Not to cite a lot of problems without any suggestions, I
recommend that a white paper be developed that clarifies DOE's
position on radiation protection policy as applied to the
Marshalls along with answers to the questions on the total
radiation exposure experience on Rongelap.
A good source of
- yadiological data and advice on these exposures and their
implications is available at Brookhaven National Laboratory
(see Attachment 11).
Translation into Marshallese would be
needed, the Environmental Protection Agency should be
informed, and the paper provided to the Marshallese through
Dol.
I further recommend that there is a valuable lesson in the
creation of this situation that needs to be told.
Regardless
of interests that were served, and certainly not those of the
Marshallese, from a health physics viewpoint, transfer of a
unique radiological safety program to DP/NV, a program that
required a high degree of coordination and cooperation between
DOE, DOI, and EPA at the Washington level, was a mistake.
DP's interest in the program appears to have been primarily
the altruistic interests of one person who wanted to change
radiological rules used in the Marshalls,
rules that were
causing hardships through loss of use of contaminated land.
EP's ignoble interest in transferring the program to DP was
apparently to get rid of a hot potato, and had nothing to do
with Safeguard C.
The result is a new low in the annals of
radiation protection standards implemention that should serve
as a warning to those who follow narrow self-serving
interests.
ee
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| orm T. Ll baeed
Tommy F. McCraw
Health Physics
Radiological Controls Division
Office of Nuclear Safety
Attachment
9081551