organizations that are out there. I 17 think that we were wrestling with that as the working group.
18 19 The best way I can explain is is you've got to kind 20 of use some technical terms. When we created the alliance, we 21 didn't quite have it quite yet defined how these folks would be 22 able to input into the alliance.
73 1 But what we have done is to put what I call the U.S.
2 universal serial bus port on the existence, so that anybody can 3 plug into it. And I think, in the long run, by being able to 4 go to the alliance, if that's what it's eventually called, they 5 would have probably better and probably a more open view, but 6 you could basically, by putting it into the alliance, you're 7 addressing your concerns to all of the parties, rather than to 8 single, 33 individual organizations.
9 MR. CAMERON: Okay. I think that point comes across.
10 David?
11 SPEAKER: At the risk if suffering Herb's look and 12 getting booted out of the room, I have a question. Why not 13 call this the national radiation program rather than the 14 national materials program?
15 Carl, to answer your question, where do they go, back 16 many, many years ago, when Ed was with Texas and I was with 17 Arkansas, we talked about a single radiation protection agency.
18 Has this been discussed? I know it's huge. You talk 19 about what the program should be. Periodically, our staff gets 20 together and we talk about this and we talk about that, and one 21 of the things that always comes up is who is regulating that or 22 where do we go with this. Five, six, seven, eight Federal
74 1 agencies are involved in the word radiation, and I know it's 2 huge.
3 But if we are taking on a big project like this, why 4 don't we take on a bigger one and try to get something going 5 called a national radiation program?
6 MR. CAMERON: In response to that, would the alliance 7 perhaps be a building block?
8 SPEAKER: I think we believe that it would be a 9 building block. You see, the working group is in a pickle 10 here, a technical one. We have direction from the Commission 11 to do certain things and that's why we caveated our statements 12 earlier with national materials program, the term is bandied 13 about, capitalized, underlined, and highlighted.
14 Yet it really has no basis. It's just a term of art 15 that's been used and we use national materials program to 16 describe our working group, because that's kind of what we're 17 working on.
18 But I think the working group has come to the 19 conclusion that it isn't done until the Commission makes a 20 decision sometime in June or July of next year, after we 21 present the options to them.
22 If they want to call it the national radiation
75 1 control program or national materials program or the alliance 2 or whatever, they are free to kind of give some additional 3 guidance on how to do that.
4 So we're kind of working at the very basic level and 5 kind of showing what the basic concept might look like, and 6 truly I think it would encompass a lot of those organizations 7 and other regulators and other Federal agencies and so forth at 8 some point in time.
9 MR. CAMERON: A process question, I guess, for the 10 working group. Will there be an opportunity for individual 11 agreement states or the Organization of Agreement States to 12 provide any input to this, besides their participation on the 13 working group, before it goes to the Commission?
14 SPEAKER: We sort of anticipate having this out for 15 public comment, that will have a lot of paragraphs and stuff in 16 there, and there will be paragraphs about maybe expanding this 17 to include things other than [inaudible] material or AEA 18 materials.
19 And a bunch of other issues will be raised in our 20 paper that we've sort of raised. That will go out for public 21 comment. Then we'll come back and get all the comments 22 together and then it goes up to the Commission. So we're
76 1 trying to get this sort of stuff out. There's also going to be 2 some articles coming up in some new [inaudible] Health Physics 3 Society newsletter covering this pretty well, I think, coming 4 out next month.
5 So we're hoping to start some discussion on a 6 national level, as well. So you can contact us at any point or 7 any time and you can also check out the NRC web site, where we 8 try to put up as much of the stuff that we've done already.
9 MR. CAMERON: Okay. Thank you. Ed Bailey?
10 MR. BAILEY: I guess what I see is a sort of change.
11 You mentioned a couple of [inaudible,] which I think could 12 serve sort of [inaudible] what you're talking about.
13 Back many years ago, Bill Selin and I one night sat 14 in my dining room and [inaudible] and we got up the next 15 morning and went to make copies of that, and that was useful.
16 And right now [inaudible.] We came out with the most 17 formal draft of Part 20. Nobody had told us to do that.
18 Finally, we got [inaudible,] well, we like [inaudible.] In 19 fact, we had it [inaudible] for a long time.
20 Once we did that and had the conference brought in, 21 we had a rather difficult time [inaudible] in getting the NRC 22 to accept the new one, that somebody could come out and write a
77 1 new part without the NRC having given the road map on how it 2 should be done.
3 I'm, one of these days, going to pull out the old 4 pen-and-ink [inaudible] computers, draft and compare it to the 5 Code of Federal Regulations [inaudible] not a lot of changes in 6 that draft.
7 Also, we're fortunate that we [inaudible] radiography 8 [inaudible] certification. And we were basically told in the 9 early stages [inaudible,] but we had one of the NRC 10 Commissioners, I can't remember [inaudible,] came [inaudible]
11 in one of our meetings of the [inaudible] and he actually 12 offered [inaudible.]
13 We developed a [inaudible] program and we were able 14 to carry that forward and [inaudible.]
15 But the main thing is that rather than both the sort 16 of exception to [inaudible,] they should have the right to 17 [inaudible.]
18 You don't try to force someone's [inaudible] to 19 improve the situation. Somebody [inaudible.] The NRC 20 [inaudible] working under very informal [inaudible] saying that 21 we will [inaudible.]
22 The very next [inaudible] and which are the ones
78 1 responsible. We will take the lead, we will do it, the other 2 people will essentially [inaudible.] [Inaudible.]
3 That's the sort of kind of [inaudible.]
4 MR. CAMERON: Does anybody have a follow-up on that?
5 Then we'll go to Bill for a final --
6 SPEAKER: I think that what Ed was saying is what we 7 would call the larger group using existing or past successes, 8 because I think that's where we will [inaudible] that idea.
9 So I think it's very supportive [inaudible.]
10 MR. CAMERON: Bill?
11 MR. DUNDULIS: Bill Dundulis, Rhode Island. I 12 couldn't resist the opportunity. I'm not sure if this is a 13 Freudian slip or a very subtle plea for another issue in the 14 area of DOT [inaudible.]
15 You say that the way Part W and the radiography was 16 developed should be the norm for future development.
17 MR. CAMERON: Thank you for adding that.
18 SPEAKER: Let me make just a couple observations. I 19 like what I heard this morning. We're really pushing, we're 20 working to get the coordination and cooperation which I think 21 the law envisions, what Congress envisioned that we do.
22 Let me reflect on a couple things. National
79 1 radiation control versus national materials. I think I made up 2 the term national materials. I don't know for sure.
3 I've thought about national radiation. I don't know 4 if we could [inaudible] right now. It clearly requires 5 significant legislation.
6 But I would throw the challenge out to you. Would 7 you be willing to merge OAS with CRCPD? Okay. I'm not telling 8 you to do that. I'm just saying, reflecting the other way 9 around.
10 Second, I think the public sees [inaudible] as 11 different than expert. Whether we like it or not, and, as a 12 physicist, I don't see any difference in the public responding 13 to the different places.
14 All you've got to do is look at, watch one of the 15 internet [inaudible] radiation, talking about the irradiated 16 food with accelerators and making a distinction between that 17 and Cobalt, and the fact of the matter is people do it. So 18 it's just the way it is.
19 We're evolving, we're moving, and I think we're 20 moving [inaudible.]
21 I'm going to throw something out, and this is not my 22 position. When you consider about a fundamental radiation
80 1 program, the international community, whatever that may be, the 2 people who did [inaudible] at one of the reactors, I think 3 North Anna, made the recommendation, the NRC or the United 4 States -- not the NRC -- the United States should, as the 5 Europeans have, go to ICRP-60.
6 The question is that I'm going to throw out here, and 7 not an answer, I'm not making any recommendations. If, in 8 fact, the United States, whatever they may be, decides to do 9 that, how should it be done? In other words, who will make the 10 decision, keeping what Congress said here, how will that 11 decision be made?
12 I don't know how we decided to go to ICRP-30. I know 13 I was in the NRC, but I was out in the field in practice at the 14 time and I am going to look into that decision.
15 Among other things, the EPA changed Presidential 16 guidance. But I'm just saying something to think about, if 17 this country would go to ICRP-60, how would that decision be 18 made? Thank you.
19 MR. CAMERON: Thanks, Paul, for the provocative 20 questions for everybody.
21 Before we go to Bob Walker, does anybody in the 22 audience have a comment or a question on the issue? Yes, sir.
81 1 If you'd tell us your name.
2 SPEAKER: My name is [inaudible.] [Inaudible.]
3 MR. CAMERON: Did you guys all hear that?
4 SPEAKER: No, I'm sorry, I didn't.
5 SPEAKER: The question was, is the working group 6 addressing anything along the lines of the IPE, looking at 7 that? Is that the question?
8 MR. CAMERON: The questioner said yes, that was.
9 SPEAKER: Okay. The answer is yes, we kind of looked 10 at it as kind of an example of how to do cooperative work.
11 MR. CAMERON: Okay. Thank you. Anybody else have a 12 question or comment before we bring Bob up?
13 SPEAKER: Chip, I've got one last thing.
14 MR. CAMERON: All right.
15 SPEAKER: I'd just like to remind you all that we 16 have lots of folks from our working group here. Please, 17 approach them and address your concerns, your questions and 18 your comments with them. This is a great opportunity to meet 19 them, as well as to discuss [inaudible.]
20 MR. CAMERON: Okay. Thank you. Kathy, do you want 21 to introduce Bob?
22 MS. ALLEN: As Jim said, actually, the working group
82 1 is a fantastic group of people. There are outreach programs 2 for [inaudible] and all kinds of work being done. So I just 3 wanted to hopefully thank everybody on the working group who 4 have made this job much, much easier.
5 Even though everybody is not up here speaking, 6 they've really worked very hard and, please, come to them, talk 7 to them, this is how we get our ideas and this is how we all 8 work together.
9 Bob Walker is coordinating the tabletop exercise. So 10 get out your homework and listen to the teacher up here.
11 MR. WALKER: Thanks, Kathy. All the speakers this 12 morning that you've heard the last hour worked by sharing or 13 cooperation and coordination of this effort, and this exercise 14 is going to start right now because we're [inaudible] do that.
15 [Inaudible.]
16 SPEAKER: It used to be [inaudible] staff.
17 MR. WALKER: Over the last month, you've seen some 18 old things on RADRAP, one from Kathy and a couple from me, 19 talking about the national materials program and what folks do 20 with it.
21 And we also asked for your cooperation in bringing to 22 this meeting your top three priorities in rulemaking, consensus
83 1 standards and guidance documents, the kinds of things that 2 you'd like to see over the next 28 months in those areas.
3 [Inaudible] and be prepared to hand them to us at 4 this meeting. What we're going to do with those is take them 5 away and [inaudible] between now and tomorrow morning, the 6 committee is going to get together and prioritize those things 7 and we're going to come back tomorrow on what this looks like 8 and a consensus for regulatory priorities over the next 9 [inaudible.]
10 So if those of you who haven't seen the bulletins on 11 RADRAP, if you [inaudible] get them to myself or Kathy or Jim 12 or any of the other committee members between now and 13 lunchtime, then we'll start working on that this afternoon and 14 evening and hope to have something to you tomorrow.
15 SPEAKER: Are there any questions about the tabletop?
16 Make sure that you put your state names on these. It can be 17 multiple pieces of paper, a single one, but include what state 18 you're from.
19 MR. CAMERON: And the tabletop may illustrate 20 questions or bring some questions up for you about some of the 21 generic issues that the working group is trying to address, 22 too. So I think there will be an opportunity to put those on
84 1 the table when we do the tabletop.
2 Okay. I would thank Carl and Kathy and Jim and Bob 3 Walker, and we're going to move into our next segment, which is 4 going to start with Ray Johnson, from the Health Physics 5 Society, and then we're going to go to Mike Ryan, who is going 6 to talk about NCRP, what the committees are and how they work.
7 Ray, do you want to come up and you're going to talk 8 to us about a number of issues, I believe, right? And Ray, as 9 many of you know, is the immediate past President of the Health 10 Physics Society. And, good, Mike is coming up, and we'll have 11 both of them up here.
12 And we'll break for questions for Ray. We'll have 13 questions after Mike. But there may be questions that refer to 14 both of their -- that are stimulated by both of their 15 presentations.
16 Do we have an overhead projector guide?
17 SPEAKER: Yes, we do.
18 MR. CAMERON: All right. We do, but it's in North 19 Carolina.
20 SPEAKER: Anybody else from South Carolina know what 21 they're doing?
22 MR. JOHNSON: I would point out that I have a copy of
85 1 the slides that I'll be sure and leave you, if you'd like to 2 get one. These will be passed around.
3 Also, I'd like to be inviting your comments on the 4 proposal that I will be sharing with you shortly and if you 5 would, please, record your comments on one of these cards, so I 6 can capture your feedback.
7 Thank you for the opportunity to visit with you.
8 Some of you may recall that I had the opportunity to visit you 9 a year ago at the meeting in Texas. So I bring you greetings 10 from the Health Physics Society, the officers and the Board of 11 Directors.
12 The Health Physics Society is very much interested in 13 developing our continuing relationship with the state and with 14 the NRC, but to offer what we can from a professional 15 development role in the field of radiation safety.
16 The current President of the Health Physics Society 17 is Dr. Paul Rohr. He was invited to represent the Society at 18 this meeting. However, I had talked with Paul about the 19 possibility of coming to meet with you, to invite your response 20 to a Health Physics Society initiative, and Paul said, "Well, 21 Ray, if you're going to do that, how about if you also 22 represent the Society." So I'm privileged to have that
86 1 opportunity this morning.
2 Could I have the next slide, please?
3 For more than 15 years, I have been providing 4 training services to RSOs and to radiation workers and I know 5 that most of you deal with those folks on a day-to-day basis 6 and probably would share an observation which I've noted many 7 times, and that is that they don't always understand the 8 information that we present them.
9 And I think of a little boy who's standing in the 10 back of a church looking up at the wall and there's a plaque 11 with a lot of names on it. He's studying this plaque. The 12 pastor comes up and asks the little boy, "Do you understand 13 what that plaque is?" The little said, "No," he didn't. And 14 the pastor says, "Well, those are a list of all of the names of 15 people who died in the service." The little boy looks closer 16 at the plaque and after a bit, he turns back and he says "Is 17 that the 10:00 service or the 11:00 service?"
18 Now, as a training provider, I get asked all the time 19 about what are the qualifications needed for RSOs; what do I 20 need to know, what regulations should I know about, what will I 21 need to know about licensing, and, most of all, what do I need 22 to know to stay out of trouble.
87 1 How much training is needed? What's the magic about 2 40 hours4.62963e-4 days <br />0.0111 hours <br />6.613757e-5 weeks <br />1.522e-5 months <br />? Wouldn't 16 hours1.851852e-4 days <br />0.00444 hours <br />2.645503e-5 weeks <br />6.088e-6 months <br /> or 24 hours2.777778e-4 days <br />0.00667 hours <br />3.968254e-5 weeks <br />9.132e-6 months <br /> be enough? And can I 3 be an RSO without any previous training or experience? And 4 this is a question that comes up quite often and the fact is, 5 at the end of each of my classes, I like to ask a question 6 about what is the previous training or experience, and quite 7 often find out that they've had no previous training or 8 experience at all.
9 The other question I ask of these students is how 10 many of you are here because you drew the short straw, and 11 usually had go up all around the room.
12 So this is a sample of what I've been observing for 13 many years in this area.
14 Next slide. Now, I've briefly summarized my view, at 15 least, of some of the roles that are interrelated here. RSOs 16 whose role is defined by regulations and licenses, NRC and 17 state to establish those regulations and provide the licenses, 18 and the Health Physics Society, which is intended to offer 19 professional and technical support to publications and 20 conferences and educational opportunities.
21 I would suggest for you, though, that our roles have 22 collectively changed over the years. Since the Health Physics
88 1 Society was formed in 1956, in those early years, many of you 2 were involved and you know that there were relatively few rules 3 and programs and that our goal was to establish programs and 4 implement programs.
5 In the current years, however, more radiation safety 6 people are involved in implementation and we've seen the 7 changing role of the states, where, in the '50s, most of 8 licensing was done by Federal regulation and now most of it is 9 being done by the states.
10 As regulations now become more prescriptive, the view 11 of the RSOs, at least, is that radiation safety often means 12 following the rules and, consequently, what we may see evolving 13 over the years is a need for professional health physicists' 14 judgment, education and experience, and more of what we would 15 traditionally think of as health physics functions are now 16 being done by people who call themselves RSOs and typically are 17 not full-time specialists in radiation safety.
18 RSOs often have less training than you might expect 19 from a professional health physicist and they often wear 20 multiple hats. And, in fact, [inaudible] to the broad-based 21 safety professionals.
22 And, unfortunately, their focus may not always be as
89 1 much on safety as it is on avoiding violations; in other words, 2 following the rules.
3 The Health Physics Society is primarily for full-time 4 practicing health physicists. Now, how does that allow us to 5 link with RSOs? RSOs, by and large, do not identify themselves 6 as health physicists.
7 In fact, at a class that I had [inaudible] about a 8 year ago, I had a class with 22 students and the first morning, 9 I asked how many of you know the words health physics or heard 10 of the Health Physics Society. Out of the 22 students, one 11 person raised their hand and that person called himself a 12 health physicist.
13 So the others in the group of students had not even 14 heard of the words health physics or knew of the Health Physics 15 Society.
16 Should the Health Physics Society be providing 17 services to these folks, such as education and technical 18 support and networking?
19 Over the past year, I've invited the Executive 20 Committee and the Board of Directors of the Health Physics 21 Society and the membership to come to grips with the question 22 of who are we, as we come into the new millennium, who do we
90 1 represent, who do we want to represent.
2 If we were to make a special effort to include 3 ourselves in the society, would that change our professional 4 status to becoming more of a trade organization rather than 5 professional?
6 What is the mission of the Health Physics Society?
7 Should this society be the primary resource of information and 8 support services for radiation safety practitioners in the 9 United States? Does the society have a responsibility for 10 maintaining and upgrading the quality of radiation safety 11 programs by providing membership services to RSOs?
12 What happens if RSOs make a mistake? Does the 13 general public have any idea that [inaudible] between RSOs and 14 the health physicists?
15 We know that there are over 20,000 radioactive 16 material licensees in the United States. Each of those has an 17 RSO. And that many of these licensees also have staff. So I'm 18 estimating that there are perhaps 50,000 or more people in the 19 United States with responsibilities for implementing radiation 20 safety programs.
21 The Health Physics Society, as with your programs, 22 can enhance the competence of these people, but who has the
91 1 responsibility? What are the qualifications for RSOs and what 2 are the programs available for RSOs to develop those 3 qualifications?
4 Well, we know that the campus radiation safety 5 officer group, which apparently has a mailing list of about 800 6 names. They're not a formal organization in terms of officers 7 or organization structure or publications.
8 There's also another group representing many RSOs, 9 the National Registry for Radiation Protection Technologists, 10 of which there are about 4,000 at the current time.
11 So by and large, if you look at those numbers on the 12 previous slide and considering that there are 40,000 or more 13 RSOs and many more people who work with them, neither of those 14 previous organizations or the Health Physics Society are really 15 providing support for this large number of people.
16 The mission of the Health Physics Society is assuring 17 excellence in radiation safety and the question is, does this 18 include or should this include RSOs.
19 Should RSOs be included, even when they're not 20 full-time practicing health physicists? What does the society 21 have to offer? Publications? They need to know of the high 22 quality of our journals, which Mike Ryan is current the editor
92 1 of. And the [inaudible] publication, Operational Radiation 2 Safety, that has had a very significant [inaudible] in our 3 society. And, of course, our newsletter, which I know many of 4 you receive, and then a membership book and the web site.
5 We hold two large meetings each year, which include 6 many training and educational opportunities. WE also attempt 7 to represent good science and good practices in radiation 8 safety for intervention with Congress and agencies and with you 9 guys.
10 Now, about four years ago, I was instrumental in 11 establishing a new service directed toward RSOs, called the RSO 12 Section, which stands for radiation safety operations. This 13 was to be intended to be a service not only for RSOs, but their 14 staff.
15 This section is now over 600 members and it's the 16 largest section of the health physics society. So it seems 17 pretty clear that within the current membership of 6,000, that 18 there is an interest in this area.
19 But how is the Health Physics Society connecting with 20 RSOs? We now have two mailings to about 18,000 each, to RSOs, 21 [inaudible] that we got from licensees, from agreement states, 22 and from the NRC.
93 1 Out of these mailings, which invited RSOs to consider 2 services of the society, we've gotten about 200 new members.
3 Now, the significance of that is that over the last six or 4 seven years, we have gone from a membership of about 6,600 down 5 to 5,800 and over the last two years or over the last year in 6 particular, that number has gone up by about 200, we're now 7 back to about 6,000. Now, not all of these are RSOs.
8 So what I would conclude from that is that by and 9 large, even though we've made some initiatives to connect with 10 RSOs, but they're still not really identifying with the society 11 and mainly because, as I indicated earlier, most of them did 12 not call themselves health physicists.
13 So the role of the society with regard to RSOs is 14 we've offered membership and we still hope that might be a 15 helpful service.
