Addressing public health risks from operating and closed US nuclear weapons facilities: Social and Environmental Research Institute (SERI)

The legacy of nuclear weapons production, testing, research, and waste management affects the physical and social health of communities throughout the United States. Both radiation and chemical contamination have affected ground and surface waters, air, and soil; in some cases, additional contamination continues. Federal agencies are moving ahead with clean-ups of these sites. Although their success has been mixed, these agencies have made great strides in some cases by removing high levels of contamination to reduce risks to health and the environment.

The objective of this effort is to make current knowledge about the health effects of low-level ionizing radiation more accessible to people who face on-going risks from radiological contamination US nuclear weapons facilities. This is accomplished in two ways: by providing technical assistance to community groups about public health issues from radiological exposures and by studying institutional and social factors in clean-up and long-term stewardship of contaminated sites.

This effort has its origins in the work of the Childhood Cancer Research Institute in the late 1980s. In 1996 the Childhood Cancer Research Institute merged with the George Perkins Marsh Institute, a research center at Clark University in Worcester MA. The result was the creation of the Community-Based Hazard Management Program. Until 2005 the Community-Based Hazard Management Program worked collaboratively with community groups around US nuclear weapons facilities by providing them with technical assistance. The program has addressed environmental and community health issues arising from activities in a number of communities, including California, Idaho, Nevada, New Mexico, Ohio, Texas, and Utah.

Now, SERI is picking up where the Community-Based Hazard Management Program left off.

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Public health risks from radiological contamination at DOE nuclear weapons sites

Recent history has brought increased awareness about environmental contamination caused by and coming from facilities in the US nuclear weapons complex. The declassification of government documents has provided information about accidental and routine releases of hazardous contaminants. Dose reconstruction and epidemiology studies have highlighted the health risks associated with exposures to the contaminants to both workers and the public. Community members nearby facilities are demanding answers about their health. They want to know: What harms might be caused by exposures released during the production and manufacturing of nuclear weapons components? What health effects can occur because of the fallout from nuclear testing? Who is likely to suffer, and when? Who is responsible for the diseases that are appearing among members of their community?

The federal government's recent attempts to answer questions about public and worker health in the nuclear weapons complex are filled with examples of misplaced expectations about what is possible. There is confusion over what the findings from studies can and do tell us, as well as what they cannot tell us. For example, a review of an ATSDR Public Health Assessment for tritium contamination at LLNL (review by Rob Goble and Abel Russ can be found at http://www.trivalleycares.org/), describes how the Agency's treatment of risks from radiation exposure contradicts standard practice as described in the National Academy of Sciences BEIR V report (NRC 1990), in international commissions (ICRP 1991, UNSCEAR 2000), and in ATSDR's own Toxicological Profile for Ionizing Radiation (ATSDR 1999). Specifically, despite a scientific consensus that cancer risk should be considered proportional to dose even at very small doses (known as the 'linear, no-threshold' model of risk) the authors operate under the assumption that there is a threshold for radiation-induced cancer. The threshold that they propose is higher than their dose estimate for a maximally exposed individual; thus they estimate zero risk. The authors did not acknowledge that they are advocating a minority position and provide only a biased review of the available literature that ignores evidence of effects below their proposed threshold. In contrast, using standard methods we found that within the range of uncertainty there was potential for cancer mortality risks that are considered 'significant' in common regulatory practice. Most disturbing was that the report (and it is not a unique example) directly subverts the two key risk management concepts - ALARA (as low as reasonably achievable) and the setting of 'risk-based standards' that have served as cornerstones for the social compact on managing radiological hazards.

Efforts to ensure that the risks from past and current exposures from these sites must involve both local and national stakeholders. The empowerment and protection of a community affected by nuclear contamination are directly dependent upon the community's ability to understand, evaluate, and provide input into the management of complex health hazards of low-level nuclear contamination. The purpose of technical assistance activities is to help local residents better understand the technical issues involved, including what is known about the health effects of low level exposures to ionizing radiation and health assessment methods. National stakeholders must also be engaged, by supporting efforts for meaningful public involvement and bringing voices of local residents into hazard management activities.

