64 a eo some compromise with safety. Therefore, it is not clear to me why the | potential doses which call for official protective actions (the PAG's) are set 15 to 50 times higher than the normally “acceptable” limits. - What are your thoughts on this matter? Answer 12D The Federal Radiation Council's Radiation Protection Guides were developed us guidelines for the protection of radiation workers and the general public against exposures which might result from routine uses of ionizing radiation. In formulating these guides there was a judgment, or balance, between the possible risks associated with a particular radiation exposure and the reasons for allowing the exposure. The Radiation Protection Guides were set with respect to environmental levels of radioactivity, and they reflect the residual risk considered acceptable after engineering and procedural controls have been applied at the source (i. e., place of origin) of radioactivity to limit releases to the environment. Although radiation doses numerically equal to the Radiation Protection Guides may impose a risk so small that they can be accepted each , year for a lifetime if there is significant benefit from the programs causing the exposure, they do not and cannot establish a line that is safe on one side and unsafe on the other. , . The Memorandum for the President on Radiation Protection Guidance for Federal agencies, duted May 18, 1960, includes the following recommendation by the Federal Radiation Council: "There should not be any man-made radiation exposure without the expectation of benerit resulting from such ex- posure. Activities resulting in man-made radiation exposure should be authorized for useful applications provided the recommendations set forth herein are followed."