16 The alternative, though, that I'd like you all to 17 offer feedback on today is that perhaps rather than asking RSOs 18 to call themselves health physicists and be a member of this 19 organization, that perhaps we should be helping RSOs to set up 20 a credentialing and a technical support service specifically to 21 meet their needs, in the same way that the Health Physics 22 Society originally set up the American Board of Health Physics,
94 1 for certifying health physicists, and the society also set up 2 the program known as the National Registry of Radiation 3 Protection Technologists.
4 For this purpose, the board did approve an initiative 5 at the meeting in Denver, a committee to consider credentialing 6 the technical support of RSOs. The names of the members of the 7 committee, it's quite a large committee, it includes the names 8 of several people here in the group today.
9 The reason the committee is so large is we're trying 10 to incorporate a very broad perspective on this issue, and, of 11 course, that's the reason that I'm here to talk with you today.
12 The role of this committee and the questions I would 13 like you to begin to consider is evaluate the need for RSO 14 credentialing, considering how credentialing services could be 15 offered, how to provide the RSOs with technical support for 16 implementing radiation safety programs, for developing and 17 establishing competence and for obtaining credentials.
18 Now, my last slide has a list of questions on which I 19 would like, if you would, please, to offer your comments on 20 these cards. Now, if you would, just write down one, two, 21 three and four, with your comments. If you'd like to include 22 your names, that would be very helpful.
95 1 Basically, what I'm inviting is your feedback and 2 written comments, of course, will be easier to work with, in 3 order than when I go to the Health Physics Executive Committee 4 meeting in two weeks, which is going to be right here in this 5 same building, I get to be back again in two weeks, that I 6 would have some concrete feedback from all of you to share with 7 the Executive Committee and then later with the Board of 8 Directors at the June meeting.
9 So at this point, I would like to open the floor for 10 discussion on the questions I put up on the board or any other 11 comments that you'd like to offer.
12 MR. CAMERON: Thank you very much, Ray. Do we have 13 questions for Ray or comments on the questions on this 14 particular viewgraph?
15 SPEAKER: [Inaudible] comments about the possibility 16 of this, one of the questions you asked me, if I remember 17 correctly, was would the credentialing of RSOs be [inaudible]
18 to the licensing program. [Inaudible] concerns they have, the 19 more difficult task is evaluating [inaudible] people that are 20 studying to be RSOs.
21 And, you know, not being one to want to take on extra 22 work, there was some work on the notion that [inaudible]
96 1 credentialing, I thought that it should be [inaudible] and from 2 that, we sort of came up with the idea of making [inaudible.]
3 I noted in your -- you're talking about 40,000 RSOs.
4 There are also -- I think we've got 25,000 [inaudible] in 5 California. At least in theory, every single one of those 6 [inaudible] and I think [inaudible] is that some of our least 7 safety conscious facilities are the ones that have [inaudible]
8 or the techs do most of the work.
9 So there is possibly another group there that 10 [inaudible] doesn't work itself [inaudible] medical.
11 MR. JOHNSON: I see many of you are notes on the 12 cards. Again, I greatly appreciate whatever comments you would 13 like to share.
14 MR. CAMERON: Aubrey? Aubrey Godwin.
15 MR. GODWIN: Aubrey Godwin, Arizona. Is this going 16 to be a concurrent program? I'd like to suggest that along the 17 lines of the [inaudible] qualifications for different types of 18 RSOs; for example, being an RSO for [inaudible] radiography 19 might [inaudible] X-ray facilities.
20 Also, maybe some sort of accreditation process 21 developed either by the HP or we encourage other [inaudible] an 22 accreditation process is important to training [inaudible]
97 1 people.
2 We have a few independent trainers now, as you're 3 well aware, and some are pretty good, some are okie-dokie, and 4 some are [inaudible.] And when they come to us, we have to 5 look at them as being good unless we can prove they're bad, and 6 we've seen them once.
7 SPEAKER: Thank you very much. Those are very good 8 points and I don't have answers specifically for those, but I'm 9 hoping [inaudible] and your experience.
10 MR. CAMERON: Okay. Anybody in the audience have a 11 comment on this for Ray? Steve Collins.
12 MR. COLLINS: Steve Collins, Illinois. As to your 13 first question, I would think that that would be yes, but there 14 would need to be a limit or approval for each type of licensee 15 category, because the training requirements for those different 16 categories vary so much.
17 SPEAKER: [Inaudible.]
18 SPEAKER: I believe you're right. That's the same 19 point that Aubrey Godwin, that Aubrey made, and that would be 20 one of the things consider [inaudible] different categories of 21 licenses and the RSO qualifications.
22 MR. CAMERON: Okay. Go ahead, Bill.
98 1 MR. DUNDULIS: Bill Dundulis, Rhode Island. One 2 thing that I am concerned about, particularly in answer to 3 question three, would such a program include quality, I think 4 even if you had such a program, in many respects, it would be 5 preaching to the choir. Those who would probably sign on are 6 probably those that we're least wary about, that probably have 7 some degree of competence already, and the ones which you 8 really want to reach are probably going to be the ones that 9 unless you put a gun to their head, are going to the ones least 10 likely to try to do it.
11 SPEAKER: One of the things RSOs have shared with me 12 about this matter so far is that, first of all, every RSO I've 13 talked to thought this was a good idea. But one of the factors 14 is provide some visibility and recognition for their function, 15 which, in many organizations, is way down at the end of the 16 organization chart.
17 MR. CAMERON: Okay. Roger?
18 MR. SUPPES: Roger Suppes, Ohio. It seems like one 19 of the unanticipated outcomes of some certification programs is 20 that whoever gets certified then wants to delegate 21 responsibility to somebody else, and that seems to be what 22 we've been through in Ohio, is when you've got, let's say, the
99 1 radiation expert or the RSO or the individual responsible for 2 radiation protection or whoever ought to have special judgment 3 and be able to delegate those, and you don't need to have those 4 people certified.
5 So I think that certification and recognition of who 6 these folks are is important and something we should do, but it 7 seems like with the emphasis on cost containment in a lot of 8 institutions, there's a lot of possible unanticipated outcomes.
9 The person who is actually doing the test is not the 10 person [inaudible] on the license.
11 SPEAKER: That's a good point. Thank you.
12 MR. CAMERON: Any other points on credentialing that 13 anybody wants to offer?
14 SPEAKER: We just went through a credentialing 15 process in Arkansas and there was a grandfather clause attached 16 to it for a one year period. Would you envision something like 17 this?
18 SPEAKER: Perhaps. I haven't heard of that, but that 19 would certainly make some sense. I know in the Health Physics 20 Society, the original group of the American Board of Health 21 Physicists were 100 people identified as exemplary of the 22 profession and they [inaudible.]
100 1 SPEAKER: And that depends if it becomes regulatory 2 or not.
3 SPEAKER: Thank you.
4 MR. CAMERON: Okay. Let's go to [inaudible.]
5 SPEAKER: [Inaudible.] I think the majority of 6 states, we enjoy the luxury of being able to take on the 7 individual, but not necessarily have a set [inaudible]
8 credentials a person must possess.
9 This gives us the autonomy [inaudible] individual. I 10 know the State of New Mexico, we ask for the resume.
11 MR. CAMERON: [Inaudible] Stan.
12 SPEAKER: Let me start over again. The State of New 13 Mexico, like many of the states, takes a look at the 14 credentials, the resumes of people who would be RSOs, and we 15 kind of like that idea because depending upon the education and 16 experience, we can't necessarily what's cut-and-dried 17 [inaudible] as far as what a person should possess.
18 I think a lot of [inaudible] would be better. I know 19 [inaudible] people receive applications for a license to be an 20 RSO, we ask for that and we reserve the right to tell whether 21 or not that person should be an RSO.
22 So I think that HPS can provide a good service by
101 1 setting up support. I think the states are still going to be 2 [inaudible] to determine who would serve in that position.
3 SPEAKER: Thank you. I would certainly full expect 4 that; that if there were credentialing services available, this 5 would just be another source of input or evaluation 6 [inaudible,] but that the states would certainly or the NRC, 7 whoever [inaudible.] You're right.
8 MR. CAMERON: Okay. Ray, thank you very much. And 9 people can just turn in their cards before you leave.
10 SPEAKER: Yes, or at the lunch break or whatever.
11 Again, I thank you very much for your feedback, appreciate it.
12 Thank you, again.
13 [Applause.]
14 MR. CAMERON: Mike Ryan is going to tell us about the 15 NCRP committees and relationships with agreement states and 16 states in general. Are you ready?
17 MR. RYAN: I'm ready. It's always hard to be the 18 last speaker before lunch. You have to keep track of the 19 public speaking rule [inaudible.] Be yourself, be prepared, be 20 clear, be brief, and be seated.
21 I want to try and stick with that goal and I'm going 22 to give you some information about the NCRP.
102 1 Let me first, again, welcome you all to Charleston.
2 It is where I make my home now, and there are hundreds of good 3 restaurants within a block of here. So if anybody gets a bad 4 meal, you must have tripped it out of town. It's a great place 5 to have [inaudible] and the weather for the next few days looks 6 terrific. So get out and about and enjoy the wonderful 7 downtown area.
8 It's my pleasure also to meet with you, the 9 Organization of Agreement States, because [inaudible] earlier 10 said, I believe that radiation protection occurs at the local 11 level [inaudible.] [Inaudible] Speaker of the House said all 12 politics are local, and I think all radiation protection, maybe 13 not all, but a large part of it is the day-to-day interaction 14 of people using radiation and radioactive materials.
15 That brings me to what the NCRP can do. We are an 16 organization, one of those locuses of some sort of skill and 17 capability, during the 1950s, '60s and '70s, but as time has 18 evolved, the role of the NCRP has not evolved with the changing 19 times.
20 I believe that there is a body of expertise 21 nationally and internationally in radiation protection that 22 extends beyond what was once the center of one of the
103 1 [inaudible] of the NCRP.
2 I've been involved as a board member and a scientific 3 vice president for NCRP and, particularly, over the last year, 4 in strategic planning for the organization.
5 One of the things that the NCRP recognizes -- next 6 slide -- and I'll tell you [inaudible] in a minute, is that we 7 had [inaudible.]
8 The members of the most recent committee to develop 9 implementation plans [inaudible] myself, Dave Moeller, John 10 Poston, John [inaudible,] Byron McNeal, Carol McLean, Jim 11 Alstein, and, of course, [inaudible] quite a nice array of 12 folks that have been involved with trying to ask a simple 13 question, what can the NCRP do to further enhance its mission 14 to collected, analyze and disseminate radiation protection 15 information in the public interest and collaborate with other 16 organizations who have a similar or like purpose.
17 That is, in fact, NCRP's mission. So we are 18 redefining and [inaudible] ourselves along that mission.
19 Next slide, please.
20 This, believe or not, started with some simple 21 meetings and some [inaudible] activity back as far as 1997. A 22 letter was written identifying five recommendations for
104 1 strategic initiatives the NCRP should take.
2 Not much happened until 1999, when it was recognized 3 that budgetary shortfalls, which catch everybody's attention 4 that something needs to be done, forced the NCRP to really 5 assess the strategic future.
6 In 1999, the board approved an ad hoc strategic 7 planning [inaudible.] Next slide, please.
8 In April of 2000, that first committee's report was 9 prepared and accepted -- prepared, delivered and accepted by 10 the board of directors.
11 It was a survey of all sorts of folks from a wide 12 variety of constituencies, about 800 individuals responded to 13 the survey, 890, I think it was, and they had some very 14 powerful and useful information to identify some of the 15 strengths and weaknesses and the opportunities [inaudible.]
16 17 At the annual meeting in April of this year, the 18 board empowered [inaudible] this list I showed you to recognize 19 activities and things that could be done to implement those 20 strategic recommendations that came out of that survey.
21 So September of 2000, just this last month, the 22 implementation committee transmitted its 11 recommendations to
105 1 the board of directors, with supporting information. The board 2 is scheduled to meet in November to consider and act on those 3 recommendations.
4 I'm pleased to tell you that both of these strategic 5 planning committees were [inaudible] and met their obligations 6 on time. Something kind of unusual in NCRP, but that is a key 7 weakness that we have. We have to be more timely and, I think, 8 more topical and relevant to the needs of those who support the 9 organization.
10 [Inaudible] were recognized in the surveys. NCRP's 11 position with respect to the National Scientific Consensus 12 [inaudible] disseminated information, guidance and 13 recommendations on radiation protection and measurements.
14 Some folks know that their NRCP reports are well 15 formed, well annotated, and when they come out, they're 16 valuable. Boy, we wish they came out sooner, very often, but 17 when they do come out, they have information that's helpful.
18 There is a breadth of scientific capability in the 19 council, and it's medical radioactive materials and other 20 areas. There's lots of folks that give their time freely to 21 contribute where they can.
22 There's a lot of utility in the reports. The NCRP
106 1 annual meeting provides an opportunity for both public and 2 private dialogue and is generally well attended, up in the 800 3 to 1,200 person range.
4 Typically, it's a topical meeting, very often one 5 that [inaudible.]
6 Some of the agencies, and I say some, that I see NCRP 7 is meeting their objectives. Some of the states have a 8 willingness of experts to serve on the NCRP on different 9 committees, very often giving up tens or months of a year to do 10 various NCRP report activities.
11 And those council members feel comfortable with their 12 level of involvement. They don't feel like they've been asked 13 to do too much, which means we probably don't ask them to do 14 enough.
15 Next slide, please. Here are the weaknesses.
16 Unrestricted funding is decreasing. Now, that's not particular 17 to NCRP. Lots of organizations have seen the same kinds of 18 trends.
19 I just saw an article in Scientific Information World 20 that said the National Academy is undergoing the same kind of 21 problem, decrease in funding. There is a decrease in 22 volunteerism.
107 1 I tell the folks the story that when I worked at Oak 2 Ridge National Laboratory for [inaudible] working on this NCRP 3 report, that was my job. Now, when I'm doing NCRP activities, 4 that's extra.
5 So volunteerism is not as closely integrated into our 6 day-to-day activities in radiation protection practices 7 [inaudible.]
8 I think the key thing is that the number of reports 9 published per year has increased. I look at that as an issue 10 of relevance, what is important to folks, what do they need to 11 have and what is going to help them in radiation protection 12 practice.
13 There has been a [inaudible] produced reports in a 14 timely fashion, and I say that openly and without excuse. It 15 just hasn't happened. Sometimes reports have taken up to 11 16 years to complete. One report had two members of the committee 17 that had passed away, but it was finally published.
18 So that [inaudible.] There is a backlog currently of 19 unfinished and unfunded report-writing committees, some of whom 20 have topics, I think, of great interest to this organization 21 [inaudible.]
22 There's a competition for money and time with other
108 1 activities. There are other organizations, both National 2 Academy of Sciences or Institute of Medicine or other kinds of 3 organizations that compete for money and time, some national 4 and some international.
5 Some folks participate in IAEA, [inaudible,] and 6 others. [Inaudible] seeing how things are shifting, for 7 example, from NRC to the agreement states. The licenses are 8 shifting and NRC's budget is rightfully shifting to go with 9 that kind of change.
10 The NCRP now needs to recognize that fact, that many 11 agencies and NCRP do not meet the objectives because there's 12 been a drift in what NCRP focus is on and what now is the focus 13 of the Federal and state agencies and [inaudible] forces NCRP 14 to realize [inaudible.]
15 There's a failure to inform sponsors satisfactorily 16 on progress. The old days were give me a big box of money, 17 we'll write a report and we'll tell you when the report is 18 done.
19 So I think it needs to be much more interactive.
20 These days, radiation protection regulations are not a science 21 for experts, its not arcane, lots of folks understand the 22 [inaudible.] It's much of a participatory process and I think
109 1 NCRP needs to recognize that.
2 There is an uncertainty about NCRP's cooperation with 3 other organizations. NCRP, I think, [inaudible] science group 4 in the U.S. had heavy leadership position [inaudible] for a 5 long time. There are others that are in the race now on both 6 sides. I think NCRP needs to look toward these other 7 organizations to work cooperatively and collaboratively, I say 8 that carefully, cooperative and collaborative, with all sorts 9 of organizations that cross radiation protection.
10 That is a particular [inaudible] that NCRP can do to 11 [inaudible.]
12 Our implementation planning committee [inaudible]
13 committee was formed to develop an improvement plan to address 14 the weaknesses in the council's work. Very important 15 statement. To offer an improvement plan to address the 16 weaknesses in the council's work.
17 The ad hoc committee has completed its report and 18 made 11 specific recommendations to the board. The board of 19 directors is considering the [inaudible] these recommendations.
20 Next slide. Now, the key recommendations are grouped 21 into four areas. Number one, improve the timeliness of 22 reports. I say reports in the broadest way because what a
110 1 report is may actually involve [inaudible.]
2 Timeliness is not only when it comes out, but what it 3 addresses. Relevance is a key part of what NCRP, I think, 4 needs to address. Relevance of what's needed in current 5 practice.
6 The way I look at it, radiation biology and 7 fundamentals of radiation protection science are I won't say 8 finished, but there's a very large body of evidence in those 9 areas.
10 What I heard everybody talking about today, which I 11 think the NCRP can help a lot with, is implementation. How do 12 you get things into practice? How do you get things on the 13 table and working, whether it's for an individual licensee, a 14 state program or a national consensus kind of project, whether 15 it's a norm, whether it's an X-ray, whether it's radioactive 16 materials, whatever subject it happens to be.
17 How do you implement decisions you make? How do you 18 arrive at consensus standards for decommissioning the 19 contamination? How many folks have had to actually terminate a 20 license and decide on decommissioning numbers in the absence of 21 this kind of national [inaudible.]
22 Lots of folks. Wouldn't it be nice to have NCRP
111 1 participate in that process to maybe bring all of that a little 2 bit closer together?
3 For example, I just pointed out. I think 4 understanding how reports can be relevant to what's needed 5 today might be a real [inaudible] and there are very specific 6 recommendations to do that.
7 You approve the [inaudible] process for producing 8 reports. There are a number of recommendations that address 9 what a committee chair does, how it gets done, responsibilities 10 of committee members. [Inaudible] ought to make it much 11 clearer. If this [inaudible] product inspected on schedule, 12 there's a particular need to address the particulars of what 13 types of things the funding agency should be doing.
14 A very important process is how those reports get 15 published, whether they're internal and the contractor talks 16 about how all that gets done, the business aspect is another 17 area of recommendation. It's very important to [inaudible.]
18 We need to respond to a broader range of [inaudible]
19 needs; again, implementation and relevance are the two words I 20 use to describe that.
21 I think we need to work more collaboratively with 22 other organizations. One of the areas of recommendation is
112 1 membership. The election process and getting members into the 2 NCRP is a little bit like electing the Pope. [Inaudible] the 3 white smoke.
4 I think it would be a much more viable organization 5 in the long haul if we recognized that a broader participation 6 of a broader membership in NCRP was the order of the day. We 7 put a couple of different kinds of structured proposals for the 8 board to consider on how that could be done, but the principal 9 is broaden participation so that we can bring more of the 10 radiation protection community into participation into the 11 NCRP. That's an important aspect of it.
12 I think by doing that and by driving the 13 participation in some way, we can then work more 14 collaboratively with those organizations that are represented 15 by this wider membership.
16 Next slide. Mr. [Inaudible], as you know, is the 17 President of NCRP and at the annual meeting last year, he 18 announced he is not going to seek another term as President.
19 Officially, his term ends like April 2002.
20 [Inaudible] Stanford is heading up the search 21 committee. HE is actively seeking input on nominations for the 22 next president, and he will be reporting to the board in
113 1 January on the input and recommendations and nominations that 2 he has received.
3 So that's an ongoing process. I would offer each of 4 you, as an agreement state of this organization, to please make 5 your desires and input known to [inaudible.]
6 What is the NCRP of the future going to look like?
7 These are kind of, I think, roles that I would put forward as 8 the kinds of things that NCRP should have in its mind as it 9 moves into this next millennium.
10 [Inaudible] and be recognized as an authority on 11 radiation protection standards, [inaudible] radiation science.
12 NCRP and its funders are fully engaged together in the 13 processes that can help both [inaudible] relationship.
14 States are involved and NCRP is the resource. I'll 15 stop on that one. I think it's very important to figure out, 16 and this organization is one great mechanism, how the NCRP can 17 serve and be of support to the radiation protection programs in 18 all of your states, as well as the states that are regulated by 19 the NRC.
20 It's obvious to me, just sitting and listening, that 21 you are becoming an organization that has its own momentum and 22 its own direction.
114 1 How can we help? A very simple question. What do 2 you need? Is it implementation guidance, is it X-rays, 3 radioactive materials, and so on.
4 So I will leave that question with you. Give me any 5 feedback or input you like on that, I'd be happy to have it at 6 any time.
7 Next slide. The actions of NCRP are timely and fully 8 responsive to customer needs. There is continuous improvement 9 through feedback as a foundation of operations of NCRP.
10 Yes, please give us your input. [Inaudible] support 11 [inaudible] scientific agenda that we currently have. One 12 thing I might add is the scientific vice presidents are 13 scheduling meetings with Federal agencies in the [inaudible]
14 and some state folks also to gather input on areas of interest.