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Long-term stewardship of residual contamination

NEW PROJECT: Seth Tuler received an NSF Professional Development Fellowship on factors that enable longterm institutional management systems to anticipate, recognize, and respond to failures (July 2009 - June 2011). This Fellowship is based at Worcester Polytechnic Institute, where Seth is a Research Associate Professor. The Fellowship includes training in groundwater hydrology, fate and transport of contaminants, and other technical issues and a research component where he will investigate longterm stewardship systems in two to three cases (more).

While the US government is making progress on remediation on many of the sites in the US nuclear weapons complex, the enormous challenges of ensuring that maximum removal of contaminants is accomplished and remaining contamination are effectively contained is daunting.

'Clean' is a relative - and highly contested - term, often meaning that contamination is reduced or isolated below some defined standard. It rarely means that contamination (and risk) has been completely eliminated or reduced to background levels. There can be many reasons why contamination is not completely removed - it can be very difficult (or unknown) how to technically remove all contamination. Appropriations from Congress are inadequate. While risks from some contamination will be negligible within a few decades (e.g., tritium), other contaminants such as plutonium and uranium will persist indefinitely.

Thus, a significant challenge for federal, state, and local governments and affected communities is how to create lasting successful arrangements to manage risks from residual contamination. A variety of mechanisms are typically used, including institutional controls to prevent exposures, such as restricting or limiting access and monitoring (e.g., of groundwater contaminant levels and plume dynamics) and engineered barriers to isolate contaminants, such as waste cells or covering contaminated soils with additional layers of fill. Oftentimes these actions are called 'long-term stewardship' (LTS) or 'legacy management.' A better way of describing them, however, is 'very longterm public health and environmental risks from residual contamination.' But, as a society we are in the infancy of understanding how to create and maintain effective ways of protecting public health and environmental resources over long periods from long-lived contaminants. Management of the contaminants is difficult to maintain, especially by centralized government authorities because they rely on the cooperation of many parties at multiple levels of government and there are many factors that can undermine their long-term vigilance. Furthermore, the capacity of technical remedies to perform for long periods of time is largely unknown (e.g., waste isolation cells), in part because the behavior of contaminants is not well understood and in part because of the effects environmental change may have. Finally, we do not have a good understanding of how institutional controls, such as deed restrictions or access restrictions will be maintained over time or what conditions lead to their failure - especially in situations where there is pressure to open such areas to economically lucrative uses (e.g., redevelopment). This is why a committee of the National Academy of Sciences recently argued that all institutional efforts to manage such contaminants will inevitably fail. This means that the arrangements to manage them must effectively monitor for failure and be responsive to failures - with alternatives at the ready to maintain protection of health and the environment.

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Publications and Reports

Tuler, S. 2007. Institutional preferences for justice, avoiding harm, and expertise in public health policy making about the health consequences of iodine-131 nuclear weapons testing fallout. In S. Quigley, A. Lowman, S. Wing (eds.) Ethics of research on health impacts of nuclear weapons activities in the United States. Report from the Collaborative Initiative for Research Ethics and Environmental Health (CIREEH). Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University. Full report also available at CIREEH website.

Russ, A., Burns, C., Tuler, S., and Taylor, O. 2006. Health risks of ionizing radiation: An overview of epidemiological studies. Worcester, MA: Community-Based Hazard Management Program, The George Perkins Marsh Institute, Clark University.(PDF available, report is 11 MB)

Tuler, S. and Webler, T. 2006. Competing perspectives on a process for making remediation and stewardship decisions at the Rocky Flats Environmental Technology Site, Research in Social Problems and Public Policy 13:49-77.

Tuler, S., Webler, T., and Finson, R. 2005. Competing perspectives on public involvement: Planning for risk characterization and risk communication about radiological contamination from a national laboratory, Health, Risk, and Society 7(3):247-266.

