radioactive building blocks in Vermont
Times Argus: "Massachusetts probes release of radioactive building blocks to Vermont
June 25, 2005
By Susan Smallheer Rutland Herald
Massachusetts has launched an investigation into why concrete blocks from the Yankee Rowe nuclear power plant — used to build a retaining wall behind a Vermont general store — initially tested free of radioactivity when later tests revealed they were contaminated.
The commonwealth's Department of Environmental Protection said Friday it would never have allowed the tritium-tainted concrete shield blocks to leave the Rowe, Mass., reactor site in 1999 to be used as a retaining wall behind the Readsboro General Store in Vermont if officials had known the blocks still contained any radioactivity.
Tritium is a radioactive byproduct of nuclear fission. The blocks at one time shielded the reactor core at Yankee Rowe.
The Massachusetts department issued an administrative order June 21 to Yankee Atomic Electric Co., requiring answers to a long list of questions about the tritium-tainted wall. The company has until Monday to answer the questions or face enforcement action.
"Yankee Atomic Electric Co. stated … that the concrete shield blocks were radiologically clean, appropriate for unrestricted use and that all contaminant had been removed from the blocks," stated the administrative order signed by Michael Gorski, regional director of the Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection.
"These statements are inaccurate and constitute a violation … as shown by the recent sampling results," he added.
And the Massachusetts agency took Yankee Atomic to task for failing to notify state regulators as soon as the company knew of the problem, as required by state law.
The company knew about the problem in 2004, but only told Massachusetts regulators earlier this month, according to the administrative order.
The proposed exemption is to leave the retaining wall in place in Readsboro.
Yankee Rowe was shut down in 1991 and is in the final stages of being decommissioned.
In 1999, the agency approved the blocks to be reused off the site, based on tests conducted by Yankee Rowe at that time. Thus the owner of the Readsboro General Store, a Yankee Atomic employee, was allowed to take about 40 blocks into Vermont to build a 250-foot retaining wall on the Deerfield River behind his store in 2000.
The problem with the tritium contamination surfaced in 2004 when the company tested similar concrete blocks in Rowe prior to getting federal and state approval to crush the blocks and use them as fill as part of the decommissioning process.
The company then went to the Readsboro General Store earlier this year and found those concrete blocks were contaminated as well. This month, the company petitioned the Nuclear Regulatory Commission for a waiver to leave the Readsboro wall in place, claiming it posed no public health risk.
According to Yankee Atomic and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, the original testing in 1999 revealed no radioactivity contamination. But more sensitive testing in 2004 revealed the low levels of tritium.
Human exposure to the wall would be very low, only one millirem above normal background levels of radioactivity, Yankee Atomic stated. By comparison, it claimed, a cross-country plane trip would result in exposure to 4 or 5 millirems.
The Vermont Department of Health has agreed that the blocks do not constitute a health hazard and has supported Yankee Atomic's application to the NRC for a waiver to leave the blocks in place.
"
June 25, 2005
By Susan Smallheer Rutland Herald
Massachusetts has launched an investigation into why concrete blocks from the Yankee Rowe nuclear power plant — used to build a retaining wall behind a Vermont general store — initially tested free of radioactivity when later tests revealed they were contaminated.
The commonwealth's Department of Environmental Protection said Friday it would never have allowed the tritium-tainted concrete shield blocks to leave the Rowe, Mass., reactor site in 1999 to be used as a retaining wall behind the Readsboro General Store in Vermont if officials had known the blocks still contained any radioactivity.
Tritium is a radioactive byproduct of nuclear fission. The blocks at one time shielded the reactor core at Yankee Rowe.
The Massachusetts department issued an administrative order June 21 to Yankee Atomic Electric Co., requiring answers to a long list of questions about the tritium-tainted wall. The company has until Monday to answer the questions or face enforcement action.
"Yankee Atomic Electric Co. stated … that the concrete shield blocks were radiologically clean, appropriate for unrestricted use and that all contaminant had been removed from the blocks," stated the administrative order signed by Michael Gorski, regional director of the Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection.
"These statements are inaccurate and constitute a violation … as shown by the recent sampling results," he added.
And the Massachusetts agency took Yankee Atomic to task for failing to notify state regulators as soon as the company knew of the problem, as required by state law.
The company knew about the problem in 2004, but only told Massachusetts regulators earlier this month, according to the administrative order.
The proposed exemption is to leave the retaining wall in place in Readsboro.
Yankee Rowe was shut down in 1991 and is in the final stages of being decommissioned.
In 1999, the agency approved the blocks to be reused off the site, based on tests conducted by Yankee Rowe at that time. Thus the owner of the Readsboro General Store, a Yankee Atomic employee, was allowed to take about 40 blocks into Vermont to build a 250-foot retaining wall on the Deerfield River behind his store in 2000.
The problem with the tritium contamination surfaced in 2004 when the company tested similar concrete blocks in Rowe prior to getting federal and state approval to crush the blocks and use them as fill as part of the decommissioning process.
The company then went to the Readsboro General Store earlier this year and found those concrete blocks were contaminated as well. This month, the company petitioned the Nuclear Regulatory Commission for a waiver to leave the Readsboro wall in place, claiming it posed no public health risk.
According to Yankee Atomic and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, the original testing in 1999 revealed no radioactivity contamination. But more sensitive testing in 2004 revealed the low levels of tritium.
Human exposure to the wall would be very low, only one millirem above normal background levels of radioactivity, Yankee Atomic stated. By comparison, it claimed, a cross-country plane trip would result in exposure to 4 or 5 millirems.
The Vermont Department of Health has agreed that the blocks do not constitute a health hazard and has supported Yankee Atomic's application to the NRC for a waiver to leave the blocks in place.
"
posted by Greta Jane at Saturday, June 25, 2005
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