15 One area, of course, is radioactive and mixed waste, 16 [inaudible] of operational radiation safety committee.
17 We're having a joint meeting in November to gain some 18 of that input. I'd welcome input from this organization, as 19 well. What can we do to help solve your problems? What kind 20 of things would the NCRP products be of value to you? So 21 that's an important opportunity to give us some input. How can 22 we better support your states' radiological health programs?
115 1 And that's it. Questions, comments?
2 MR. CAMERON: Maybe we could leave that slide up, 3 because there are a good set of questions. Let's start with 4 Bill.
5 MR. DUNDULIS: Bill Dundulis, Rhode Island. Two 6 questions. The first one, and this kind of plays in with how 7 can you help state radiation programs, what is the latest 8 floating deadline for the NCRP-49 rewrite? I mean, that's a 9 good document, but it's basically X-ray shielding as it was 10 practiced in the '70s.
11 Then the second question is, you know, one of the 12 perceived weaknesses you said was failure to communicate with 13 sponsors on a timely basis. But just as an observation, that 14 may be a very fine line, so that it's not perceived that the 15 sponsors are having too much input into exactly what the report 16 says, because they think that could damage your overall 17 credibility as an objective purveyor of true science.
18 MR. RYAN: I agree on both points. First of all, the 19 shielding report, I do not know of a schedule to update that at 20 the current moment. I do not believe it is in the revision.
21 MR. DUNDULIS: There's a working group supposedly.
22 MR. RYAN: There's a working group just forming?
116 1 MR. DUNDULIS: Three years ago, at least.
2 MR. RYAN: Three years ago. Well, I do not know the 3 schedule, so I'll have to apprise you. I'll find out and let 4 you know.
5 With regard to the communication aspect, I agree with 6 you. I think it's important not to compromise the scientific 7 integrity of the report development process. However, I do 8 think it's important to at least report progress or lack of 9 progress.
10 But I think clearly the communication on schedule and 11 anticipated schedule and so forth needs to be brought out.
12 [Inaudible] of course, is what NCRP is good at and I think that 13 has to maintain a high integrity.
14 MR. CAMERON: Any others around the table on these 15 three questions?
16 MR. RYAN: On this shielding report, let me also give 17 you an idea. One thing I've tried to flash is I think it would 18 be terrific if that was a CD calculational package.
19 MR. CAMERON: Let's go to Greta Dicus, and then we'll 20 go to Ed Bailey. Greta?
21 COMMISSIONER DICUS: [Inaudible.]
22 SPEAKER: No, no. [Inaudible.]
117 1 SPEAKER: Can we sign over the mic?
2 SPEAKER: Again.
3 COMMISSIONER DICUS: Here we go again. Now, one of 4 the things that certainly affects my agency and affects others 5 and certainly will affect the states is the fact that no 6 [inaudible] people get their knowledge of radiation from a 7 [inaudible] write them a letter that says do we know what 8 they're talking about.
9 So my question to you is what is your [inaudible]
10 from Congress, what are your connections to Congress? Are you 11 asked by Congress for information and how do you do that?
12 MR. RYAN: Actually, the history of NCRP's 13 interaction with Congress has been very little, and I think 14 that's an area of weakness and one of those really important 15 folks who was on the committee was Gilda Plank, obviously, a 16 former Commissioner of the NRC, and I think part of the 17 recommendation was to engage in the process on government 18 [inaudible] Congressional needs and information needs, was to 19 explore [inaudible] collaborative avenues that NCRP needs to 20 take on.
21 So as of this point in time, no, not much.
22 [Inaudible] NCRD address this in the future, yes, it should.
118 1 Now, again, the risk is you don't want to become a [inaudible]
2 organization [inaudible] scientific information in the 3 information flow for Congress and staff and so forth.
4 So that's something that's started of late, but needs 5 a lot more attention.
6 COMMISSIONER DICUS: [Inaudible] setting up to be a 7 lobbyist organization. Of course, the NRC cannot be 8 promotional, but giving correct information --
9 MR. RYAN: Exactly.
10 COMMISSIONER DICUS: [Inaudible] what we know, what 11 we've done.
12 MR. RYAN: I think that's good advice and something 13 that is one of the elements of our plan.
14 MR. CAMERON: Ed Bailey.
15 MR. BAILEY: Mike, you mentioned the decrease in 16 funding and so forth. As we move toward the national materials 17 program, I think one of the things that may come about is that 18 with decreased funding in NRC or whatever, that also sets the 19 opportunity [inaudible.]
20 What is the -- my question now. What is the typical 21 or average or whatever range of costs to the NCRP [inaudible.]
22 MR. RYAN: Too extensive. It's currently an
119 1 expensive process. [Inaudible] something in the $300,000 2 range. One of the key areas in our strategic implementation 3 program is to look at those processes, one, to make it more 4 timely, which will, two, make them less expensive.
5 I mean, it's very important to recognize that the 6 [inaudible.] Much more focused are the [inaudible] will be 7 much more efficient.
8 It's interesting to note that none of the members of 9 the writing group get paid. It's strictly travel and then 10 report production. Both of those specific business matters are 11 [inaudible] the report, but actually look at report production 12 and publishing as an issue and to look at [inaudible] that 13 process.
14 I think we'd like to see it be a much lower level 15 than it is today.
16 MR. CAMERON: Anybody else out here in the audience 17 have a comment on any of those questions or anything else?
18 Anybody else at the table have any questions for Mike? Ed?
19 SPEAKER: [Inaudible] topics that really need to be 20 addressed when you get back home [inaudible.]
21 And you think about this [inaudible] things to be 22 covered, such as the X-ray shielding [inaudible] very
120 1 important. [Inaudible.] And I'll be happy to call 2 [inaudible.]
3 SPEAKER: Sure.
4 SPEAKER: So whatever we can do, I think maybe when 5 you get back and talk to your staff and say what do you really 6 need, Mike mentioned DNB [inaudible.] There's a lot of us that 7 are sort of uncomfortable with the open-endedness of the 8 present guidance on DNB.
9 SPEAKER: One of the best-selling documents of NCRP 10 in the NCRP's recent history was the screening document, the 11 screening modeling that John Telford did got sold out twice.
12 So it's clear to us [inaudible] implementation 13 guidance seem to be very helpful.
14 Let me review two points. One, many of you have 15 participated in surveys already for NCRP. Hopefully, many more 16 of you will think and give us some additional info. For that, 17 I give you thanks and appreciation. Many folks have been 18 supportive of NCRP during this [inaudible] process and that's 19 been terrific and I appreciate it very much.
20 The second, I'd like to just borrow ten seconds and 21 answer Ray's comments. As editor in chief of the Health 22 Physics Journal, I want to encourage all of you to please send
121 1 in your articles and submissions for publication.
2 It's a great way to communicate with your peers and 3 it's a great way to have [inaudible] reference information 4 [inaudible] in your program.
5 [Inaudible] supplemented the Health Physics Journal, 6 which is a very classical, very much [inaudible] program, sort 7 of a publication that produces all the [inaudible] problems and 8 none so simple that you deal with every day, and a lot of good 9 publications.
10 We now have a few articles ready to publish that go 11 past the journal that's currently in progress. So we're now 12 seeing a lot of submissions for that stuff and it's very 13 positive.
14 One that we published at [inaudible] university was 15 to look at and actually measure [inaudible] released to 16 [inaudible.] So you see some realistic information and data on 17 that question of [inaudible] a few months ago.
18 So, again, I thank you for your time and attention 19 and input, and I appreciate being here very much.
20 MR. CAMERON: Thank you, Mike.
21 [Applause.]
22 MR. CAMERON: -- to give the national materials
122 1 working group here your input for the tabletop, and I think 2 Kathy and Bob are going to be coming around to talk to you 3 about that right now and then we can get out of here for lunch.
4 But I'm going to turn it over to Ed right now.
5 MR. BAILEY: Before we break for lunch, I'd just like 6 to express my appreciation to Ray and Mike for taking time out 7 of their busy schedules to come and address us.
8 [Inaudible] volunteer service, so if you get a 9 chance, please thank them. And we look forward, or I do, to 10 continuing interactions between both NRC and NCRP at future 11 meetings.
12 And with that, we shall recess for lunch, scheduled 13 to be back at 1:00.
14 [Whereupon, the meeting was recessed, to reconvene 15 this same day at 1:00 p.m.]
16 17 18 19 20 21 22
123 1 AFTERNOON SESSION 2 MR. CAMERON: -- all of you that we're putting in the 3 parking lot, and I would especially want to call NRC staff 4 attention to this issue, because I think we're going to ask you 5 to address it when we get to the medical rule presentation.
6 This is the Health and Human Services final rule, 45 7 CFR Part 61, on the obligations of Federal agencies, agreement 8 states, non-agreement states, to report what are called final 9 adverse actions under the HHS rule to the HHS, so that they can 10 put it in their data bank.
11 And we'll go in and explain more about this, find out 12 more about this tomorrow, hopefully, but I just wanted to note 13 that, particularly for the NRC staff, because I think that 14 we're probably going to rely on them to maybe give us a better 15 explanation than we might have now.
16 Our first presentation is Bob Emory, from the 17 University of Texas, and Bob was with us in Austin last year to 18 talk about a study that he and his colleagues were doing on 19 root causes of notice of notices of violations and he's back to 20 give us an update on it. So I'll turn it over to Bob, and he's 21 going to try to give us a condensed presentation, so that you 22 all have time to interact with him.
124 1 MR. EMORY: Thanks very much. Can you hear me in the 2 back with this, is it up high enough? No, you can't hear.
3 I appreciate the opportunity to be back here today to 4 talk about a continuation of the study that we were performing 5 last year.
6 Those of you who were here about a year ago received 7 a handsome copy of our Texas Compliance Almanac, and if you 8 remember -- probably the only thing you remember about the 9 presentation was that we asked if we could get a picture of 10 everybody, so that my boss wouldn't eat me alive for burning 11 out three color copiers to make this thing.
12 I just wanted to let you know that you all may be 13 made it into print. The newsletter for the [inaudible]
14 Southwest Center has a photo, a photograph that made it to the 15 publisher with a picture of us sitting in front of all of you, 16 with Ed Bailey holding his fingers up behind my head like this.
17 Ed holds the banner high.
18 Last year was a tag team match with myself and Mike 19 Charlton. Mike Charlton is now Director of Environmental 20 Health and Safety at our [inaudible] in San Antonio, and he 21 sends his best regards. He was unable to make it, so he asked 22 for me to field any of the tough questions for him.
125 1 In addition, I need to recognize two other colleagues 2 that work on this project. [Inaudible] and Mike Hernandez 3 [inaudible.]
4 What I would like to do today is four things. I 5 would like to reemphasize to you how stakeholders really 6 evaluate how radiation safety programs are doing. I want to 7 objectively identify the common violations that are issued to 8 permit holders in Texas, and we'll limit that discussion to 9 licensees, although we have the data for registrants, as well.
10 I think I will be able to demonstrate to you how this 11 data can be put to use for prevention by identifying the root 12 causes of these violations, and, in fact, it will serve as an 13 independent validation for something all of you intuitively 14 know, but it sure will be nice to able to say, kind of like a 15 toothpaste commercial, the university study said or verified.
16 And then I'm going to make an offer you can't refuse.
17 Now, at this point, everybody says, wait a minute, did you 18 bring along a cool ice chest like you brought last time, and 19 gosh darnit, no. We're out of ice chests. [Inaudible.]
20 As a brief review, if anyone takes an advantage of 21 that, you will realize that there are two ways that one can 22 evaluate the outcome of a program. You can use systemic
126 1 measures and, in the health and safety business, systemic 2 outcomes are those measures of ultimate program performance in 3 the traditional health and safety realm.
4 That's the body counts, the number of workplace 5 injury doses or fatalities, that's the stuff that's reported on 6 that OSHA-200 law.
7 There's a whole other set of indicators that are 8 called organic indicators and these are precursors to this 9 ultimate outcome. A lot of work in quality assurance focuses 10 on organic indicators.
11 In our business, because we don't have a lot of 12 systemic indicators that we can put our fingers on, we 13 necessarily have to rely on organic indicators, and those would 14 be the number of unsafe conditions or observations that we make 15 during inspections or our internal evaluations.
16 A lot of work now being done on behaviors and 17 attitudes or, in fact, whether [inaudible] compliance, and I 18 would argue that most of those are governed on the status of 19 the regulatory compliance.
20 Now, because I've been around the countryside talking 21 about this violation phenomenon, I wanted to make sure that you 22 understand that I try to always include this caveat to the
127 1 regulated community, and that is the public and the radiation 2 safety profession benefit from the compliance inspection 3 process.
4 And I try to emphasize that to the regulated 5 community, that these words are intended to make permit-holders 6 aware of the common deficiencies, so they can be avoided, but 7 they should not be done to the exclusion of all the other 8 reported safety [inaudible] that should be performed out there.
9 Sometimes people spend too much time focusing on 10 [inaudible.]
11 Okay. I'll just recap very quickly. Last year, we 12 showed you we had ten years worth of data for the violations 13 that are issued to licensees in the State of Texas, and it 14 turns out, with the coding system that they have in place 15 there, that if we do an analysis on this, that although there's 16 50 different violation codes, that the top ten list 17 consistently reflect 65 to 70 percent of all the violations.
18 In fact, if we were to go down the list, a lot of 19 that stuff is rocket science, nor does any of it require a 20 certified health physicist or professional engineer to address.
21 These are simple things, like making sure you have a 22 radiation protection program, doing your surveys and testing,
128 1 on and on and on.
2 But in our training, we find that the RSOs are very 3 welcoming to find out about this information, because they're 4 intimidated by this huge stack of regulations that face them, 5 and they say, no, that these are things that will be focused 6 upon, they can make sure they got their ducks in order.
7 Now, this is one of my favorite graphs, because you 8 can't read it, and that's the great thing about academics. You 9 just slap it up real quick and then [inaudible.] This is the 10 ten-year period here. Those are those ten violations there.
11 And notice that although the relative position within may 12 change, the top ten are always the top ten.
13 Now, the reason we picked this figure here is because 14 right in the middle is when 10 CFR 20 was made. Notice there's 15 a big jump over here in procedure, most likely due to radiation 16 protection program requirements, but, nonetheless, you're 17 focusing on these top ten because it's always the same top ten.
18 Another way you can sort this data is actually by 19 regulatory citation, and this is the Texas Administrative Code 20 citation and then the same thing shapes out. It turns out that 21 this is data from 1999, but here we have a listing of the top 22 five and that accounts for 60 percent of all the violations
129 1 issued.
2 Again, we're doing training or perhaps going out and 3 doing [inaudible] activities, that we can focus on these top 4 citations, people know where to focus their activities.
5 We can break it out by severity and the good news 6 here is that most of the violations issued are of low severity, 7 low severity being severity level five and four, and that 8 represents about 78 percent of all the violations issued in the 9 State of Texas.
10 Now, we get into the educational value. Why is this 11 of any use to anyone? Well, I have a couple of compelling 12 graphs. This graph here shows the overall number of incidents 13 reported in the State of Texas for the last ten years.
14 You will see that there was a dramatic decrease in 15 those things and then the blue line indicates the number of 16 overexposures during that same ten-year period. You can see 17 the major driver of the total number of incidents was 18 overexposure.
19 And that decrease did not come from all of a sudden 20 people started reading the latest edition of the Health Physics 21 Journal and implementing [inaudible] and shielding. In fact, 22 the dramatic decrease came from a change in the regulations,
130 1 thus eliminating the quarterly dose limits, and here we see a 2 dramatic decrease in number of reported overexposures for this 3 time period.
4 Conversely, if you go to the next draft, here is 5 misadministration and dose irregularities. Now, you guys know 6 better than myself that there's been some definition changes 7 and the like and you'll notice there's a flip-flop in that 8 line, the blue line and the purple line, an overall increase in 9 reported events associated with misadministration and dose 10 irregularities.
11 Now, there's all sorts of ways to interpret this and 12 we're still working on this project here, but the point being 13 that misadministrations, as they are defined, have gone down 14 dramatically.
15 The reporting mechanism that's in place has driven up 16 the number of dose irregularities that are being reported.
17 That is not to say that the [inaudible] the reporting phenomena 18 much more than [inaudible.] All of that's important 19 educational information.
20 If we go to the next slide, this pie chart shows all 21 the different radionuclides that can be used to inject in 22 people. It's not surprising that of all those incidents that
131 1 were reflected in the last graph, 73 percent were associated 2 with technetium-99M. Why is that? Go to the next graph, of 3 all the things that can go wrong, what if you inject the wrong 4 radionuclide, the wrong patient, or do the wrong study, the 5 compound, the labeling compound seems to be the root cause of 6 the problem.
7 The technetium can come in different flavors and if 8 we can come up with some way to clarify those different 9 flavors, then maybe we can reduce the overall number of these 10 incidents.
11 So I hope you begin to see a little bit of the 12 glimmer of where there might be some educational value in 13 having this data collected and studied.
14 Now, what really piqued my interest, after working on 15 this project, is that I began to realize that there is a cost 16 incurred by this, because there is a cost incurred by the 17 regulatory authorities, because every time a violation is 18 issued, one has to process it and then it kicks into the legal 19 realm, if you will, eventually, in some cases.
20 There is also an equal or perhaps greater cost borne 21 by the regulated community. I don't think we can catch that, 22 but we did working on what the cost would be to the regulator.
132 1 So what we did is the working group of the Bureau of 2 Radiation Control, we established a baseline [inaudible] and 3 then quantified the added cost to issue a subsequent resolved 4 notice of violation. WE felt that if we could quantify that 5 cost, that could be used as a justification to educate 6 [inaudible] the number of penalties that are issued without 7 affecting safety or the compliance and testing process in any 8 way.
9 So if we go on to the next graph, lo and behold, 10 [inaudible] if the correlation doesn't work, you move the data 11 points around a little bit. But we didn't have to do that 12 here. It actually fell out quite nicely.
13 But here's the number of penalties issued and here's 14 the administrative extra cost that's associated with issuing 15 and resolving those violations. It's a nice correlation. And 16 hence suggests that if we were to set as an educational goal, 17 that through education, let's reduce the number of penalties 18 that need to be issued by ten percent, this would be the 19 equivalent amount of money that would be freed up that then 20 could be targeted toward other pressing areas that we have 21 within our organizations.
22 I'm so delighted that there's so many representatives
133 1 from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission here today, because one 2 of the reasons I'm here is that I wanted to make sure that I 3 marketed the unit that we named after this, which is the Emory 4 unit, which is the dollars saved [inaudible] at standard 5 temperature and pressure.
6 Now, [inaudible] over a year for this to be called a 7 special [inaudible] definition portion of 10 CFR 20 and I guess 8 I'll need to talk with the Commissioner later about that.
9 Okay. Now, that's kind of a recap of what we did 10 before. Now, let me tell you what we've done since the last 11 time we met.
12 We noticed the different types of violations that are 13 issued and there seemed to be a common trend there. The next 14 step is really to ask the question, why, what was causing these 15 violations to be issued.
16 So let's take the third most common violation issued 17 in the State of Texas, and that's a sealed source link test.
18 What can go wrong? The problem is you either do it or you 19 never did it. You never did it ever or you didn't do at the 20 prescribed frequency.
21 The timeframe for that frequency is either a 22 regulatory limit or built into your license as a permit
134 1 condition. It could be that the documentation is incomplete 2 or, in fact, it was found leaking, which is not a violation, 3 but you didn't do the subsequent actions correctly that you're 4 supposed to.
5 Here, we can [inaudible] to categorize these root 6 causes as either a failure to execute, a frequency based issue, 7 violation of a reg or permit condition, or the [inaudible]
8 issue or the appropriate actions.
9 How many people here are familiar with a safety 10 science technique called fault tree analysis? But once you 11 start mapping this out, you, in fact, can map this thing out.
12 So if you flip on the next one here, here is the fault tree 13 analysis, with all the appropriate [inaudible] and all this 14 other stuff that goes with it for a sealed source leak test 15 violation.
16 Now, all I want you to notice here is this side is 17 the same as this side and now we're going to blow up this 18 section. Here is violation of the regulation. What happened 19 to that fault tree analysis? It could be that someone didn't 20 do the task, which would be failure to execute, they didn't 21 document it, either it was performed without documented, or it 22 was performed, but not fully documented, and that's the
135 1 [inaudible] in here.
2 The frequency is in here and then action. They found 3 it leaking, they didn't take it out of service, or perhaps they 4 didn't report it.
5 So what we decide to do is to use these events as our 6 basis for the root cause analysis. We obtained access to the 7 Bureau of Radiation Control inspection files for the year 1999 8 for the licensee. They were gracious enough to identify us as 9 a benign party, which I think is good. And we set up a 10 sampling strategy, a statistically appropriate sampling 11 strategy, went through and got the violations, quoted them, but 12 then also quoted them with these root causes applied to it, and 13 that moves on to the next slide.
14 So what did we find out? Well, what's interesting is 15 that all of the blue indicates that it was either the sole or 16 the contributing case that the reason that violation was issued 17 was failure to execute. The people didn't do what they were 18 supposed to do.
19 Now, in some cases, there may be an additional cause 20 that was tied in to these letters that were sent out, but 93 21 percent of all the letters that went out for NOV were failure 22 to execute.