Tuler, S., Webler, T., and Tanguay, J. 2003. Perspectives on Public Participation at a Department of Energy Nuclear Weapons Facility, Case Study: Addressing Public Health Risks from Radiological Contamination Released by the Fernald Nuclear Weapons Facility (Ohio). SERI Report 03-003. Greenfield, MA: Social and Environmental Research Institute. (PDF available)

Webler, T. 2002. Radiation Risk Perception and Communication: A Case Study of the Tritium Controversy at Brookhaven National Laboratory. SERI Report 02-002. Greenfield, MA: Social and Environmental Research Institute. (PDF available)

Tuler, S. 2002. Radiation Risk Perception and Communication: A Case Study of the Fernald Environmental Management Project. SERI Report 02-001. Greenfield, MA: Social and Environmental Research Institute. (PDF available)

Tuler, S. (ed.) 2000. Community Guide to Environmental Health Research Methods. Report prepared by the Childhood Cancer Research Institute, Worcester, MA as part of a subcontract with Clark University. 110 pgs.

Tuler, S. (ed.) 1998. Community Health Education Needs Assessment: Status, resources, and needs in communities affected by US nuclear weapons complex facilities. Report prepared by the Childhood Cancer Research Institute, Worcester, MA as part of a subcontract with Clark University. 125 pgs.

Kasperson, R. E., Golding, D., and Tuler, S. 1992. Siting hazardous facilities and communicating risks under conditions of high social distrust, Journal of Social Issues 48(4):161-187.

Tuler, S., Kasperson, R. E., and Ratick, S. June 1988. The effects of human reliability on risk in the transportation of spent nuclear fuel. Report prepared for the Nevada Nuclear Waste Policy Office and Mountain West Research, Inc. by the Center for Technology, Environment, and Development, Clark University, Worcester, MA. 217 pgs.

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			Addressing public health risks from operating and closed US nuclear weapons facilities 278 Main Street, Suite 404, Greenfield, MA 01301 phone: 413-773-9955, fax: 530-348-7325, e-mail:


