More radioactive Yankee Rowe waste to pass through Vermont

More radioactive Yankee Rowe waste to pass through Vermont: "More radioactive Yankee Rowe waste to pass through Vermont
By Kathryn Casa | Vermont Guardian
posted August 19, 2005
BRATTLEBORO — As much as 23 million pounds of tritium-laced construction waste could be trucked through southern Vermont within a stone’s throw of two elementary schools after Massachusetts regulators turned thumbs down on a request to leave the low-level radioactive material on site.
Officials of the shuttered Yankee Rowe nuclear power plant near Rowe, MA, had asked the Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection (MassDEP) for a “beneficial use determination” (BUD) permit, which proposed leaving in place building foundations and other underground structures of the reactor containment building, one of the few structures left standing at the site.
They also asked for permission to fill holes left by demolished foundations and other excavations with about 20 tons of concrete rubble from demolition of other structures at the site.
Yankee Rowe, the nation’s third-oldest nuclear power plant, began decommissioning in 1993. Late last year, officials there estimated there were about 1,000 shipments left before decommissioning was complete.
But in a July 29 decision, MassDEP said the proposal could complicate cleanup of soil and groundwater contamination. “MassDEP has concluded that the BUD approval to abandon-in-place subsurface structures and reuse concrete rubble as fill shall be limited to only those materials with no distinguishable plant-related radioactivity above background level,” said MassDEP Commissioner Robert W. Golledge, Jr.
“While the risk posed to the public by Yankee’s proposal may be low, tritium-contaminated rubble is low-level radioactive waste which cannot be left on site. Further interring the material on site may exacerbate or complicate the clean up of existing soil and groundwater contamination at the site,” he determined.
Tritium, a known carcinogen, is released in steam from commercial nuclear reactors and may leak into the underlying soil and ground water, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. It has a half-life of about 12 years.
The EPA considers tritium one of the least dangerous radionuclides because it emits very weak radiation as it decays, and leaves the body relatively quickly.
But Diane D’Arrigo, a low-level radiation specialist with the Nuclear Information and Referral Service in Washington, said that when tritium enters the human body, “if it were to displace a hydrogen atom in our DNA we would have potential genetic damage.”
Because tritium is almost always found as a water contaminant, it goes directly into soft tissues and organs, according to the EPA.
Tritium “is very much something that can be taken up by the body,” D’Arrigo said. “It gives off beta emissions, so wherever it lodges it will give off radioactivity in that region.”
A National Academy of Sciences panel in June said that even very low doses of radiation pose a cancer risk over a person’s lifetime. “It is unlikely that there is a threshold [of radiation exposure] below which cancers are not induced,” the scientists stated.
Yankee Rowe spokeswoman Kelley Smith said that plant officials and Massachusetts state officials are in negotiations about how much of the 23.7 million pounds of concrete in the reactor support structure will have to be shipped out. That determination will be made after officials measure tritium background levels, she said.
MassDEP spokeswoman Elizabeth Stinehart said the process used to determine background levels is “still under development.”
Kelley said that if left in place, the tritium would result in exposure levels that exceed only those set by MassDEP, but would be within the limits set by both the Massachusetts Department of Health and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
According to NRC criteria, Kelley said, decommissioning plants must demonstrate that a hypothetical resident living on a reclaimed site would not be exposed to more than 25 millirems of radiation in addition to the 360 millirems that resident would receive during the course of a normal year. She said the increased dosage must take into account all possible pathways, including drinking water from a well drilled on the property, or drinking milk from a cow raised on the land.
Because Massachusetts restricts the transport of radioactive waste through various towns and on certain roadways, the concrete will be shipped north on Route 100 through Readsboro and Whitingham, VT, then east on Route 9, a windy highway that crosses Hogback Mountain and comes within yards of Marlboro Elementary School and the Academy School in West Brattleboro.
The trucks will connect to Interstate 91 at exit 2, where they will head south, eventually ending up at a rail line in Worcester, MA, where the waste is loaded onto railcars and transported to a nuclear waste facility in Utah, Smith said.
Yankee Rowe notifies the Vermont Department of Health in advance about the shipments, which in turn notifies Vermont State Police headquarters in Waterbury. But local emergency response officials have told the Vermont Guardian that they are not notified of the shipments.
State records showed that 250 shipments had passed through southern Vermont as of November 2004, the last time the Vermont Guardian requested the information. Current statistics were unavailable this week because the Vermont Department of Health Protection was moving.
Past shipments have contained low levels of the radioactive isotopes cobalt 60; nichol 63; iron 55; cesium 137; cesium 134; americium 241; CM-243; plutonium 238, 239, 241, 245; and depleted uranium said Carla White, Vermont’s senior radiological health specialist.
During the busiest demolition periods, about one truck per week has passed through southern Vermont, state records showed.
Marlboro School Board Chairwoman Lauren Poster said the elementary school has long been concerned with traffic on Route 9, which includes a passing lane in front of the school, where the speed limit is 50 miles per hour. She said traffic accidents and jack-knifed trucks are routine on the roadway during the winter months."