136 1 Now, all of you sitting around this table are going, 2 I knew that, but what's amazing is that the regulated community 3 doesn't realize that and put yourself in their shoes. They get 4 the permit, they go through all the application process, 5 they're so happy when that thing shows up in the mail, they 6 slap it in an envelope and they see that big stack of 7 regulations and they have no idea where to even start there.
8 So they don't even know what it is they're supposed 9 to do, which is kind of interesting. So this is kind of 10 compelling information. It is that 93 percent of all the 11 violations, the identified root cause as per BRC records are 12 failure to execute.
13 Okay. So what are the implications of this? Well, 14 consider these findings within the context of the regulator's 15 common plea, which is read your permit. Do the permit-holders 16 really know what they're supposed to do? In fact, after we did 17 this whole project, it kind of dawned on me that this is why 18 VCRs flash with 12 on them.
19 Many people, all they really wanted to do was to tape 20 something. They open up the box, they plug it in, and off they 21 go and it flashes 12, because they never read the directions to 22 figure out how to set the clock.
137 1 And I think that's pretty much what we're doing.
2 We've got a lot of RSOs out there with the number 12 flashing.
3 What can be done to improve compliance? Well, I 4 think one idea might be to create easily digestible summaries 5 of the requirements inherent to the purpose and then tie it to 6 the regulations, as well. It may be that we need to modify the 7 way RSOs are trained, and there were some comments about the 8 challenges that RSOs face, before lunch.
9 And then, also, it might be a possibility to 10 restructure the permit inspection process, because if we get 11 this squared away and a lot of people's paperwork could be 12 submitted electronically, if the paperwork is not in place, 13 that may trigger on-site evaluations, and all of you are faced 14 with battles associated with finite resources, and this might 15 be something worth considering.
16 The reason I'm here today is to ask the next 17 question, and I'm so happy that there was a talk this morning 18 about this unique program about the now 30-some-odd states that 19 are now agreement states.
20 The next question for me is are the trends here 21 consistent across the country? Are their root causes 22 consistent? And could there be some basic simple
138 1 interventions?
2 I would contend that if this organization begins 3 starting the process of putting this data together now, this 4 would be a very key feature to include in this national 5 materials program to show what the outcomes are and to make 6 sure you have a coordinated effort to put interventions in 7 place to reduce those outcomes.
8 Go on to the next slide.
9 My proposal, the proposal that you can't turn down, 10 to facilitate the comparisons, here's the deal. I brought, 11 unfortunately, not enough, but this is actually, with 12 permission of the Bureau of Radiation Control, sitting in front 13 of each of the members up here at the table, and I'll get 14 copies for anybody else, if they'd like, this is the copy of 15 the coding sheet.
16 Down the left-hand column is the violation codes that 17 are used by the Bureau of Radiation Control, front and back, 18 for the NOVs issued for licensees of radioactive material.
19 Then to the right-hand side are all of those root 20 causes which we've identified.
21 We would argue that if you were to take this home and 22 think about it for a little bit, if you were willing to do so,
139 1 if you could tell us the number of licensees and the average 2 number of NOVs that are issued per permit inspection, we can 3 then provide you back with a statistically valid sampling 4 strategy and sampling methodology for the collection of the 5 data for each of your states.
6 Then all you have to do is then follow that sampling 7 strategy and complete one of these forms for each one of the 8 NOVs. Then you send it back to us and then we -- notice I put 9 "we," that's the royal sense, then I turn it over to a grad 10 student.
11 But the grad student will then summarize and analyze 12 this data for their respective research project. Then we give 13 the information back to you and then we can start looking at 14 doing some comparisons across the country, which I think would 15 be very compelling information.
16 So you've got the form in front of you and we'll have 17 time to ask questions later. I'll be happy to give everybody a 18 card, but I think this is the next step in the process.
19 Last, but not least, I think like any good marriage, 20 the spouse can't just walk around saying, oh, well, he or she 21 knows I love him. You need to say it and you need to say it 22 often. And one of the pitfalls I see in this business is we
140 1 don't say it enough to the regulated community that we're both 2 on the same pool. We both have the same objectives. We both 3 want to preserve the health and well being of our constituents.
4 I would argue that if we remind people that we're all 5 in the same ballpark, it's a good idea. By any measure, the 6 radiation safety record is excellent. Look at it compared to 7 any other health and safety program in this country. The 8 radiation safety business does a very good job and you should 9 be proud of what you're doing.
10 This success is due in part to the inspection 11 process. Love it or hate it, it benefits all of us. NOV 12 outcome data, I think, can be very valuable for prevention and 13 I think it's a very good value-added tool that you can provide 14 back to your constituents to help them minimize costs 15 associated with using the materials.
16 And then I think what we have to do is constantly 17 emphasize this common goal and then work together to achieve 18 it.
19 The last slide is some copies of some articles that 20 were written on this. I actually brought some copies up here, 21 if you're interested. But that's the last of my prepared 22 remarks. I'll be happy to answer any questions or comments
141 1 that you may have.
2 MR. CAMERON: Thanks a lot, Bob. Any questions or 3 comments for Bob about this study? And I think he would be 4 particularly interested in hearing from people about the 5 proposal that he put forward. Anybody want to start us off on 6 that? Roland. Roland Fletcher, Maryland.
7 MR. FLETCHER: Roland Fletcher, State of Maryland. I 8 don't know how many other states do it, but we have a program 9 whereby when a license is initially issued, we actually visit 10 the facility and ensure that what is in the license and 11 everyone is conforming to what they need to be doing.
12 The problems seem to come in once that first RSO 13 moves on to greener pastures and the next RSO comes in. And I 14 think -- I don't know how many other states find that problem.
15 MR. EMORY: It's like the used car salesman who says 16 I sold the car, they just didn't buy it. We go out and attempt 17 to educate, but, in fact, due to a dynamic situation or people 18 just hiding their heads because they want you to leave, I think 19 the message isn't getting all the way through.
20 MR. CAMERON: Other comments? Ed?
21 SPEAKER: Just a point of information. When you're 22 talking about a sampling set, how large are you talking?
MR.
142 1 EMORY: I actually brought the numbers from Texas, so we can 2 apply those to the upper 49 after that.
3 There are approximately 1,500 licensees of 4 radioactive materials in the State of Texas. We used a 5 one-in-six sampling strategy, which meant that it went down 6 every sixth one.
7 We got a printout of all the inspections that 8 occurred for a year and went down every sixth one. There's a 9 number of reasons why we did that. That resulted in a 10 selection of 85 files or 85 inspections which represented a 11 total of about 180 NOVs.
12 Now, Texas is a huge program, so you can scale it 13 back. I don't know what the average number of licensees you 14 have in each one of your states, but just a ballpark figure, 15 without doing the math.
16 If you have perhaps 50 or less licensees, the best 17 thing to do would be to move on, because when you sit down with 18 this form, [inaudible.] If you have over 50, you can sit down 19 and do some math and make sure that we get a representative 20 sample.
21 I did not have time to show the slide, but I can 22 assure you that our sampling strategy was representative
143 1 because the top ten that came up in that sample were identical 2 to the top ten in the order of the other ones, as well. So we 3 were right on target there.
4 MR. CAMERON: Bob, a process point. On your proposal 5 to the Organization of Agreement States, would you need back 6 from either the Organization of Agreement States or individual 7 states, for your proposal to be "accepted?" I mean, what needs 8 to be done on that?
9 MR. EMORY: Any studies that we perform at our own 10 institution, and you're probably aware of the increased 11 [inaudible] organization that was called OTRR, [inaudible] and 12 doing research studies and also includes human-provided data, 13 which is [inaudible] data.
14 So what we need is just a letter on letterhead saying 15 here is our data, you're welcome to do some evaluations on it.
16 We don't want to know about the individual permit-holder. All 17 we want to know is the summary of data.
18 And the way we work it with the bureau is that we put 19 the data together, we go back and meet with them, we go over 20 it. Anything that we wrote up, we brought to the bureau and 21 made sure we were all singing from the same songbook.
22 Again, our next step in the project is to see if what
144 1 is happening in Texas is true across the country and if so, 2 what can we do to prevent it, because there's only so much 3 money that can be put into public health and I'm sure we'd like 4 to make sure we use it right.
5 MR. CAMERON: But you wouldn't need a response 6 necessarily from all 30 agreement states, although that would 7 be -- in the NRC, that would be better. But as long as some 8 states send it back, that would be useful.
9 MR. EMORY: Yes. And I'll be around this evening, as 10 well, so I'll be happy to give anybody who needs it a card and 11 talk to you further about this. But if we can get four or five 12 states, that would be idea. That would be four or five 13 [inaudible] and one happy faculty member going for a promotion 14 [inaudible.]
15 MR. CAMERON: Ed Bailey.
16 MR. BAILEY: Just for information, and I don't know 17 who can answer this question, are the identified root causes on 18 this sheet similar or identical to the ones that are caught in 19 the NRC root cause investigation, or whatever it's called? I 20 haven't been [inaudible.]
21 MR. CAMERON: Anybody from the NRC who can answer 22 that?
145 1 MR. BAILEY: [Inaudible.] I'm afraid we'll all 2 non-workers and --
3 MR. CAMERON: Paul?
4 MR. LOHAUS: Paul Lohaus. I don't have an answer, 5 but we can certainly get one. I don't know if there's anyone 6 else here, Don possibly, you may know, but we can certainly 7 look into that.
8 MR. CAMERON: I'll put it up as an action item for us 9 here. Bill, and then Aubrey?
10 MR. DUNDULIS: Aubrey was first.
11 MR. CAMERON: Go ahead, Aubrey.
12 MR. GODWIN: I was just curious how the top ten 13 compared to [inaudible] the licensees or registrants.
14 MR. EMORY: Actually, I've got --
15 MR. GODWIN: Except for leak tests.
16 MR. EMORY: It's pretty much the same stuff, but the 17 top ten is even more compelling, because there's over 180 18 different violation codes that can be issued to the registrants 19 and the top ten reflects almost 80 percent of the violations.
20 So it's the things that you and I can intuitively 21 make, they were missing radiation inspection programs or the 22 written program, time and temperature, correcting charge, those
146 1 kinds of things. [Inaudible.]
2 SPEAKER: [Inaudible.]
3 MR. CAMERON: Bill?
4 MR. DUNDULIS: Bill Dundulis, Rhode Island. One 5 thing, and I don't know how this would mess up your statistics, 6 but some of the bigger states, like Texas and Ed's shop in 7 California, they have a very diverse population on inspections 8 that were done.
9 I think Rhode Island, the last time I checked, we had 10 about 70-odd licenses and other than some hospitals and some 11 universities and a couple of manufacturers, the rest are 12 basically like industrial gauge licenses that we may not do 13 every year and maybe every four or five years.
14 So when you get into some of the smaller state 15 programs, I don't know what -- you know, if you're going to be 16 able to generalize, because a lot of it might be governed by 17 what they had the time and manpower to inspect that year and 18 maybe a small absolute number and it may happen that this year, 19 all we did was hospitals and that may not reflect industrial 20 radiography and so forth.
21 MR. EMORY: It's interesting you mention that, 22 because up in the upper right-hand corner, we've got the
147 1 license type categorization of existing [inaudible.] But when 2 we first did this study, we attempted to segregate by license 3 type and the top never changed. It was always the same stuff.
4 But that was reassuring as far as our goal being an 5 educational tool, regardless of your setting, these were the 6 common things.
7 Another common point that's brought up when I go talk 8 to the regulated community or the academic community, they 9 argue, well, this is just reflective of inspector bias and my 10 response is that's absolutely right, that's what I want to 11 know.
12 As a permit-holder, I want to know what they're going 13 to be focusing on, so I can make sure I got my ducks in a row 14 there. There's nothing wrong with that. So some of the 15 academic folks go ballistic. They go into apoplexy over that 16 about selected bias and all this stuff, but, in fact, I think 17 that's interesting to note.
18 MR. CAMERON: Anybody in the audience that has a 19 question for Bob, or a comment? Go ahead, Ed.
20 MR. BAILEY: I think one thing that I failed to do 21 after last year's meeting was -- this is just a reminder.
22 We're developing an IP system and we need to look for capturing
148 1 this kind of information in a fairly uniform format if we're 2 going to compare apples to kiwifruit or something.
3 So states might want to look at this and see how 4 they're going to -- what they're and the NRC might want to look 5 at it, too, and see how it fits in. And then assuming that 6 Texas doesn't have a veto right over the categories.
7 So we might want to look at that and, in fact, 8 probably ought to set up some sort of committee to sort of --
9 or something to [inaudible] these categories and see if we 10 think they're appropriate.
11 I mean, some of these cover a multitude of 12 [inaudible.] So that's not all bad.
13 MR. CAMERON: All right. Well, thank you very much, 14 Bob.
15 MR. EMORY: Thank you.
16 [Applause.]
17 MR. CAMERON: All right. We have a panel that's 18 going to cover decommissioning and we have John Greeves, from 19 the NRC, Larry Camper, Ruth McBurney from Texas, and either 20 Terry Frazee and/or John Erickson from the State of Washington.
21 And I think the way this will work most efficiently 22 is to go through each panelist and then turn it over for
149 1 questions and then bring the other panelist up. And we should 2 have room, Ruth, for you up here somewhere. Okay? And our 3 first presentation of issues, including the big picture 4 overview, is John Greeves, who is the Division Director of the 5 NRC's division where decommissioning and a number of other 6 activities take place.
7 John?
8 MR. GREEVES: Thank you. How is this coming across?
9 Can you hear me? Is that a yes back there?
10 First, let me apologize a little bit for this 11 presentation. I'd like to tell you I'd be a lot better if I 12 hadn't have gone to Hank's last night for seafood. But by the 13 way, it was terrific over there. So I would highly recommend 14 that.
15 For those of you who missed it, the pecan pie was 16 wonderful. [Inaudible] to my presentation, blame it on that.
17 What I want to do is give you an overview of the 18 decommissioning process from my vantage point, from the Nuclear 19 Regulatory Commission, talk about what we've done over there in 20 a number of years.
21 I also want to go into a standard, there's been 22 discussion of setting standards here today and I call it
150 1 seeking finality.
2 The third topic I want to address is the assured 3 isolation topic that's been coming up in some of your states.
4 And I'm going to end with kind of a list of challenges that 5 Larry Camper and I [inaudible] in terms of what's out there.
6 I would like to just report on the agenda. It says 7 tomorrow I'm going to be talking about FUSRAP, and, 8 unfortunately, I won't be able to do that. Jim Kennedy is with 9 us and Jim will take that spot. I thought I got that 10 [inaudible.] He will do [inaudible] my spot on FUSRAP and Dr.
11 Paperiello I'm sure will be happy to chime in on that, so that 12 will be well covered.
13 Next slide, please.
14 Just kind of an overview of what's been going on in 15 the decommissioning arena. For about the last decade, we've 16 been getting regulations in place. Started with the 1988 17 decommissioning rule. Unfortunately, it didn't go far enough.
18 Really, it only introduced the concept of unrestricted release 19 and it didn't tell you what that was, but it did include a lot 20 of information on financial assurance, which the agreement 21 states have come along and adopted.
22 Since that timeframe, we've also gotten in place a regulation
151 1 on record-keeping, timeliness of decommissioning. I think 2 these have all helped put some discipline in the 3 decommissioning process.
4 In '94, the General Accounting Office came out with a 5 study and asked a lot of questions about, well, what is the 6 standard and how do you get to a final position. A number of 7 you were familiar with that.
8 As part of the effort over the last decade, the NRC 9 began in '94 the effort on the enhanced participatory 10 rulemaking to set a standard for decommissioning. That 11 standard actually, after a lot of stakeholder involvement and 12 dialogue with the states, was -- a notice was put in place in 13 the 1997 license termination rule.
14 Unfortunately, we lacked consensus with the 15 Environmental Protection Agency at that point in time.
16 A recent milestone that many of you may be familiar 17 with was a set of reports recently and they documented the 18 continuing disagreement in terms of where the agencies are on 19 this topic.
20 One of the topics they went into was not the standard 21 [inaudible] that some of you are familiar with, and so I 22 probably don't need to say a lot more about that.
152 1 I will give some background on where we are in terms 2 of finality.
3 Let's go to the next slide. I don't know how much 4 people are familiar with this, but upon the completion of that 5 NSC standard in '97, the agency then Chairman Jackson sent a 6 letter to Administrative Browner, with a draft MOU, to try and 7 reach some agreement on how to proceed on these sites.
8 There were also several house reports in the past 9 couple of years, the first of which was in '99, where the house 10 report recognized that the NRC standards and regulations fully 11 protect public health and safety and encouraged the 12 Environmental Protection Agency to defer to the NRC on these 13 site [inaudible.]
14 They also went on to encourage us to finish the 15 process and [inaudible] memorandum of understanding and they 16 also requested both agencies to report in May of this year.
17 Both agencies did provide a report and the 18 [inaudible] and once again, it was left with the information 19 that they were still concerned, based on the reports that they 20 had received, they stressed that the Environmental Protection 21 Agency should defer to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and, 22 in their minds, this problems is obviously not resolved.
153 1 So what they did was they directed the Administrator 2 of the Environmental Protection Agency to report on the status 3 of the MOU, [inaudible] both agencies looking at these sites, 4 identify some options. It is a regulation, is it legislation, 5 is it something else? And that report is due March 31st of 6 next year.
7 As far as the current status, the MOU is still in 8 play, but there is no closure yet. That's something I really 9 can't go any further than that, but to let you know where it is 10 at this point in time.
11 Let's move on to the [inaudible] standards. I think 12 all of you in the room are quite familiar with NRC's 13 requirements [inaudible] in license termination rule, the '97 14 rule. It is consistent with the ICRP recommendations, the NCRP 15 recommendations, also the Health Physics Society position that 16 came out in August lines up with this sort of top-down 17 approach.
18 And it's in use today. Larry Camper and his staff 19 are using this to evaluate sites and to release sites.
20 When you look at the [inaudible,] when I go to 21 meetings, I have to also address the questions, the EPA 22 guidance. EPA has no general equivocal standards. They
154 1 couldn't put out [inaudible] standards for decommissioning and 2 NRC would have to comply with those.
3 This is not fair. What they do is reference their 4 CERCLA guidance, the so-called bottom-up approach, and it 5 creates a lot of questions that I have to address and other 6 agencies, also, and [inaudible] working with your licensees.
7 The last item on the chart, there was some discussion 8 earlier this morning about standards. This is your 9 opportunity, the states are to have put in place their own set 10 of standards. They can adopt a license termination rule or 11 they can be more restrictive.
12 I've seen some results that are right in line with the license 13 termination rule that the Commission has. I've seen others 14 that use numbers like ten millirem, all pathways, four 15 millirem, ground water.
16 And it's my understanding that those are due this 17 year. I've asked a question to understand if states have 18 something in place, and I'd like to tag an action item. I'd 19 like to know where you are on putting these standards in place.
20 I have a need to know. I get a lot of questions from 21 stakeholders, well, what's the state of X doing.
22 And I would contend that you have a need to know,
155 1 also. If you have a different standard, you're going to have 2 to answer questions about that.
3 So I would challenge us to pull together and let's 4 get this list, where are [inaudible] states in this case and 5 which ones have a more restrictive approach.
6 Larry Camper is going to talk about [inaudible.] All 7 of our guidance is put in place for 25 millirem all pathways.
8 It is not a trivial exercise to revise that for a more 9 restrictive approach. It's complicated [inaudible] some 10 problems and I just would like to enter that clearly. So if 11 there's a way we can help you, we want to know where you are 12 and [inaudible.]
13 Next. Kind of an emerging issue that comes up in a 14 number of meetings that I go through around the country. The 15 topic is assured isolation. There is no regulation in our 16 space for this. The study came down, I believe, in Texas, 17 other places, [inaudible]. But whatever this is, obviously, 18 it's key to public health and safety.
19 So when you bring that forward, we need, 20 collectively, the regulators need to be able to explain how 21 does this address public health and safety issues.
22 We need a regulatory framework. It's not there, that
156 1 I know of. There is [inaudible,] what is the regulatory 2 framework.
3 Essentially, you have to explain that to the 4 stakeholders and build public confidence [inaudible.] What I 5 do, we don't have a lot of public confidence in the regulations 6 we have, so as this one comes forward, our job ought to be to 7 be able to explain that and increase public confidence.
8 We'd like to provide assistance to the states 9 regarding this in an efficient and effective manner. I'm not 10 quite sure how to do that. Maybe a meeting like this 11 [inaudible.] So I'd appreciate hearing from you.
12 The last item on the chart is the implementation of 13 the Low Level Waste Policy Act. We know how successful that's 14 been. But if you bring forward an assured isolation approach, 15 somebody is going to have to answer the question, does this 16 satisfy the Act.
17 That's just for disposal, and I know there are some 18 various views on that and maybe we can hear some today.
19 The next topic I want to do is [inaudible] trying to 20 assure the big picture, the challenges in decommissioning 21 space. This is just a partial list. [Inaudible] partial site 22 release.
157 1 I don't know how many of you followed this, but 2 Commissioner Freed was talking about parsing off a big chunk of 3 their site and there are some challenges on how you do that in 4 regulatory space, and [inaudible] is talking about that.
5 [Inaudible] ideally a piece of property, and that's a 6 real good piece of the property. There ought to be some way to 7 [inaudible.]