All material © SERI unless otherwise noted.			Contents Project Objectives Public health risks from radiological contamination at DOE nuclear weapons sites Long-term stewardship of residual contamination Publications and Reports Project Overview The legacy of nuclear weapons production, testing, research, and waste management affects the physical and social health of communities throughout the United States. Both radiation and chemical contamination have affected ground and surface waters, air, and soil; in some cases, additional contamination continues. Federal agencies are moving ahead with clean-ups of these sites. Although their success has been mixed, these agencies have made great strides in some cases by removing high levels of contamination to reduce risks to health and the environment. The objective of this effort is to make current knowledge about the health effects of low-level ionizing radiation more accessible to people who face on-going risks from radiological contamination US nuclear weapons facilities. This is accomplished in two ways: by providing technical assistance to community groups about public health issues from radiological exposures and by studying institutional and social factors in clean-up and long-term stewardship of contaminated sites. This effort has its origins in the work of the Childhood Cancer Research Institute in the late 1980s. In 1996 the Childhood Cancer Research Institute merged with the George Perkins Marsh Institute, a research center at Clark University in Worcester MA. The result was the creation of the Community-Based Hazard Management Program. Until 2005 the Community-Based Hazard Management Program worked collaboratively with community groups around US nuclear weapons facilities by providing them with technical assistance. The program has addressed environmental and community health issues arising from activities in a number of communities, including California, Idaho, Nevada, New Mexico, Ohio, Texas, and Utah. Now, SERI is picking up where the Community-Based Hazard Management Program left off. (back to top) Public health risks from radiological contamination at DOE nuclear weapons sites Recent history has brought increased awareness about environmental contamination caused by and coming from facilities in the US nuclear weapons complex. The declassification of government documents has provided information about accidental and routine releases of hazardous contaminants. Dose reconstruction and epidemiology studies have highlighted the health risks associated with exposures to the contaminants to both workers and the public. Community members nearby facilities are demanding answers about their health. They want to know: What harms might be caused by exposures released during the production and manufacturing of nuclear weapons components? What health effects can occur because of the fallout from nuclear testing? Who is likely to suffer, and when? Who is responsible for the diseases that are appearing among members of their community? The federal government's recent attempts to answer questions about public and worker health in the nuclear weapons complex are filled with examples of misplaced expectations about what is possible. There is confusion over what the findings from studies can and do tell us, as well as what they cannot tell us. For example, a review of an ATSDR Public Health Assessment for tritium contamination at LLNL (review by Rob Goble and Abel Russ can be found at http://www.trivalleycares.org/), describes how the Agency's treatment of risks from radiation exposure contradicts standard practice as described in the National Academy of Sciences BEIR V report (NRC 1990), in international commissions (ICRP 1991, UNSCEAR 2000), and in ATSDR's own Toxicological Profile for Ionizing Radiation (ATSDR 1999). Specifically, despite a scientific consensus that cancer risk should be considered proportional to dose even at very small doses (known as the 'linear, no-threshold' model of risk) the authors operate under the assumption that there is a threshold for radiation-induced cancer. The threshold that they propose is higher than their dose estimate for a maximally exposed individual; thus they estimate zero risk. The authors did not acknowledge that they are advocating a minority position and provide only a biased review of the available literature that ignores evidence of effects below their proposed threshold. In contrast, using standard methods we found that within the range of uncertainty there was potential for cancer mortality risks that are considered 'significant' in common regulatory practice. Most disturbing was that the report (and it is not a unique example) directly subverts the two key risk management concepts - ALARA (as low as reasonably achievable) and the setting of 'risk-based standards' that have served as cornerstones for the social compact on managing radiological hazards. Efforts to ensure that the risks from past and current exposures from these sites must involve both local and national stakeholders. The empowerment and protection of a community affected by nuclear contamination are directly dependent upon the community's ability to understand, evaluate, and provide input into the management of complex health hazards of low-level nuclear contamination. The purpose of technical assistance activities is to help local residents better understand the technical issues involved, including what is known about the health effects of low level exposures to ionizing radiation and health assessment methods. National stakeholders must also be engaged, by supporting efforts for meaningful public involvement and bringing voices of local residents into hazard management activities. (back to top) Long-term stewardship of residual contamination NEW PROJECT: Seth Tuler received an NSF Professional Development Fellowship on factors that enable longterm institutional management systems to anticipate, recognize, and respond to failures (July 2009 - June 2011). This Fellowship is based at Worcester Polytechnic Institute, where Seth is a Research Associate Professor. The Fellowship includes training in groundwater hydrology, fate and transport of contaminants, and other technical issues and a research component where he will investigate longterm stewardship systems in two to three cases (more). While the US government is making progress on remediation on many of the sites in the US nuclear weapons complex, the enormous challenges of ensuring that maximum removal of contaminants is accomplished and remaining contamination are effectively contained is daunting. 