8 We've got materials sites that are asking questions 9 about can we separate portions of the sites. For the rule, we 10 have to come forward here, and, as mentioned, [inaudible.]
11 We're looking into it and will probably hear more about that.
12 Dose modeling. Most of the meetings I go to raise 13 the dose modeling issue and we have a tremendous drive there.
14 We've done a lot of refinement to the RESRAD code, with 15 developments in that, the coordination of the Department of 16 Energy. The D&D code also has been improved significantly and 17 I think a challenge is developing training on how to use these 18 codes.
19 The theories are simple, but I think developing a 20 training program is a topic that [inaudible] interested in.
21 The control of solid materials, I'm not going to say 22 much about that, but, again, it's one of the significant
158 1 challenges. I don't go to a meeting that people don't talk 2 about where is this, when is going to be put forward, because 3 the licensees certainly need feedback on this topic.
4 The advisory panels, I don't know how many of you are 5 involved in these. I think there is an excellent format when 6 you've got a difficult site.
7 Our experience has been some good, some not so good.
8 If you're working an advisory panel, I would very much like to 9 talk to you and share my views and my experience with the 10 challenge.
11 The last one is attendance is actually an accession, 12 where Trish Holahan is going to talk about that as an emerging 13 issue, and it's sort of [inaudible] trying to sort of what is 14 this. [Inaudible.] I'm not going to say much about it, other 15 than it's one of the challenges that we see.
16 Just as an aside, I've got about 25 sites involved 17 [inaudible.] If anybody wants to volunteer to take a few of 18 them, [inaudible] doesn't seem to want to [inaudible]
19 Anybody who gets into this business, I really would 20 like to talk to you and engage you and let you know what our 21 experience is, and Larry Camper will follow-up with kind of the 22 guidance.
159 1 MR. CAMERON: John, do you want to take some 2 questions now on the overview? I would suggest that on 3 entombment and clearance, we hold those comments until we get 4 to those sessions and perhaps assured isolation will fit better 5 into the need for questions into the waste disposal panel.
6 MR. GREEVES: I'm happy to take questions now and 7 I'll be here the rest of the day. Unfortunately, I will not 8 [inaudible.]
9 MR. CAMERON: And if you see a question that you 10 think Larry is going to address, we can save that for Larry's, 11 too. But any questions for John Greeves? He covered a lot of 12 ground.
13 SPEAKER: My question is I'd like to know where 14 people are on the standards and I think that would be a 15 valuable piece of information for all of you at the same time.
16 I'll follow-up in the next year's meeting and [inaudible] what 17 that is. There's a question up here.
18 MR. CAMERON: Go ahead, Alice.
19 MS. ROGERS: Could I suggest that you just simply 20 [inaudible] RADRAP and everybody will respond within 24 hours2.777778e-4 days <br />0.00667 hours <br />3.968254e-5 weeks <br />9.132e-6 months <br />.
21 SPEAKER: Paul is going to do that. Talk Paul into 22 it. [Inaudible.] I'm planting a seed here today.
160 1 MR. CAMERON: Well, there is an action item up here 2 to get the status of state cleanup standards and I guess it's 3 the NRC might want to think about what is the best way to get 4 that information out, either from -- Paul, do you want to 5 comment on that? Do you want to sort of stimulate that?
6 MR. LOHAUS: Paul Lohaus, NRC. Everywhere we do 7 maintain, through our regulation and assessment tracking 8 system, information on each of the states' regulations, the 9 level of detail does not go down to the actual provisions in 10 the rule.
11 So what I would suggest is either using RADRAP or ONP 12 announcements, we'll provide one or two questions. I guess the 13 first one would be do you have an effective license termination 14 rule in place, and then the second question would be if you do 15 have a rule in place, what are the specific provisions, is it 16 25 millirem or are you using an alternative [inaudible.]
17 That rule, as you're aware, it's a category C, which 18 does provide ability to establish a more restrictive standard.
19 I think those would probably be the two questions.
20 MR. CAMERON: And I guess there were some of the 21 responses that came in from the agreement states in response to 22 the Congressional that we did on the clearance issue did cover
161 1 some of these cleanup standards, but we'll look to NRC to take 2 the initiative on getting this information in.
3 All right. Carl? Carl Paperiello, from the NRC.
4 Let me -- yes, that's not going to work, Paul. I'll give you 5 this one right here.
6 MR. PAPERIELLO: [Inaudible] I have to be involved 7 with most of the discussions with the EPA and you're going to 8 hear a number of things discussed at this meeting which are 9 related, and that is the total source material.
10 We know that we're raising this issue, it's been one 11 of my favorite issues for years. We're finally going to work 12 on it. And that is, we wrote an exemption 50 years ago based 13 on national security considerations, not like the source 14 material, [inaudible.]
15 The problem is when you just look at screening, and 16 the screening numbers we have for decommissioning, that 17 corresponds for uranium and equilibrium with radium a dose of 18 about six rem a year.
19 That raises the point, if you're decommissioning, 20 somewhere between ten and 100 millirem a year, I won't get into 21 the number, it won't make any difference, I'll give you 500 22 millirem a year, and if you recognize that when you look at all
162 1 these DOE private sites, the ones that were in the USA Today a 2 couple weeks ago, I pulled them out.
3 Putting aside things like beryllium, these people all 4 handle source material. And so now the question is, I would 5 have to explain to somebody why is it, as long as they never 6 got up to .05 percent, I don't need a license, this is like 7 all over, if I want to clean up, I've got to get all the way 8 down here.
9 So there's a problem and I think we've recognized it 10 for years, except we haven't done anything about it. Now we're 11 trying to do something about it. So I think that's important.
12 Related to this is the issue of NORM, NARM and PNORM, 13 because by and large, PNORM and NORM is source material or 14 source material [inaudible] and then one has to say what is the 15 standard for that.
16 And one has to explain, if you're not going to do 17 anything about it, why is it okay -- why does the -- and this 18 is part of my argument with EPA -- why isn't the American 19 public today going to be given the same level of protection as 20 is being proposed by people ten thousand years from now at 21 Yucca Mountain or in New Mexico.
22 I'm just laying that out. It's a problem in
163 1 consistency in whatever these numbers are, how you're going to 2 explain why these numbers aren't the same.
3 MR. CAMERON: Thanks, Carl. That consistency issue 4 is an overarching issue that might be discussed at a number of 5 points in the agenda. I would note that at 3:45 tomorrow, 6 there is going to be an opportunity to discuss the Part 40 7 rulemaking that the NRC is considering and to talk about the 8 source material issue.
9 We're going to go to Larry Camper now and Larry is 10 the Branch Chief for Decommissioning in John Greeves' division 11 at the NRC, and he is going to talk about -- he's going to 12 cover a number of topics.
13 Larry?
14 MR. CAMPER: Good afternoon, thank you, Chip. As 15 John was alluding to, there's a lot going on. Actually, it's 16 27 material sites and four reactor [inaudible] right now, so a 17 lot.
18 I do have a handout of my talk. I'm not going to 19 cover every slide in the package. There's a smorgasbord 20 assigned in here, range between guidance, mobilization, 21 decommissioning modes, [inaudible,] restricted release, a lot 22 of stuff.
164 1 So obviously we don't have time to handle that, but 2 I'll be around all through the meeting and we can have 3 sideboard discussions, if you'd like to talk through, of 4 questions, I'd be happy to engage you.
5 On this slide will be the address and the telephone 6 number and, more specifically, my e-mail address, if you want 7 to call up.
8 Next slide.
9 We have been developing a lot of guidance over the 10 last three years, since the license termination rule. The 11 guidance is linked to our strategic plan. There are four major 12 goals of the strategic plan, which has been made into a 13 package.
14 There have been 16 of these guidance documents, in 15 fact, the most recent being our standard review plan. We have 16 also some reviews of the license termination plans at this 17 point and we'll share with you some of the observations 18 [inaudible] for reactors.
19 A lot of stakeholder involvement along the way; for 20 example, a lot of workshops we conducted in developing the 21 standard review plan.
22 Give you some idea of how we think it's going in
165 1 terms of licensing. Utilizing the guidance, and, finally, work 2 we foresee in the future that we need to do.
3 Next slide. NUREG-1700 was the guidance document for 4 the reactor license termination plan. We conduct an acceptance 5 review process, whether it be for LTP or for the nuclear plant 6 and materials space. We try to do this 30 days from the time 7 we actually docket the receipt of the LPT and we do it to look 8 at the adequacy of the submission, not the accuracy or the 9 totality of all the information, but whether or not all of the 10 key points are addressed.
11 We did reject two license termination plans 12 previously, that being from [inaudible.] We have now accepted 13 two, rather than one, as the slide says, but the two are Maine 14 Yankee and Connecticut Yankee.
15 And then ultimately, in the case of Trojan and 16 [inaudible,] when they came back around, they also passed the 17 acceptance review and now we have four LPTs under review.
18 Next slide. In terms of why were the acceptance 19 reviews not accepted, why were they rejected the first pass. A 20 site characterization was not sufficiently detailed. There 21 wasn't an adequate description of the extent and nature of 22 radiological contamination, for example. The plant's future
166 1 decommissioning activities were specifically not detailed 2 enough.
3 The plans for the final survey were typically 4 inadequate. They were not along the lines of MARSSIM, if you 5 will, and justification level [inaudible] was not adequate 6 detailed.
7 Decommissioning costs were not sufficiently detailed.
8 In some cases, we had nothing more than [inaudible] that we got 9 from the SDAR. And there was full supporting justification for 10 some of the [inaudible.]
11 Now, some of these kinds of findings occur on the 12 materials side of the house, if you will, not just on the 13 reactor side of the house. So particularly [inaudible]
14 characterization.
15 Next slide. We have the reviews underway at this 16 point in time. So it's a work in progress. We are finding, 17 though, that we are going to have to go back to the licensees, 18 the four LPTs, for additional information. It appears that 19 there are going to be two RAIs and this, to a large degree, is 20 because of site characterization issues and modeling questions.
21 Reactor license termination plans are not simple 22 documents. They are probably about that thick and [inaudible.]
167 1 We'd like to be able to get them through one RAI. We 2 find that to be very difficult. There are fundamental flaws in 3 them, I've already cited what those are. But we're going to 4 try to be very proactive in the license termination, by holding 5 meetings with the licensees just after providing the RAI and 6 before they provide their response to the RAI, to make sure 7 they thoroughly understand what our questions are and what's on 8 our mind, and put together a better response.
9 Next slide. We did finalize the standard review 10 plans for decommissioning in July. We sent a memo up to the 11 Commission saying that we had completed the document. We were 12 given a great deal of direction by the Commission, and that's 13 [inaudible] of things they wanted to see in that SRP 14 [inaudible] to address all those issues.
15 Again, this is a very thick document. It was 16 designed for materials licensees. It does have some 17 applicability to reactor licensees, but primarily the 18 decommissioning for materials sites.
19 I think it will be very useful to you in the agreement states 20 as you examine decommissioning plans prepared by your licensees 21 [inaudible] your licensees, as well.
22 This document was developed, as I mentioned earlier,
168 1 with a great deal of stakeholder input, a lot of input, in 2 fact, from this organization, the CRCPD, the [inaudible] to 3 develop this.
4 And we think it's the right way to develop a guidance 5 document. It is a bounding document. It's designed for a very 6 complex site. Licensees are to adjust the input, the level and 7 nature of the input, according to the complexity of their 8 particular site, and it does call for a lot of interaction with 9 the licensees and the public beginning early in the process.
10 This document, we informed the Commission in July 11 that thee staff is going to start using this document in 12 September. The Commission didn't have a problem with that. We 13 are now putting the document in terms of a NUREG and placed on 14 the web. It will be NUREG-1727, when it's available, and we 15 would hope that would be sometime this month.
16 Also, I provided you an agenda for a workshop that's 17 going to take place actually the 8th and 9th of November, 18 that's what the agenda says, not the 7th and 8th. It's going 19 to be held at the NRC Headquarters. The purpose of the 20 workshop is to familiarize our licensees with the license 21 termination rule, standards of that rule, all the guidance, the 22 process the staff uses in viewing license termination plans,
169 1 decommissioning plans.
2 We want to share with licensees lessons learned to 3 date from the LPTs. We have invited a very interesting 4 cross-section of participants for stakeholder discussion.
5 We've invited representatives from the nuclear power industry, 6 materials industry, NEI, Organization of Agreement States has 7 been invited, as well as a number of intervenors, and 8 particularly intervenors from the northeast that have been very 9 active in attending and raising concern at decommissioning 10 public meetings for reactor license termination plans.
11 So it promises to be a very interesting discussion.
12 It will be two full days in the auditorium of the NRC 13 Headquarters and we'd love to have you there. [Inaudible] so 14 we invite you to come on down.
15 Next slide. So how is it going with the guidance?
16 What are we seeing? Well, we're experiencing what I call 17 regulation growth. We've got two new rules on the books, the 18 '96 reactor decommissioning rule, the '97 license termination 19 rule, and as with every rule, whether it be one of our rules or 20 one of yours, [inaudible.] We're seeing that with these two 21 [inaudible.]
22 I think there has been a timing needs and expectation
170 1 [inaudible] if you will. When we put this rule, the license 2 termination rule on the books in '97, the Commission said 3 [inaudible] currently develop all the guidance that you can. I 4 think similarly license termination plans have been planned or 5 initiated prior to the availability of all this guidance.
6 So I think some of it is mismatched, but that's 7 getting better.
8 The licensees are gaining experience and we're 9 gaining experience and as I mentioned, we now have four LTP, 10 two were rejected initially, two were acceptable, two came back 11 around, we now have four.
12 So we're all [inaudible] and I think it's time that 13 [inaudible.]
14 Some adjustments are needed. We have found some 15 areas in the modeling guidance, some of our guidance and 16 modeling guidance is overly conservative. [Inaudible] and we 17 are working in the Office of Research to make some of those 18 kinds of changes, and it's clearly one of Carl's pet areas. We 19 are working on that aggressively.
20 So overall, how is it going? I think pretty much 21 [inaudible] given that we have two new rules to implement.
22 It's not bad really and it's getting better on our part and on
171 1 the licensees' part.
2 Next slide. We have some work to do. We have, at 3 this point, some 16, 17, 18 documents that deal with 4 decommissioning. There's a lot of information available for 5 our licensees.
6 The problem is it's contained in many, many different 7 documents. We are initiating a project now where over the next 8 two years, we will consolidate all of the guidance.
9 While we are consolidating, we are also struggling.
10 It's not limited to evaluating, to make it is risk-informed and 11 performance-oriented as we can.
12 We think we've done a good job of getting the 13 guidance out there. Now we want to go back and make sure that 14 we've given the licensees as much flexibility as possible, that 15 [inaudible] performance-oriented as possible [inaudible]
16 risk-informed.
17 So we're consolidating and doing that type of 18 analysis. Our vision is to have a decommissioning rule, 19 probably three or four volumes, on the shelf [inaudible.]
20 Two years after the SRP is on the book, we are 21 charged with going back and looking at it and the lessons 22 learned, updating it and making it as user-friendly as
172 1 possible.
2 Along the way in doing all this, we want to try to 3 try to break the barrier as much as possible, industry and NRC 4 and agreement state interaction as we work our way through this 5 guidance.
6 The guidance consolidation and scrubbing process, 7 we'll follow the process that we used before in our NUREG-1556.
8 There were a number of agreement state participants, managers 9 and staff, in that process. We'd like to bring that kind of 10 expertise to bear again. I think that will be interesting to 11 do, because by that point in time, we'll have a license 12 termination rule or something like the current decommissioning 13 criteria in the regulation.
14 You will have experiences and observations to bring 15 to bear as well, so that will be helpful to us.
16 So I want to conclude just by saying that there's a 17 lot going on in decommissioning today. I think John will lead 18 into that.
19 Our role has a great deal of Commission interest, 20 [inaudible] with the Commission. There is a tremendous amount 21 of industry interest, especially on the reactor side in that 22 decommissioning power plants is an expensive proposition and
173 1 the industry is trying to find cost-effective ways to meet the 2 license termination rule, which is a dose-based standard, while 3 [inaudible.]
4 Mobilization, as I said, I'll be happy to talk to 5 some of you about that [inaudible.] The mobilization standard 6 talks about [inaudible.]
7 Those are most of the comments I wanted to share with 8 you today. I'll be around [inaudible] if there are questions 9 on the distribution. And in your package that I provided that 10 to you, I did provide information on implementation, but also 11 on [inaudible.]
12 So with that, I'll conclude.
13 MR. CAMERON: Thank you, Larry. Larry covered an 14 number of implementation issues. Questions or comments for 15 Larry on any of those topics that he addressed?
16 SPEAKER: We can't let Larry get by without 17 questions.
18 MR. CAMERON: I didn't think so.
19 MR. CAMPER: I knew you were not going to do that.
20 MR. CAMERON: Ed?
21 MR. BAILEY: Ed Bailey, California. We are -- well, 22 when I get back in a week or so, we're going to have a public
174 1 hearing on the D&B decommissioning rule and we have been -- we 2 know we're going to have one what you term intervenor, a man 3 named Dan Hirsch. Some of the others of you know him.
4 Would NRC be willing to support states in their 5 public hearings on these regulations and coming and testifying 6 as to how these numbers are derived and the justification and 7 so forth for them?
8 Because the question, quite frankly, Mr. Hirsch has 9 brought up already is why we do not, California does not step 10 out ahead of NRC and reduce that dose limit down to a 11 ten-to-the-minus-six risk.
12 And as we heard earlier today, category C 13 compatibility. So, in fact, in my interpretation, we can -- we 14 could go and put it in simply as ten-to-the-minus-six rather 15 than the 25 millirem.
16 MR. CAMPER: Your first question, can we respond, 17 yes. Please give us some advance warning. We have had, a 18 couple of times, one or two day advanced requests, which 19 created a problem for us. [Inaudible] has responded to those 20 kinds of requests in the past. We'd appreciate a little bit of 21 heads-up.
22 MR. BAILEY: Okay. You've got it. I just don't know
175 1 the date.
2 MR. CAMPER: The second one was you're thinking of 3 maybe doing ten-to-the-minus-six risk and I'd like to talk to 4 you about that a little more. Ten-to-the-minus-six risk 5 [inaudible] it's going to be very difficult to pin that down.
6 In fact, it's --
7 People in the room who have worked in the EPA CERCLA 8 approach know this is not a ten-to-the-minus-six approach. It 9 varies by many orders of magnitude and, in fact, exceeds 10 ten-to-the-minus-four.
11 When we come and talk to those groups, we will tell 12 them what we did, about our rule, and that it is adequate 13 protection of public health and safety. I'd like to talk to 14 you about the ten-to-the-minus-six.
15 SPEAKER: [Inaudible.]
16 SPEAKER: Let me just amplify. In our system of 17 public hearings on regulation, quite often, one person standing 18 up and being opposed to something, when it goes to our Office 19 of Administrative Law, there being no testimony to the 20 contrary, they will think it, being primarily lawyers, as 21 gospel and, therefore, suggest that we, in fact, adopt it, 22 because no one was opposed to it being adopted.
176 1 SPEAKER: You are well aware now, with ICRP 2 recommendations that just came out recently in that range, 3 maybe one, maybe two, [inaudible] position, but this came out.
4 NRC's rule, the background that we did on the GEIS, all that 5 [inaudible] 25 millirem all pathways and [inaudible.]
6 SPEAKER: Thank you.
7 MR. CAMERON: And, John and Larry, I've put an action 8 item up there for the NRC on testimony in support.
9 SPEAKER: We've done that before.
10 MR. CAMERON: All right. Aubrey, do you have one 11 comment?
12 MR. GODWIN: Godwin, Arizona. The problem is that's 13 not in the record and sometimes it takes someone other than the 14 staff to put that into the record. And it's nice to say all 15 these documents are out there, but as far as the lawyers and as 16 [inaudible] concerned, if it wasn't said in that hearing or 17 wasn't written in by somebody, it doesn't exist.
18 But like some judges do, that do a very narrow 19 reading, and it's very difficult.
20 SPEAKER: You know what's going on in your state, so 21 you need to create those, document them and get it into the 22 record. Put it in there yourself [inaudible.]
177 1 SPEAKER: Ed, on your comment, we have -- I've been 2 in a number of public meetings where we've taken some pretty 3 serious heat as far as why don't you move to the 15 millirem 4 instead of four millirem approach.
5 So as John is saying, be able to participate and 6 explain the basis for Commission's 25 millirem all pathway, I 7 hope, would enhance public confidence. I think that's what 8 really suffers here with these detailed approaches.
9 MR. CAMERON: All right. Anybody out here in the 10 audience have questions or comments before we move to Ruth 11 McBurney?
12 SPEAKER: I want to make, again, an observation. I 13 go back for Ray. Ray, the EPA value for radium, if you take a 14 look at that, is .013 pico curies per gram. We know where that 15 stands relative to natural background.
16 If you go to this new .gov, great, I finally found 17 the EPA web site for all their records of decision. If you 18 look at their records of decision on radium, it happens to be 19 five pico curies per gram. So essentially what is done is not 20 what is said.
21 And how we can manipulate, I can understand your 22 problem. This is one where we have to -- as Ben Franklin said,
178 1 either we hang together or hang separately.
2 And I think it's a moot point. We need to support 3 you in your hearings. Other agreement states need to support 4 you in your hearings. We all need to support each other.
5 MR. CAMERON: And that web site that Carl just 6 mentioned is a new web site that the Federal Government set up 7 that ties together a lot of individual agency and other Federal 8 sites and if you're interested in more on that, we'll get the 9 web site address and put it up there. We'll definitely do 10 that.
11 SPEAKER: Firstgov.gov.
12 MR. CAMERON: Firstgov, all one word.
13 SPEAKER: Yes. One word. Firstgov.gov, and it's 14 [inaudible] all the Federal agencies.
15 MR. CAMERON: And it's supposedly a super-fast 16 response, right?
17 SPEAKER: I had no problem with it.
18 MR. CAMERON: All right. Let's go to Ruth McBurney, 19 and Ruth is going to talk about financial assurance case 20 studies and Ruth is the Division Director of the Division of 21 Licensing and Administration Standards in the Texas Program.
22 Ruth?
179 1 MS. McBURNEY: Thank you. What I'm going to be 2 talking about this afternoon is the money in decommissioning, 3 financial security, what happens when there's not enough, those 4 existing licensees, some of which are approaching bankruptcy, 5 end-of-life situations.
6 I'm not here to share dirty laundry, but bring about 7 some issues that if you haven't faced in your state, you may in 8 the future.
9 Most of our licensees that require financial security 10 are pretty straightforward, such as irradiators and 11 [inaudible.] But when you start getting into the 12 decommissioning funding plans, it's not an exact science.
13 There's a lot of controversy, emotions get involved, 14 and the level of effort that the staff has to put into these is 15 quite high.
16 We have a lot of opposing forces going on, not only 17 the licensees and us, but also landowners and so forth, and 18 politics get involved.
19 So if you haven't had some of these situations, tell 20 us how you're avoiding it. It's really been a lot of 21 time-consuming effort in securing some of these facilities and 22 making sure that the state doesn't have to pay for a big
180 1 cleanup.
2 I'm using the Perry Mason type of titles to describe 3 the three situations that I will be talking about.
4 Unfortunately, we don't have Perry Mason to win every case, but 5 hopefully they'll all turn out okay.
6 The first case I call "The Case of the Missing 7 Management." This is an in situ uranium company that's in 8 decommissioning. The management, which is probably -- there 9 are names on [inaudible] that they've pretty much gone out of 10 the picture.
11 The type of security we had and still have a part of, 12 it was a trust that was set aside to provide for the 13 decommissioning of the facility, and when we first got it, it 14 was $17 million in that trust for closure of two sites.
15 Next slide. The [inaudible] the ground water 16 restoration has been completed. This is for a vendor, the 17 Texas Natural Resource Conservation Commission, and they have 18 jurisdiction for the ground water and the flooding and 19 abandonment of the well. That part has been completed.
20 The surface remediation, however, has not been 21 completed. As a part of this, as this was done, the trust 22 company released money at the direction of the regulatory
181 1 agency. So there is now only 1.2 million dollars left in the 2 trust to complete remediation.
3 As said before, the company is essentially defunct.
4 These are some pictures of one of the sites. You will see 5 piles of rubble. What has happened is they moved a lot of the 6 material from one of the sites over to another site.
7 So the first site is almost completely remediated, 8 but they just moved the problem over to the other site. We'll 9 go through that and look through these pictures.
10 Some of our attorneys, who went down there and 11 visited the site [inaudible] made several calls on the material 12 on the second site.
13 Okay. What has happened thus far is that the company 14 now has no other access, other than what is in this trust.
15 They have told another company, which is essentially one 16 person, that they would give him the rest of what was in the 17 trust if he would remediate the site, do the decommissioning.
18 So he is essentially trying to get it done as cheaply 19 as possible so he can make a little money on it.
20 In 1999, we got a letter stating that the sites were 21 clean. We sent down a crew and found that that was not the 22 case at all. There was excess contamination still there.
182 1 We got letters from their Washington attorney, saying 2 this is just my mine waste that's still there; therefore, it is 3 NORM. It is not -- so it doesn't have to meet the 515 standard 4 for radium that a uranium facility would.
5 And we said, no, our rules say that you must meet the 6 515 standard for radium, since this was a uranium facility.
7 We also found that there was a possible inappropriate 8 use of the trust fund. They had filed that they had spent 9 money for disposal at one of the Uranium Tailings facilities.
10 We got a letter from Uranium Tailings Company that they had not 11 been paid.
12 Somehow they were using the money for something else 13 other than for the disposal. So we've done an audit of a lot 14 of the past expenditures and have refused to reimburse them 15 until we see additional progress made in the cleanup.
16 One of the things in the trust agreement is that we 17 can call in the financial security if we find that the site is 18 abandoned. We thought that the site was abandoned, because no 19 work was being done for a certain length of time. They said, 20 no, it's not abandoned, we've been by there to look at it.
21 We've taken a few samples. We've moved this material over to 22 this other site.
183 1 So the company has requested the trustee to release 2 the money to them. The trustee said no, not unless the agency 3 says that it can be released.
4 TEH, in turn, has asked the trustee to release the 5 funds to TEH, since we thought the site was abandoned. The 6 trustee said no. You must take it to the courts, because of 7 the controversy.
8 So we have asked for assistance from the Texas 9 Attorney General's office on this case.
10 Some of the recent activities that we've had with 11 this, in August 2000, company B, the cleanup crew, who is also 12 named on the license as the radiation safety officer, came in 13 with a new attorney and a new proposal to us that if we would 14 release about a third of the remaining trust to them, they 15 would do a little bit of work, remove the concrete, if it was 16 clean and if it was not -- do some testing, and so forth, and 17 then plan to plow in the remainder to get it to 515.
18 And they gave us a work plan that seemed way out of 19 whack with what actual dollars would do. About -- they were 20 saying give us about 400,000 out of this trust fund and we'll 21 do some of this work. And we said, no, what you're proposing, 22 the amount you're proposing to do is only -- was probably less
184 1 than 40,000.
2 So we were way off from their estimates on what 3 should be done for the money and we wanted the radioactive 4 material removed and sent for disposal.
5 If they planned to do anything alternative, it's 6 going to take a process or we're really going to have to look 7 at it more carefully.
8 So we have now referred this whole matter to the 9 Attorney General's office for action against this company and 10 their attorney is continuing now to try to negotiate with the 11 Attorney General's office. So that's where we are with that 12 one.
13 The second case is what we call "The Case of the 14 Faltering Finances." This is an in situ facility that was 15 operational and, as you know, [inaudible] slowed down. But 16 they were in near bankruptcy. The type of financial security 17 that they have is a bond with a guaranty company, the total 18 amount which is about six million dollars, about four million 19 dollars of which they have -- that the company has in 20 collateral with the bonding company.
21 The bonds are held by both the Texas Department of 22 Health and the Texas Natural Resources Conservation Commission,
185 1 since [inaudible] has the regulatory authority over the 2 underground injection, which is involved in in situ mining, and 3 -- but we hold the bond for the ground water restoration, which 4 is still under the regulatory jurisdiction of the NRC.
5 This is a picture of one of the facilities that 6 they're planning on remediating. This is what an in situ 7 mining facility looks like.
8 They came to us in May with a proposal in order to 9 stay in business and continue restoration with a four-pronged 10 agreement that would last for 18 months between the uranium 11 company, the bonding company, Texas Department of Health, and 12 the NRCC.
13 In this proposal, the bonding company would release 14 collateral back to the company that they could spend for like a 15 quarter of a year on restoration activities.
16 At the end of that quarter, the Department of Health 17 would reduce the bond dollar for dollar for the amount that 18 they had spent during that quarter.
19 It would be based on an approved budget. In 20 addition, in order to keep the company in business, or the 21 administrative part of the business, they were receiving --
22 were to receive additional investment from other outside
186 1 stockholders, but it was only if the agreement on the 2 restoration went through.
3 At the end of the 18 months, we would review then the 4 status of the company and what was going on in the uranium 5 industry, to see if they could still stay in business at that 6 time.
7 Next slide. The advantages of this proposal are that 8 the company can accomplish restoration more economically.
9 TNRCC [inaudible] has estimated that if we were -- if they were 10 to go bankrupt and call in the bond and the first part of that 11 would be restoration of the ground water and that would be 12 under the TNRCC.
13 But in order for them to evaluate what was going on, 14 part of that contract, to call in outside contractors to do it, 15 it would cost two to three times as much.
16 The second advantage is the company could avoid 17 bankruptcy, continue in business, and proceeding with 18 restoration and that restoration could proceed more rapidly.
19 If we had to stop, call in the bond, it would be a 20 period of time in which nothing would be done, for the state to 21 take over and get the outside contractors to continue with 22 restoration.
187 1 Some of the disadvantages, some of the local activist 2 groups and commissioners in the local area, they don't like the 3 company. They would just as soon them go out of business.
4 And of course, there is a risk that the state is 5 taking in reducing that financial security during the next 18 6 months, and [inaudible] future for the uranium industry and for 7 the company.
8 The agreement was signed by TVA and TNRCC on the 15th 9 of September. Since there was a delay in getting some of the 10 language on the bond reduction letter, that was an attachment 11 to the agreement. That was finally agreed to September 28th.
12 But now we're having to discuss the process over it 13 to understand on the signing and in the meantime, Texas 14 Department of Health received a letter, a commissioner has 15 received a letter from a state senator from the region, asking 16 for a face-to-face meeting with that commissioner. So we 17 [inaudible] and why we believe it's the best route to go.
18 Under the -- there's now a new local TNRCC inspector 19 that will be going out mores frequently to see that restoration 20 is proceeding expeditiously, and we've agreed to go ahead and 21 reduce the bonds the first quarter while we're waiting for the 22 agreement to go through.
188 1 So we're not sure yet, but hopefully we'll get that 2 resolved this week.
3 The third case is called "The Case of the Reluctant" 4 [inaudible.] This is our licensee with two licenses. One is a 5 waste processing license, one is a [inaudible] license.
6 And it's hard to forget what the amount is for 7 [inaudible] decommissioning funding plan, since somebody is 8 authorized for atomic numbers three to 83 and [inaudible.]
9 And three to 83 can include things like iodine-129, 10 which is not comparable, they don't tend to have as much of 11 that as they are authorized for.
12 The type and the manner of the current security was 13 started with the waste processing license. Currently $133,518.
14 So we asked, when the new decommissioning rules went into 15 effect for other types of licenses, and also we put them in our 16 waste processing licenses, [inaudible] decommissioning funding 17 plan estimate.
18 And the license first applied under the waste license 19 renewal. In their renewal application they said no security 20 appears to be needed. We said that's all [inaudible.] So they 21 came back in 1997 with an estimate of $155,732, and we said 22 that's not acceptable either.
189 1 So in 1998, they came back with another estimate of 2 $304,632 and finally in 1999, they came in with $436,000.
3 We were asked -- since we got the attorneys involved 4 in this, to give our [inaudible] of business. They were 5 estimating based on what they had on hand at the time. We were 6 basing our estimate on what they were authorized to have, and 7 our estimate came in more like 17 million.
8 A little more of the history of this, financial 9 security has been applied for waste licenses since 1983, but 10 that was before the NRC and agreement states did the financial 11 security requirement across the board.
12 In 1990, the license condition required $225,000, but 13 they were to build up funds as they accepted radioactive waste.
14 It never did get built up at the 133,000.
15 And in 1995, the new financial security rules 16 [inaudible] went into effect. The waste licenses is under time 17 limit. They were issued a notice of violation in 1996 for 18 failure to have the required amount of financial security and a 19 site decommissioning plan.
20 The company said that they had provided financial 21 assurance and a decommissioning plan. It was not acceptable.
22 We sent them a letter regarding the requirements for financial
190 1 security for the manufacturing license and have issued 2 additional notices of violations and escalated those violations 3 that [inaudible] a severity level.
4 We had a meeting at the facility a couple years ago 5 to discuss the requirements. They did finally revise the 6 decommissioning and financial plan and we found that 7 inadequate.
8 As I mentioned earlier, they were basing it on what 9 they had, we were basing it on what they were authorized.
10 In addition, their hourly labor rates were something 11 like $13 an hour and while checking with outside contractors, I 12 think they were charging a little bit more than that for health 13 physics technician work.
14 They had not submitted any additional financial 15 security. So in December of '98, we referred it to the 16 Attorney General's office and we had another meeting with the 17 licensee, with the AT person, and suggested a tiered approach, 18 that they provide financial security for maybe the amount that 19 they normally have on-hand and then if they want higher 20 authorization, it would go through us [inaudible] financial 21 security.
22 They did not comply with that request, to change
191 1 their license to request that.
2 So we are preparing a letter to the licensee, this 3 agency [inaudible.] The intent is to propose to deny 4 [inaudible] in the rule and modify the manufacturing license if 5 they don't come back with [inaudible] amount that -- or a 6 proposal to change the license.
7 Some of the issues involved in this are really 8 difficult to resolve, namely the disputes we have over the 9 funding amount. I was talking with Mike Mobley, who is the 10 head of the Tennessee program, what they require is that rather 11 than the licensee sending in a decommissioning and funding 12 plan, that they actually get [inaudible] third party 13 [inaudible] to resolve some of that, how much they say versus 14 we say, so we don't have to go through and actually do all the 15 research and find out how much it's going to cost.
16 Another issue is the assumptions that you make when 17 you're doing a decommissioning funding plan. What do you do 18 about [inaudible] receive waste. There's no place for it to 19 go. It's not going to cost anything, so forth.
20 We did a survey [inaudible.] This is the 21 decommissioning funding plan on what they're authorized and 22 what they have, and those people are saying what they're
192 1 authorized [inaudible.] So that helps support our case.
2 And then accounting for this atomic number of three 3 to 83, as I mentioned earlier, [inaudible.] If you take that 4 into account on this level of politics and really [inaudible]
5 way up.
6 The other issue, the final issue is the timing and 7 doing cost estimates. Most of our HPs aren't really trained in 8 where to go to get the information that they need [inaudible]
9 with these estimates.
10 So I guess one way to do that is to actually get a 11 third party that is in the business of it to actually 12 [inaudible.]
13 One of the other comments I got from one of the other 14 places, that once the funding is called in, that getting --
15 being able to use that money for outside contractors is really 16 difficult through the state system, because they've had 17 experience with that part of it.
18 So these are just things to think about and I'll be 19 happy to answer any questions.
20 MR. CAMERON: Ruth, do you mind if we go to the case 21 of the belly-up bonding?
22 MS. McBURNEY: No.
193 1 MR. CAMERON: And then a quick round of questions for 2 both you and John, since these are all case studies.
3 This is John Erickson, with some more about financial 4 issues, and John is the Director of the Division of Radiation 5 Protection Program in the State of Washington.
6 Then we'll have a quick round of questions and set up 7 the break and the poster session for you.
8 MR. ERICKSON: Good afternoon. I actually just have 9 a couple real quick comments on the belly-up bonding company.
10 But before I do, I thought I would tell you a little bit about 11 Washington's standard-setting role in the last year or two.
12 We have a 25 millirem standard. We set the standard 13 on April 16 this year. We have the same stakeholder 14 involvement. It was mostly non-controversial. We had a lot of 15 input to say set it at 15. We had comments suggesting 16 ten-to-the-minus-six.
17 We have a state cleanup regulation that says 18 ten-to-the-minus-five. We considered setting it lower than 25, 19 but under our Governor's order, we would have to do a 20 cost-benefit analysis to show it was getting somewhere by doing 21 it and we knew where that was going to go, so we set the 22 standard at 25.
194 1 We're this close to settlement on it. Basically, it 2 will just stand the way it is, with some words and some 3 guidance [inaudible.]
4 We still use 15 at Hanford. There is no argument 5 from EPA on the 25 or the 15. Our state cleanup organization 6 in Washington is the State Department of Ecology, has had 7 problems and they continuously use ten-to-the-minus-five, but 8 they're also this close to saying, nah, let's go ahead and do 9 it.
10 So that's kind of where we are on that, where we 11 stand on that.
12 The belly-up bonding company. My story is really 13 short. It's a uranium milling facility, the early '80s, a 14 young company, just starting out, got a bond from them, the 15 bond crossed out of the [inaudible] market looked a little 16 shaky. We said no problem, Governor, we got a bond. The 17 Secretary of State's Office says fine and dandy, you've got a 18 bond. The company bailed. The bonding company went belly-up.
19 Nothing we could do to get any of the funds. The 20 bonding company was a New York bonding company. I think we 21 tried to go to the State of New York and squeeze the money out 22 of the state.
195 1 We were too far down the list. We had to pay for the 2 decommissioning ourselves.
3 The good news is the company only manufactured about 4 one barrel of [inaudible.] But it still cost us about a 5 quarter of a million dollars to clean it up and a number of 6 years, mostly done by our staff. End of story.
7 MR. CAMERON: All right. Thanks, John. I heard some 8 lessons on financial assurance. Do we have questions for 9 either Ruth or John on either individual case studies or 10 generic issues here? Aubrey.
11 MR. GODWIN: Godwin, Arizona. In the case of 12 Washington, did the bonding company go belly-up before or after 13 the uranium company went belly-up? I want to make sure I've 14 got the order down.
15 MR. ERICKSON: I think --
16 MR. GODWIN: You would have had not a prayer to do 17 anything because they were still solvent when you started 18 asking for money, then they declared bankruptcy.
19 MR. ERICKSON: Right.
20 MR. GODWIN: Thank you.
21 MR. CAMERON: Other questions? Yes, Roland.
22 MR. FLETCHER: Roland Fletcher, Maryland. When you
196 1 start looking for those third parties, make sure you get a good 2 list of credentials, because there's not a whole lot of 3 experience out here and be very careful.
4 MR. CAMERON: Anybody out in the audience? Richard, 5 go ahead.
6 SPEAKER: One of the questions or what happened also 7 is on the NRC rule where it allows insurance policies, and yet 8 it appears that the insurance is not something that NRC would 9 allow someone to turn in. I need to kind of verify that, 10 because that's a problem we have. They have insurance, but the 11 insurance gets so complicated, the insurance companies don't 12 want to notify before they make changes to the policy.
13 We've had a real hard time working with them. So it 14 still, in NRC, is an acceptable method of financial security.
15 MR. CAMERON: Larry, do you want to respond?
16 SPEAKER: This insurance is [inaudible.] It turns 17 out that [inaudible.] We actually conduct -- as I say, even 18 though [inaudible] regulation, the experience and use of it 19 [inaudible] used in conjunction with or associated with a 20 pre-established trust. [Inaudible.]
21 MR. CAMERON: All right. Thank you. We're ready to 22 take a break now and I'm going to ask Dennis Sollenberger to
197 1 tell us about the NRC poster session, and we're going to try to 2 make up a little bit of time by having a 20 minute break 3 instead of a half-hour break.
4 I just wanted to take the opportunity to introduce a 5 colleague of mine from the NRC, Brooke Poole. Brooke is with 6 the Office of General Counsel and she is the new attorney on 7 agreement state issues for the NRC.
8 So you might want to take an opportunity during the 9 break or at the reception to brainwash her -- I mean, introduce 10 yourself and tell her the agreement state perspectives.
11 Brooke is an excellent attorney and I think she'll be 12 a real resource for both the NRC and the agreement states.
13 Dennis, do you want to talk about the poster session?
14 MR. SOLLENBERGER: Just real quick. We have a poster 15 up here on the wall and some literature on the table. What 16 this is, is a number of years ago, we sent some letters out to 17 the states talking about the formerly licensed sites from NRC 18 who worked at Oak Ridge and we were looking at ways to -- one, 19 the Commission said it was an agreement state responsibility to 20 follow-up on these sites, since you had the jurisdiction for 21 regulating these materials in your states, and then we went 22 back and did several papers on the program and the Commission
198 1 eventually approved a grant program to assist those states that 2 still had sites to be cleared up.
3 This is the presentation of the logic on a grant 4 program. We have money in this fiscal year, which started 5 yesterday. It's in the budget, although I haven't heard if 6 Congress has approved our budget yet, in the amount of 1.65 7 million, and it's a phased grant program and Kevin Shea, who 8 has done a lot of the work putting this together, and myself 9 will be here during the break, for those states that are 10 interested, and we'll walk through the phased grant program 11 that we've developed in this plan.
12 MR. CAMERON: That's terrific. Dennis and Kevin will 13 be right over here. Let's be back at 3:20 and we'll start out 14 with Trish Holahan.
15 [Recess.]
16 MR. CAMERON: We're going to go to what is called 17 other decommissioning issues now, and we have Trish Holahan 18 with us, who is the Branch Chief of the Rulemaking and Guidance 19 Branch, in Don Cool's Division of Industrial and Medical 20 Nuclear Safety.
21 Trish is going to talk about two issues, entombment 22 and the so-called clearance rule, so-called clearance,
199 1 so-called rule, I guess.
2 I'm going to ask her to cover both of those and then 3 we'll for questions, and then we're going to have a 4 presentation on ISCORS and you don't see John Greeves on your 5 agenda, but John is the co-chair, he's the NRC chair for 6 ISCORS. So he's going to give a little introduction and he'll 7 talk about that.