'Clean' is a relative - and highly contested - term, often meaning that contamination is reduced or isolated below some defined standard. It rarely means that contamination (and risk) has been completely eliminated or reduced to background levels. There can be many reasons why contamination is not completely removed - it can be very difficult (or unknown) how to technically remove all contamination. Appropriations from Congress are inadequate. While risks from some contamination will be negligible within a few decades (e.g., tritium), other contaminants such as plutonium and uranium will persist indefinitely. Thus, a significant challenge for federal, state, and local governments and affected communities is how to create lasting successful arrangements to manage risks from residual contamination. A variety of mechanisms are typically used, including institutional controls to prevent exposures, such as restricting or limiting access and monitoring (e.g., of groundwater contaminant levels and plume dynamics) and engineered barriers to isolate contaminants, such as waste cells or covering contaminated soils with additional layers of fill. Oftentimes these actions are called 'long-term stewardship' (LTS) or 'legacy management.' A better way of describing them, however, is 'very longterm public health and environmental risks from residual contamination.' But, as a society we are in the infancy of understanding how to create and maintain effective ways of protecting public health and environmental resources over long periods from long-lived contaminants. Management of the contaminants is difficult to maintain, especially by centralized government authorities because they rely on the cooperation of many parties at multiple levels of government and there are many factors that can undermine their long-term vigilance. Furthermore, the capacity of technical remedies to perform for long periods of time is largely unknown (e.g., waste isolation cells), in part because the behavior of contaminants is not well understood and in part because of the effects environmental change may have. Finally, we do not have a good understanding of how institutional controls, such as deed restrictions or access restrictions will be maintained over time or what conditions lead to their failure - especially in situations where there is pressure to open such areas to economically lucrative uses (e.g., redevelopment). This is why a committee of the National Academy of Sciences recently argued that all institutional efforts to manage such contaminants will inevitably fail. This means that the arrangements to manage them must effectively monitor for failure and be responsive to failures - with alternatives at the ready to maintain protection of health and the environment. (back to top) Publications and Reports Tuler, S. 2007. Institutional preferences for justice, avoiding harm, and expertise in public health policy making about the health consequences of iodine-131 nuclear weapons testing fallout. In S. Quigley, A. Lowman, S. Wing (eds.) Ethics of research on health impacts of nuclear weapons activities in the United States. Report from the Collaborative Initiative for Research Ethics and Environmental Health (CIREEH). Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University. Full report also available at CIREEH website. Russ, A., Burns, C., Tuler, S., and Taylor, O. 2006. Health risks of ionizing radiation: An overview of epidemiological studies. Worcester, MA: Community-Based Hazard Management Program, The George Perkins Marsh Institute, Clark University.(PDF available, report is 11 MB) Tuler, S. and Webler, T. 2006. Competing perspectives on a process for making remediation and stewardship decisions at the Rocky Flats Environmental Technology Site, Research in Social Problems and Public Policy 13:49-77. Tuler, S., Webler, T., and Finson, R. 2005. Competing perspectives on public involvement: Planning for risk characterization and risk communication about radiological contamination from a national laboratory, Health, Risk, and Society 7(3):247-266. Tuler, S., Webler, T., and Tanguay, J. 2003. Perspectives on Public Participation at a Department of Energy Nuclear Weapons Facility, Case Study: Addressing Public Health Risks from Radiological Contamination Released by the Fernald Nuclear Weapons Facility (Ohio). SERI Report 03-003. Greenfield, MA: Social and Environmental Research Institute. (PDF available) Webler, T. 2002. Radiation Risk Perception and Communication: A Case Study of the Tritium Controversy at Brookhaven National Laboratory. SERI Report 02-002. Greenfield, MA: Social and Environmental Research Institute. (PDF available) Tuler, S. 2002. Radiation Risk Perception and Communication: A Case Study of the Fernald Environmental Management Project. SERI Report 02-001. Greenfield, MA: Social and Environmental Research Institute. (PDF available) Tuler, S. (ed.) 2000. Community Guide to Environmental Health Research Methods. Report prepared by the Childhood Cancer Research Institute, Worcester, MA as part of a subcontract with Clark University. 110 pgs. Tuler, S. (ed.) 1998. Community Health Education Needs Assessment: Status, resources, and needs in communities affected by US nuclear weapons complex facilities. Report prepared by the Childhood Cancer Research Institute, Worcester, MA as part of a subcontract with Clark University. 125 pgs. Kasperson, R. E., Golding, D., and Tuler, S. 1992. Siting hazardous facilities and communicating risks under conditions of high social distrust, Journal of Social Issues 48(4):161-187. Tuler, S., Kasperson, R. E., and Ratick, S. June 1988. The effects of human reliability on risk in the transportation of spent nuclear fuel. Report prepared for the Nevada Nuclear Waste Policy Office and Mountain West Research, Inc. by the Center for Technology, Environment, and Development, Clark University, Worcester, MA. 217 pgs. (back to top)