8 I'll turn it over to Trish.
9 MS. HOLAHAN: Thank you, Chip. There is a handout 10 going around, and I apologize if there are not enough. Let me 11 know if you didn't get one and you want one, and we'll make 12 sure that I get one to you.
13 The other thing is the slides and the handout cover 14 both the two talks today, as well as what we're going to talk 15 about tomorrow.
16 The first issue that I'm going to talk about is 17 entombment and the next slide says what is entombment. Well, 18 entombment was first discussed in concept in the 1988 19 decommissioning rule, which John Greeves mentioned earlier, and 20 in that, they addressed some alternatives, which include decon, 21 safe store.
22 So entombment was considered to be a decommissioning
200 1 option in which the radioactive contaminants are encased in a 2 structurally long-lived material, such as concrete, and then 3 the entombment structure is appropriately maintained and 4 surveillance would be continued until the radioactivity decays 5 to such a level that the license could be terminated and the 6 site released for unrestricted release.
7 I think you heard John mention as to whether or it is 8 it a decommissioning option or is it perhaps another option 9 that's a form of disposal, and that's certainly something that 10 I will entertain any comments on that.
11 Let me go to the next slide, which talks about the 12 need for a rulemaking action. There are some current 13 requirements and 10 CFR 50.82, which is the regulation for 14 power reactors, under the decommissioning, there are 15 case-specific exemptions during license termination beyond 50 16 years, and then, also, in the license termination rule, there 17 are still criteria that may be [inaudible] for the certain 18 release scenario.
19 However, the problems with that or issues associated 20 with is that the requirements are flexible enough [inaudible]
21 scenarios that the licensees would consider worthwhile or 22 viable.
201 1 And then, also, all the cases of specific situations 2 require extensive resources. Also, the licensees, in coming in 3 for the case-specific exemption, can't just make a resource 4 argument, but it must be related to health and safety.
5 When it was considered, it was also assumed that the 6 off-site low level waste disposal option would always be there 7 and [inaudible] costs. So entombment is being considered as an 8 alternative to the low level waste disposal, since that is 9 becoming problematic.
10 The background for where we are today, and there's 11 been a number of papers over the years, but I'd like to, first 12 of all, in 1999, the staff provided the Commission with a paper 13 that discussed entombment as being a safe and viable option and 14 then they proceeded to hold a public workshop in December of 15 last year, where they were soliciting stakeholder views on the 16 technical basis and issues and options for treating entombment 17 equally with some of the other decommissioning alternatives.
18 They looked at various regulatory considerations, as 19 well as the technical aspects, concrete performance assessment, 20 the hydrological evaluations and engineering features that 21 would be needed for such a situation.
22 In June of 2000, the staff had then taken to the Commission,
202 1 and, again, this is just one of the NRC terminologies, a SECY 2 paper is a Commission paper, and it was entitled "Workshop 3 Findings on Entombment Options for Decommissioning Power 4 Reactors," and the staff recommendations on further actions.
5 And in that paper, the staff indicates that it did 6 appear from the workshop that entombment was indeed a viable 7 option. However, it was obvious that there was further public 8 input needed on some of the technical aspects and various 9 options to proceed.
10 They also recommended that the staff would then 11 develop a rulemaking plan and as part of that rulemaking plan, 12 would have an advance notice of proposed rulemaking to go out 13 to stakeholders trying to address some of these additional 14 questions.
15 In July, the Commission approved the staff 16 recommendation. So that's where we are today. We're actually 17 developing a rulemaking plan. We are looking at the options 18 and we're still in the very early stages currently.
19 On the next slide, some of the options that we have 20 to date are, first of all, to maintain the status quo; that is, 21 to do no rulemaking, but continue under the case-specific 22 evaluations. Another one would be to terminate the license,
203 1 but amend Part 50 and subpart E of Part 20 in terms of the dose 2 criteria for restricted use scenario.
3 And a third option would be to retain the license, 4 but under a different -- extending the 60-year period, but 5 actually it would then be -- the licensing entombment would be 6 considered as a storage activity rather than as an active 7 reactor license. And the license would eventually be 8 terminated, but there would still be long-term NRC oversight.
9 In the first case, there would be -- I'm sorry. The 10 second option, there would be a need under the termination of 11 the license, there would be a need to [inaudible] for the 12 institutional controls.
13 So as I say, we're still looking at other options, 14 and so I look for your input on that.
15 Where are we today? Well, as I say, we're developing 16 both the rulemaking plan and that includes the options. It's 17 to provide more flexibility and closure of this issue. Also, to 18 attempt to define the clear delineation of responsibilities for 19 cleanup and mitigation, and yet maintaining public health and 20 safety.
21 In addition, we've got an advanced notice of proposed 22 rulemaking in draft which addresses some of the regulatory
204 1 framework issues, the technical feasibility.
2 One of the issues that the Commission specifically 3 directed the staff to consider was the viability of including 4 the greater than Class C waste within the entombed structure.
5 So we're going out and asking questions on that aspect, as well 6 as associated issues with regard to the regulatory framework 7 for GPCC.
8 Also, what are the state responsibilities in line 9 with this.
10 The next slide. As I indicated, we're working on a 11 draft and we hope to have the draft rulemaking plan and the 12 ANPR out to the states for comment sometime this month. I 13 don't have a specific date, but we are working to get it out to 14 you this month.
15 The rulemaking plan and the ANPR are due to the 16 Commission in early February of 2001. So we are on a fairly 17 aggressive time schedule to get it out, get comments and 18 resolve and get it up to the Commission.
19 Following Commission approval of the rulemaking plan, 20 we would propose to publish the ANPR and then based on that, we 21 may end up refining some of the options and come up with a 22 recommended option, so we can go back to the Commission with
205 1 where we are.
2 And then following that, we would look at a proposed 3 rule. Now, about 12 months after comments received on the 4 ANPR, but that could depend on what we need to do in terms of 5 refining our options in the interim. And then if we still 6 proceed down the path of rulemaking, we would then have a final 7 rule, we would hope, 12 months after publication of the 8 proposed rule, or after the end of the comment period on the 9 proposed rule.
10 That's really sort of a brief overview of where we 11 are and sort of an anticipation for you in terms of seeing a 12 draft rulemaking plan within the next month.
13 Okay. Let me now continue on to our status of what 14 we're doing with control of solid material, our plans. I think 15 many of you are aware, I think last year, in terms of where we 16 were on the initiative at that time, so this is really more a 17 status of what's going on.
18 As a reminder, we published an issues paper on the 19 need for rulemaking and what a rulemaking could potentially 20 look like on June 30th of 1999.
21 Since then, we've held four public meetings in San 22 Francisco, Atlanta, Chicago and Rockville last fall, at which a
206 1 number of you attended, and we've also got a web site which 2 we're still maintaining.
3 And then in March of this year, we provided another 4 SECY paper or Commission paper to the Commission, outlining the 5 results of the public meetings, all the public comments to 6 date, the status of where we were on the technical basis, with 7 a number of recommendations.
8 And in addition, there was a staff briefing to the 9 Commission, there was also a stakeholder briefing to the 10 Commission in May of this year.
11 All right. Where are we today? In August, on the 12 next slide, in August, the Commission a staff requirements 13 memorandum providing direction to the staff. As part of the 14 recommendations, the staff had included a recommendation to 15 pursue a contract with the National Academy of Science, which 16 was implementing an earlier Commission direction which we 17 received in March, and I apologize, I'm sort of going back a 18 little bit in the time, to look at alternatives.
19 And so we did continue with that and, in fact, a 20 contract was issued to the National Academy on August 31. It's 21 anticipated I will take six months to finalize the committee to 22 begin to look at this issue.
207 1 In addition, we are continuing to put in place new 2 technical basis contracts to look at inventory costs and 3 surveys.
4 Just as a summary of what the Commission direction 5 was, in the next slide, the Commission directed us to defer a 6 final decision on whether to proceed with rulemaking until the 7 National Academy completes its look at the regulatory 8 alternatives for this aspect.
9 And then, also, however, in the meantime, that we 10 would continue to develop technical bases to support the 11 decision-making and that we would also stay informed of the 12 international efforts, along with the efforts of the EPA and 13 the Department of State. And so we are continuing to do that.
14 And to try and put all this in perspective, this last 15 slide, which hopefully you can all read, I apologize, but that 16 might have come out a little bit larger, this just shows, at 17 the top, the NRC actions. We have the issues paper, the SECY 18 paper, and then the staff requirements memorandum in August.
19 We have a number of regulatory efforts, to include 20 the decision on rulemaking was deferred and we have an study to 21 look at the alternatives, and then we have a number of 22 technical basis efforts going on.
208 1 We are still working to finalize NUREG-1640, which 2 was published as a draft for comment. It's now in technical 3 review by the Center for Nuclear Waste Regulatory Analysis.
4 Also, we are doing some work with the National Agricultural 5 Laboratory on soils, to look at the technical basis there.
6 We are working to get a new technical basis contract 7 to look at the inventories, the doses and the costs. And the 8 final piece of that is looking at surveys, the contracts 9 through [inaudible] and the Environmental Measurement 10 Laboratory, and the draft report is coming in on that, and we 11 hope to get those published for comments, as well.
12 So that's really the status of where we are. I'll 13 now entertain any questions.
14 MR. CAMERON: Any questions for Trish or comments on 15 either entombment or the clearance issue?
16 John Greeves.
17 SPEAKER: This topic has generated a lot of interest 18 and we need your feedback on that. I will just mention that 19 the Department of Energy has a number of examples where they're 20 going through an entombment effort and I believe they are going 21 to try and host a workshop in March of next year.
22 MS. HOLAHAN: They were looking at March, but they
209 1 may delay that a little bit in the possibility that we may have 2 an ANPR out on the streets at the same time. So we'll kind of 3 work with them to see about the timing.
4 SPEAKER: That would be a good time to raise the 5 issue, because that would have a large impact on the agreement 6 states in one way or the other.
7 MR. CAMERON: Entombment, anybody? Yes, sir.
8 MR. KIRK: Just an aside. I have been directed not 9 to use the term impolite society in Pennsylvania. That's by 10 the Secretary, Deputy Secretary.
11 SPEAKER: Give us another term.
12 MR. KIRK: Bill Kirk. I'm from the Pennsylvania 13 Bureau of Radiation Protection. With the agreement state, I 14 think, as well.
15 MR. CAMERON: And Bill is going to be on the agenda 16 on Wednesday morning, I believe, on something that they're 17 doing. Greta?
18 COMMISSIONER DICUS: Greta Dicus, NRC/Arkansas. The 19 question I want to bring out, perhaps it was discussed in the 20 early part of the afternoon and, unfortunately, I had to leave 21 to take care of some other stuff.
22 But when we talk about whether there's going to be
210 1 entombment or what kind of decommissioning issue gets done, 2 there's a decision-making process on the part of the states, 3 whether it's the political body, the utility or the radiation 4 control body, as to what kind of decommissioning will be done, 5 including the fact that it might be entombment.
6 So I was -- I'm not sure myself whether or not in the 7 document that you're going to send to us you talk about the 8 decision-making process on the part of the states.
9 MR. CAMERON: Trish, do you want to provide some 10 information to everybody on that?
11 SPEAKER: We're still deliberating internally on 12 this, but it clearly needs to be flagged. In my mind, this is 13 going to be an issue the state either buys into or it does not 14 buy into. If your utility is going to come to you and say I 15 know what my options are, I can decommission, take it all away, 16 Greenfield, and hopefully send it to a disposal facility, do I, 17 in this state, have another option.
18 So each of you are going to, I think, need to answer 19 that question. You don't have to all give the same answer.
20 It's going to get flagged in this document and we'll receive 21 your advice, and the question is how many real stakeholders are 22 out there, how many states think I want to hear more about
211 1 this.
2 I'm not saying I'm buying in, but I want to hear more 3 about this to see whether it really is an option in my state, 4 because there are some stewardship issues associated with it.
5 The stuff is in the ground, you've got a mega curie 6 and it's more than a hundred years control. So these are the 7 issues that I think will be flagged in the paper and, in fact, 8 we want your early feedback to make sure we're defining the 9 issue properly.
10 MR. CAMERON: Thank you. Aubrey?
11 MR. GODWIN: It's just a little [inaudible.] Godwin, 12 Arizona. But is it possible that if something got entombed 13 under the Nuclear Regulatory Commission regulations and then 14 somewhere down the line, the state became an agreement state, 15 but as long as its reactor types [inaudible,] but they become 16 an agreement state, they decide to lower the standard a bit to 17 say two millirem a year instead of 25 and their license 18 [inaudible] and requires to keep a license a tad longer.
19 Has anybody looked at that or is that going to be one 20 of these issues that we're going to wait until we have to cross 21 that bridge?
22 I can see a philosophical change occurring in
212 1 government over a period of 20 to 30 years that may change 2 [inaudible] national level, which if you started out with 3 entombment, you may be forced to do something else before it's 4 over with.
5 Is there any way to judge these things and try to 6 address them?
7 MR. CAMERON: Trish, do you understand the issue that 8 Aubrey is raising and how are we going to try to address that?
9 MS. HOLAHAN: I think it's a very good issue and I 10 think it's one of the things that we're going to have to look 11 at and, in part, may determine what option you proceed down. I 12 think some of the options, it isn't clear that the individual 13 states would have to assume some responsibility and depending 14 on what the institutional controls are.
15 But I think it's going to be have to be something 16 that is looked at closer. I don't have a specific answer yet.
17 MR. CAMERON: We have noted that issue as an issue 18 that needs to be explored, though. Right?
19 SPEAKER: I think the same issue I addressed earlier.
20 Whether entombment or decommissioning, one, we need to all know 21 where we are. So next year, I'd like to come back and say 22 here's where the 32-33 entities are. And as I mentioned when I
213 1 spoke, when you put something in place that is more 2 restrictive, you have to back that up with some kind of 3 methodology to define how you get to that two millirem or how 4 do you get to that four or how do you implement that NCL, and 5 that's a big can of worms.
6 So it's a good question and, one, we need the answer 7 for decommissioning and I think we'll that next year, and the 8 same issue will develop for entombment, unless the standard for 9 entombment is one that -- well, maybe I won't go there. It 10 depends on how the Commission puts the regulation out, whether 11 it's strict compatibility or not.
12 COMMISSIONER DICUS: I wonder how many states, 13 because where John was headed [inaudible.] The cost-benefit 14 analysis. If you go to two millirem or one millirem or 15 whatever the standard might be, does the state have the 16 responsibility to do a cost-benefit analysis, and that is 17 something that would be useful in these kinds of discussions.
18 MR. CAMERON: Any comments from anybody on Greta's 19 observation? Jake?
20 MR. JACOBI: I'd just observe that many times, 21 especially when you get down to low levels, that cost-benefit 22 may be a question of perception and more a political issue, the
214 1 old line about if I gave you $10,000 to cut off your right arm 2 and you accept your arm is worth $10,000, but if no amount of 3 money will cut your arm off, then you can't put a price on it, 4 and you get into a very political situation, what is the public 5 going to take.
6 We all work for an executive branch, they can select 7 it, and the bottom line really is probably going to be more 8 political than technical.
9 MR. CAMERON: Thank you, Trish. I think that we 10 should probably move on to the interagency steering committee 11 on radiation standards. And as I mentioned previously, we have 12 one of the co-chairs here of the ISCORS. John Greeves is the 13 Division Director at the NRC for Waste Disposal and John wanted 14 to --
15 MR. GREEVES: It's a high-paying job, I would point 16 out. Actually, we're going to do this in two steps, kind of 17 like Jim and Kathy did earlier in the day.
18 I've got three slides I'm going to go through, give a 19 little background on ISCORS, and Steve will finish it off.
20 There are copies of our annual report back there. I 21 think that's probably the most helpful thing to give you some 22 background on what is the interagency steering committee on
215 1 radiation standards.
2 We're going to attend this every year, so I think that will be 3 helpful. Just a -- first slide -- little background. This was 4 kicked off in '94, when Senator Glenn requested a path forward 5 regarding things we've already been talking about, 6 inconsistencies, gaps, overlaps in radiation standards.
7 Actually, [inaudible] receives this, and so this 8 particular group first started meeting in April of '95. It's a 9 pre-decisional, inter-governmental group, and we meet four 10 times a year.
11 One of those we open up as a public meeting and look 12 for that kind of input. As Chip mentioned it's co-chaired by 13 NRC and EPA, Frank Marson is my co-chair. I think most of you 14 know Frank.
15 The membership is probably what you would expect.
16 The Department of Energy has a large presence in the meeting, 17 brings a lot of information to it. Department of Defense, 18 Health and Human Services, Human Health and Safety, Department 19 of Labor, the OSHA rep supports that, Department of 20 Transportation, there's a lot of transportation issues out 21 there, especially with things like Yucca Mountain.
22 OMB also participates and then we have the observers,
216 1 the Office of Science and Technology and the states, which were 2 quite ably represented by Steve Collins and Joe Lapote, and to 3 really add a dimension to these meetings.
4 As far as the objective of ISCORS, it's really not 5 funded. It's basically what the agencies and the states can 6 put into this.
7 There are four objectives. The first is to 8 facilitate consensus on levels of radiation risk. I wish I 9 could tell you that we're able to achieve that, but haven't 10 quite made it.
11 What we have been able to do is promote consistent 12 risk assessment approaches. The agencies come together, the 13 states come together and talk about what are the assessment 14 techniques that we have and there doesn't seem to be any 15 consensus in how to do the assessment part.
16 Risk management is where it breaks down and it's 17 pretty much the top down ICRP approach and the CERCLA approach, 18 which is the bottom up approach, and we have not been able to 19 resolve that.
20 Another objective is completeness and coherency of 21 Federal standards. One of the things is the Federal guidance 22 for [inaudible] that was put in place years ago needs to be
217 1 revisited and it is a challenge on bring consensus on that 2 topic.
3 So I invite you to give Steve and Jill your input on 4 that topic, the last of which is identify issues and coordinate 5 resolution.
6 I think when you see, and Steve will show you, the 7 subcommittees, there are a lot of opportunities there for us to 8 work on issues and do some coordination.
9 So first, I would like to thank you for your support.
10 A number of the agreement state representatives have staff 11 working with us, NRC and the committee. I'd like to thank you 12 for that, and turn it over to Steve.
13 MR. CAMERON: And Steve Collins is one of the state 14 representatives to ISCORS and Steve is the Assistant Office 15 Manager of the Office of Radiation Safety, which is within the 16 Illinois Department of Nuclear Safety.
17 Steve?
18 MR. COLLINS: Thank you. The handout is the 1999 19 annual report for ISCORS. I put a copy on each one of the 20 positions here on the horseshoe earlier and I put a copy of 21 each one on my overhead as an insert into that.
22 It is NUREG-1770, in volume two, and, as Mike says,
218 1 there will be a volume three coming out in the next year.
2 And my last side basically shows you the internet web 3 site address, where you can updated on all these on a quarterly 4 basis.
5 Next slide. John covered these four items. As he 6 said, the EPA and NRC have pretty much come to agreement on 7 consistent risk assessments, but risk management is more of a 8 policy item and there's quite a bit of lack of agreement there.
9 Joe and I really do need your input. The last big 10 document that ISCORS put out, Joe and I both commented that it 11 needed a whole lot more work, except that our justifications 12 were on wholly opposite ends of the spectrum for why we thought 13 it needed more work.
14 So we definitely need your input. Joe was leaning a 15 little bit toward the EPA side, and you know I never go there.
16 Next slide. John mentioned that this is 17 pre-decisional, inter-governmental discussions, not normally 18 open to the public. One meeting a year is generally open to 19 the public. That means what we say and what we talk about 20 there, I really can't come back and discuss with you until it's 21 open to the public.
22 So I can receive a whole lot of input. The output
219 1 that you will get from Joe and I is when you see an article in 2 the newsletter or maybe on RADRAP or somewhere, whenever we are 3 able to communicate something to you to keep you up to date.
4 But the NRC does, after each meeting, put in their 5 public document room most of the meeting. The ISCORS does all 6 this technical work through [inaudible.]
7 Next slide. I put down the page numbers for you on 8 the slide, so you'll know accomplishments and planned 9 activities for 1999 and 2000, on those pages 2 through 12, 10 memberships and subcommittees are on 13 through 18, and a 11 charter, which basically has the objectives and operating 12 procedures and things.
13 Next slide. The states are, and we're not limited to 14 New Jersey and Illinois. If you want to pay your own travel 15 and participate in this, we're not [inaudible,] but we are 16 observers, not members. We don't get to vote.
17 Next slide, please. These are the seven different 18 subcommittees that do the technical work. I'm going to cover 19 them one by one.
20 Next slide. The cleanup subcommittee, Deborah McCall 21 from Washington works on this. You may notice that there is 22 some parallel with who the chair of the SSR committee that
220 1 works primarily in this area.
2 These people are not representing CRCPD on these 3 ISCORS subcommittees, but if you were to pick out who is the 4 best person on these issues to represent you, I think you would 5 kind of come there, and that's number 11; well who do we ask 6 first and maybe they'd share this work.
7 Reviewing NRC decommissioning regulatory guide and 8 focusing on the subcommittee web sites, lists the models, and a 9 checklist to aid selection of an appropriate model to 10 demonstrate compliance.
11 This is something very new. They would like for you 12 to go in there and try to look at those models, look at those 13 questions, look at the checklist, see how user-friendly it is 14 and give them some comment and feedback on the proposal.
15 This whole thing was designed to be put there to make 16 it easy for you to fit the right model for you to do the job 17 you want to do.
18 The mixed waste subcommittee, Paul Merges, from New 19 York. They analyze and share information. EPA's whole 20 activity in the mixed waste initiative and they provide input 21 to the CRCPD working group, which is doing a lot of the work 22 here in this portion to review that, so that they provide
221 1 input.
2 Next slide. Recycle substitute, that's me. We're 3 reviewing and participating in the NRC rulemaking for recycling 4 of materials or trying to decide if there is going to be a 5 rulemaking. Anyway, we're monitoring that and providing input.
6 We're maintenance Federal agency actions on the 7 clearance and the import controls. The current status of that, 8 and Joe Klinger is here if you want to talk about what's going 9 on from his aspect, from the CRCPD.
10 Finally, the Department of State is pretty much 11 stalled due to reorganization, but they're hoping to get back 12 on track very soon.
13 EPA has tabled its recycle rule work and was focused 14 on interception, thank goodness, and DOE is issuing guidelines 15 for recycle and DOE has posted on their web site and would like 16 to have your input and comments on the material that they have 17 focused on.
18 Next slide. Risk harmonization. This is the group 19 represented by Joe Lapote that is trying to handle the major 20 issue that was the focus of the original charge from Senator 21 Glenn, who established this group, resolving these differences.
22 The GAO report that came out not too long ago
222 1 basically says that they do not yet agree on a technical basis 2 for what rules we do have and they certainly don't disagree on 3 the policy things.
4 GAO sent their report out in draft form to have it 5 reviewed by all these different Federal agencies. All of the 6 Federal agencies but one thought that GAO had pretty much 7 produced a report that had accurately defined what the status 8 was and what the problems were and where they were. EPA didn't 9 agree.
10 Another thing [inaudible] looked at is develop a 11 table to provide an understanding of the use of institutional 12 controls by various agencies.
13 If you look at Appendix B, which is on the path of 14 this 1999 annual report document, it contains a table, which is 15 not yet completed. There is going to be more added to that 16 table on other items by DOE and others fairly soon.
17 Next slide. Joe Lapote also loves [inaudible.]
18 You've heard her say it several times. She is the [inaudible]
19 as well. And they have published guidance on radioactive 20 materials [inaudible.]
21 It is out there available for you to use and to 22 comment on and they are going to be analyzing the POTW sample
223 1 analysis results. Some of those results are in. It's not 2 completed yet and they are doing an analysis of those.
3 The NORM subcommittee, Tom Hill from Georgia. Next 4 slide. They are reviewing reports on the NORM regulations, 5 revisions that are in that are going on now. Tom is the chair 6 of that SR-5 committee and I'm one of the members, so we don't 7 have to do a lot of extra work to keep up with this one.
8 But they're also going to comment on EPA's technical 9 report on uranium mining.
10 Next slide. The last one of the seven, Federal 11 guidance subcommittee, Cindy Cardwell from Texas is on this 12 one. If anybody else is interested in this particular one and 13 would like to get on and be another person to help do this 14 work, Cindy would appreciate that.
15 They're working with EPA to develop an update of the 16 Federal guidance for the general public. I certainly hope that 17 you will read the October newsletter for the Health Physics 18 Society and look at that position paper. I think it's very 19 good.
20 I had prepared a slide and tried to sneak it through 21 past John Greeves, adding it as one of the bullet points we're 22 supposed to work on. I thought if I put it in print, that
224 1 would make it official and not [inaudible] be able to push them 2 to look at it, without having to change it to [inaudible.] I 3 just hope they'll look at it. I know they will, because 4 anything that's new that comes up that's relevant, this 5 particular steering committee looks at it to see what kind of 6 impetus they should give Federal agencies and suggest to their 7 management to deal with it.
8 Next slide. How do you keep informed about what's 9 going on with ISCORS? It now has a new web site, 10 www.iscors.org, and you can link from that web site to the 11 subcommittees that have established their own web sites. Not 12 all of them have, but the ones who have, there are links there.
13 So you can keep up with that.
14 And you really do need to contact myself or Joe 15 Lapote or the subcommittee chair, which is in the handout, if 16 you have input for any of these. But you can keep up-to-date 17 by checking those web sites at least once a quarter to see what 18 new information is there.
19 Thank you.
20 MR. CAMERON: Thank you, Steve, and thanks, John. Do 21 we have questions for Steve and John on ISCORS and on the 22 subcommittees, what they're doing? Stan?
225 1 SPEAKER: I was wondering, ISCORS is taking all the 2 rumblings that come out of the radiation effects research 3 community. It seems a lot of these people are trying to push 4 for higher numbers as far as the standard.
5 Has ISCORS considered doing that?
6 SPEAKER: I'm not sure I understand the question.
7 Could you tell me which higher numbers you're talking about?
8 SPEAKER: The people I call the lobby and [inaudible]
9 and people like that, who seem to think that the current 10 standard for the public of 100 millirem is too low, because 11 they can't really statistically come up with valid information 12 [inaudible.]
13 Is ISCORS considering that?
14 SPEAKER: The membership is fully aware of the 15 responses [inaudible] but everybody on the committee is 16 knowledgeable about [inaudible.] So are they taking it into 17 consideration? Yes is the answer.
18 SPEAKER: Steve Collins is the only person that ever 19 really mentions the mysterious fashion that we do more than 20 just think about them enough.
21 SPEAKER: I'm having enough trouble with [inaudible]
22 millirem, that above 100 millirem, as some would suggest, would
226 1 be a real challenge. We're open-minded.
2 MR. CAMERON: Any other forum that's addressing the 3 100 millirem issue?
4 SPEAKER: I think the Health Physics Society's 5 position that Steve just mentioned is the most recent example.
6 When I spoke -- ICRP came out with new recommendations 7 [inaudible] would prolong exposure and the geologic disposal 8 limit.
9 All these things line up. Basically, the ICRP 10 approach to setting the limit and constraint, and those are the 11 things that -- Ed asked earlier, what could you come and talk 12 about. Those are the things that I think we all point to.
13 The cost-benefit analysis that we did in the '97 14 rule, these are all the tools that you can and should use if 15 you're talking about setting standards. And that's what the 16 NRC would bring to any invitation that would come to the state 17 to make a presentation.
18 Fortunately, over time, you get more material, like 19 the ICRP recommendation and the Health Physics Society.
20 To me, I think they're all consistent. What you 21 don't have is a generally applicable standard in this arena by 22 the EPA. If we did, we'd have to pay attention to that, too.
227 1 MR. CAMERON: All right.
2 SPEAKER: As I said, there is -- the EPA is looking 3 at the Federal guidance standard and the update of it and 4 that's really -- John seems to be referring to the August 5 Health Physics Society meetings. I'm referring to an October 6 position statement of new additional limits.
7 If you've read what you got on your desk this week, a 8 specific position paper of the Health Physics Society on the 9 general radiation standard, and I'm really hoping they will go 10 with something like that to remove a lot of the stuff that was 11 causing a lot of heartburn in terminology had that sort of 12 stuff, but very general and hopefully will eliminate a lot of 13 the arguments about specific numbers.
14 MR. CAMERON: Thanks, Steve. Let's go to David.
15 SPEAKER: I think the president of ICRP has recently, 16 last year, come out with the concept of controllable dose, 17 which is somewhat definition from what you are apparently 18 pressing.
19 Are you all looking at that concept and the dose 20 limits on standards that might come out of that?
21 SPEAKER: MR. CAMERON: Does anybody know what 22 controllable dose is? Is it worthwhile explaining that?
228 1 SPEAKER: If you want. What do you mean by -- maybe 2 Don Cool would like --
3 MR. CAMERON: Steve or John, you don't have anything 4 to say on this, right?
5 SPEAKER: I'm not quite sure what Ed is stating here.
6 Maybe Don can help.
7 MR. COOL: Don Cool, NRC. What Ed is referring to is 8 an idea that was floated a little over a year ago by Roger 9 Clark and he floated it as an individual [inaudible] and ICRP 10 document in and of itself.
11 There was, I believe, a task group or at least a 12 small group of the Health Physics Society that participated in 13 putting together some questions and discussion.
14 It engendered quite a bit of discussion earlier this 15 year at Hiroshima, at the 2000 conference. It is not, at this 16 moment, an ICRP proposal.
17 Basically, what it says is that rather than starting 18 from the standpoint of a limitation and controlling individual 19 sources and controlling individuals, that you stand back and 20 you look at a given situation and look at all of the different 21 pieces which you could put under control, irrespective of the 22 types of materials, quantities, types of exposure routes, as a
229 1 different way of looking at some of the activities and possibly 2 giving you a different perspective that might allow some 3 reconciliation or at least some alignment between some of the 4 things that happen now with non -- some of the intervention 5 issues versus some of the nominal practice issues, the kinds of 6 sources that we normally deal with.
7 I would not expect that ISCORS is looking at that as 8 detailed yet. It's still engendering a great deal of 9 discussion and I know will be under discussion by the ICRP's 10 main commission over the next couple of years, as they consider 11 what the next set of recommendations will look like in 12 approximately 2005.
13 MR. CAMERON: Thank you, Don.
14 SPEAKER: The only thing that I was thinking about is 15 that it might be nice for once for the United States not to be 16 lagging the rest of the world by five to ten years.
17 So it would seem that now is the time to be 18 discussing it rather than reacting to it if and when the change 19 comes.
20 MR. CAMERON: All right. Greta?
21 COMMISSIONER DICUS: Just to add a little bit to what 22 Don said, because he is absolutely correct in what [inaudible]
230 1 trying to do.
2 I was at the meeting and as Ed was and Ruth and we 3 were all there and listened to what he said. And he also, and 4 it is his individual comment, it is not ICRP position, would 5 suggest we need to also consider background when we start 6 talking about what we're going to do as allowable dose 7 [inaudible] background in it as well.
8 And I agree we're way behind the curve, but I think 9 we're waiting to see the next rendition of ICRP before the NRC 10 tries to upgrade Part 20, because you know much trouble we've 11 had doing that.
12 MR. CAMERON: All right. Thanks, Greta. John and 13 Steve, thank you very much.
14 [Applause.]
15 MR. CAMERON: We're going to close out the day with 16 an interesting panel on low level waste disposal, and we have 17 representatives of four states with us. I've asked them to do 18 their presentations and then have one question and answer 19 comment session at the end of all four of the presentations.
20 And we do have a keynote speaker for the panel, and 21 this is Dr. John Clark from the State of South Carolina.
22 Dr. Clark is currently the Senior Director of
231 1 External Relations for South Carolina Governor Jim Hodges and 2 he has been in a number of other positions with the Executive 3 Branch and the Legislative Branch in the state.
4 For example, he served as Energy Advisory to both 5 Governor Dick Riley and also to Governor Hodges, as well as the 6 Executive Director of the [inaudible] Energy Office and he was 7 the Director of Research for the Joint Legislative Committee on 8 Energy, the Executive Director of Public Affairs for the Sam 9 Key Cooper, which is South Carolina's state-owned electric 10 utility.
11 Dr. Clark was also lead staff on the South Carolina 12 nuclear waste task force, which issued the recommendations in 13 December of 1999 that led to the introduction of the Atlantic 14 interstate low level radioactive waste compact implementation 15 act.
16 As the Energy Advisor to Governor Hodges, he was the 17 chief strategist in getting the legislation through the South 18 Carolina General Assembly here in the most recent legislative 19 session.
20 He is a graduate of Dickinson College, has a Ph.D.
21 from Syracuse University, and has studied at the University of 22 Paris.
232 1 In Guava and Ethiopia, worked in the U.S. Congress, 2 and has taught political science at both at the University of 3 Florida and the University of South Carolina.
4 And now comes the real interesting part. I think 5 he's a member of the board of trustees of the college in 6 Charleston, but also the co-author of [inaudible] South 7 Carolina, the guidebook.
8 I would just ask Dr. Clark to join us at this point.
9 SPEAKER: -- and the new Assistant Secretary of 10 Health, and a new State Health Officer, none of which were 11 there five years ago. And they're just sitting at the table 12 with their mouth open saying we have to make what decision?
13 Okay. Thanks a lot.
14 SPEAKER: I apologize. This is the Trojan reactor 15 vessel. Many of you have seen this plot. [Inaudible] gave it 16 at the conference in May.
17 It was a big deal to us. We approved the shipping of 18 this reactor in one piece, full of concrete, it was a thousand 19 tons, 1.5 million curies, [inaudible] the river.
20 It took us a long time to do the technical evaluation 21 report. NRC was very patient. The NRC was very involved in 22 the transportation, and, of course, it was their licensee.
233 1 It was put on this rolling truck with 28 axles, I 2 think, encased in this shrink-wrap plastic, in the State of 3 Oregon.
4 We approved it after a series of public meetings and 5 for the most part, with the exception of some stakeholders in 6 Oregon who didn't want to move it at all, for whatever reason, 7 because it had been shut down [inaudible] for 20 years, most 8 people thought okay.
9 Put it on a barge, took it from the Trojan River.
10 Trojan was just down river from Portland, at river mile 72, up 11 this river to [inaudible] river mile 342, which is 270 miles or 12 so. It took several days.
13 And the next slide. Gary Robertson met up with the 14 truck and [inaudible] pulled it off and took it to the site, 15 which is about three or four miles from there.
16 For all practical purposes, [inaudible] controversy.
17 The public wasn't there. Part of the reason was the fact the 18 Navy ships reactors up the river, seven or eight a year, and 19 none of them [inaudible] sub-reactors and now some critical 20 reactors are going up there. [Inaudible] some public do see 21 them going up there.
22 And here's [inaudible.] The public doesn't
234 1 differentiate Hanford commercial low level waste and where it 2 goes. It's going to happen. They see it every day. Next 3 slide. Put it in the hole, cover it with dirt.
4 Now, all of this was a little over a year ago. Now let's go to 5 the last issue. The last [inaudible] many of you haven't heard 6 about. The Trojan reactor was one and a half million curies.
7 This thing was 20 curies.
8 You can't imagine the politics involved. The company 9 and its CEO, who make up for [inaudible,] and the fact that 10 NORM is part of the compact agreement arena, and is always 11 looking for business.
12 This waste was collected as part of the national 13 [inaudible] program over the last 15 to 20 years. [Inaudible]
14 consumer products, a whole bunch of stuff. [Inaudible.]
15 Based on health and safety -- and I had to sit across 16 the table from the Governor, when he said you're doing what.
17 The goal is [inaudible.] I know the goal is [inaudible] but on 18 the other side, I never saw so many Federal agencies work so 19 many hours in so short a time to try to find a national 20 solution, because it's not a state issue. It's a national 21 issue.
22 There is nothing in place that says this [inaudible]
235 1 can't be shipped into any location. They have a beautiful low 2 level waste package. The most amazing one, they have a web 3 site in six different languages or something like that. You 4 should really go there to see. It looks spectacular. But it 5 was not like [inaudible.]
6 And they determined that it would cost more money to 7 do an environmental assessment of this material and ship it.
8 So they rented, the company rented a [inaudible] -- the 9 government rented a 747, 120 [inaudible] a place called 10 [inaudible] right smack dab in the middle of the State of 11 Washington, just up the road from the low level waste.
12 Next slide. [Inaudible.] Obviously, economics 13 controls the decision. [Inaudible] finally got the point where 14 the company could make some money doing it and it didn't make 15 any sense to ship it all the way around the world.
16 We were told that Italy, France and Brazil also have 17 [inaudible.] [Inaudible] statement discusses [inaudible] and 18 I'm giving hourly calls to the governor's office.
19 The governor is very happy about this, because we got 20 so much information from the State Department and that he had 21 answers to every question and [inaudible.] [Inaudible] my 22 phone rings and it's the State Department, who [inaudible] high
236 1 level [inaudible] and they gave me a 24-hour number and said, 2 now, if anything goes wrong, call this number.
3 SPEAKER: What is their definition of wrong?
4 SPEAKER: The definition of wrong had nothing to do 5 with radiation or anything. It was the vision that [inaudible]
6 airport would be surrounded by angry Washingtonians and 7 wouldn't let this plane full of Spanish foreign nationals to 8 leave the state once it landed, and we would have an 9 international [inaudible.] That's basically what they were 10 worried about.
11 Next slide. Real quick, here is our [inaudible.]
12 Here's our volumes. You can see the big pump in the early '80s 13 and late '70s. We look at about 200,000 cubic feet a year from 14 now on until closer in the year 2056.
15 There's 13.5 million cubic feet there now and 16 [inaudible] pretty close to 24.5 million cubic feet. Next 17 slide. Total volume of waste currently in the site. It's 18 mostly low level and unclassified, pre-1984 materials.
19 The Trojan material didn't even make it there, 20 because it was only about 8,000 cubic feet.
21 Next slide and last slide. But the activity, on the 22 other hand, is entirely different. The Trojan is 40 percent of
237 1 the activity, although that's mostly Cobalt, things like that.
2 So it will be gone by the time [inaudible.]
3 Last, but not least, Northwest [inaudible] stay like 4 it is.
5 MR. CAMERON: More fascinating stories. We do have 6 time for questions for any and all of the panelists, but I'd 7 like to at least begin with a question for Dr. Clark on the 8 South Carolina situation.
9 Do we have a comment or a question in regard to the 10 South Carolina situation and Dr. Clark's presentation on that?
11 Any questions on low level waste? Ed Bailey.
12 MR. BAILEY: Yes. I've got [inaudible.]
13 MR. CAMERON: Okay.
14 MR. BAILEY: Bill, I think I've found a way to 15 [inaudible.] Is there any private land available for sale 16 within five miles of the --
17 [Laughter.]
18 MR. CAMERON: Is there no answer or any comment on 19 this? Bill?
20 SPEAKER: [Inaudible.]
21 MR. CAMERON: Greta.
22 COMMISSIONER DICUS: A question for Mr. Sinclair. I
238 1 think you mentioned on the land ownership, you're looking at 2 legislation. Is that to revert the site to state ownership or 3 Federal ownership?
4 MR. SINCLAIR: The proposed legislation will actually 5 give the option of both and it will declare the Federal 6 ownership preferential [inaudible.]
7 COMMISSIONER DICUS: And that would be DOE, right?
8 MR. SINCLAIR: That would be DOE.
9 COMMISSIONER DICUS: I wanted that clarified. Then I 10 have a question to Mr. Erickson, if I could.
11 On the NSTR, and you mentioned [inaudible,] can you 12 tell me which one or ones you're talking about?
13 MR. ERICKSON: That's a good comment. I'm glad you 14 brought that up. In DOE, in this document, DOE is going to 15 operate this reactor and generate these isotopes and loan the 16 facility to a contractor and they will regulate through this 17 medical isotope company, that's my understanding.
18 SPEAKER: We distribute to the [inaudible.]
19 COMMISSIONER DICUS: My understanding is, I can't 20 remember which one it is, maybe someone can help me, but 21 there's just maybe one or two, but we do have an issue of 22 technetium.
239 1 A reactor in Canada was trying to make a conversion 2 here to the [inaudible] problems and there is a potential of 3 having problems [inaudible.]
4 But I think [inaudible] is just to do one 5 [inaudible.]
6 SPEAKER: I can't remember either.
7 MR. CAMERON: Dr. Paperiello.
8 MR. PAPERIELLO: I have to say, if I recollect, it 9 was run in the early '80s and there was even discussion of 10 using it as a plutonium burn at some point to offer a 11 disposition [inaudible.] I know the [inaudible] this is a DOE 12 reactor. I understand the NRC/NRR was involved in doing --
13 helping DOE with the SCR many years ago. That's about all I 14 know about it.
15 Actually, as reactors go, it's not as old as any 16 commercial power reactor. I was not aware that DOE was looking 17 into making [inaudible] because they were making medical 18 isotopes or looking into it at the [inaudible] reactor at 19 Sandia and they had made a decision not to go with the 20 technetium.
21 MR. CAMERON: I should give the panelists who just 22 presented an opportunity to ask any of their colleagues on the
240 1 panel any questions that they have. Alice, Bill, John, Dr.
2 Clark, anybody have a question or a statement that they want to 3 make after hearing the other presentations?
4 All right. We're ready to adjourn. I just have two 5 things before we do. One is that you will see that the OAS 6 business meeting starts tomorrow morning and, also, in that 7 time slot is the national materials working group tabletop.
8 The beginning of that is dependent on when the OAS 9 meeting ends. So the best that we can tell you now is that the 10 tabletop -- not everybody is going to be at the OAS business 11 meeting. The tabletop will not start before 10:30.
12 So check in at 10:30 to see how everything is 13 running.
14 And the second item is related to the tabletop.
15 There's about eight states that we haven't heard from yet in 16 terms of what their priorities are and we know that there's a 17 number of representatives from each state, but the other ones 18 turned in their priorities.
19 So if you could try to get that to Kathy or any of 20 the other working group members sometime during the reception, 21 that would be helpful.
22 I'm going to turn this over to Pearce now to tell us
241 1 about the -- do you want to tell us just where -- anything you 2 want to say on that? It's always dangerous, I guess, to ask 3 you.
4 [Whereupon, at 5:00 p.m., the meeting was concluded.]
5 6
7 8
9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22