Re: Precautionary principle

["Jim Nelson" <nelsonjima@HOTMAIL.COM>]

Ruth,



What would you use as your basis for "no noticeable effect" below?  How 

would you determine whether or not there is an effect?



Jim Nelson



>From: RuthWeiner@AOL.COM

>Reply-To: RuthWeiner@AOL.COM

>To: radsafe@list.vanderbilt.edu

>Subject: Precautionary principle

>Date: Thu, 26 Apr 2001 17:29:01 EDT

>

>This is in response to a request for a reference (I lost the email)

>

>Tengs, et al "Five Hundred Life-saving Interventions and Their Cost

>Effectiveness"  RISK ANALYSIS v. 15, 1995, p. 369 et seq.

>The cost is to save a year of life in the U. S.

>Some examples:

>

>Median  cost: $42,000

>Mandatory auto seat belts: $69

>Benzene standard of 1 ppm v 10 ppm: $240,000

>Chlorination of drinking water: $3100

>Collimators on x-ray equipment: $23,000

>Radiation emission control at NRC-licensed facilities: $2.6E9

>Rad emission control at uranium fuel cycle facilities: $3.4E10

>Chloroform reduction at 33 worst  pulp and paper mills:$9.9E10

>All vaccinations: $<0 (a positive benefit)

>Colorectal cancer screening for people aged 40+: $4500

>

>What would I use?  I'd look at the methods used in the Tengs study, for

>openers, and try to estimate the cost.  Then, I'd use some common sense.  

>If

>people in a community (like mine) have been drinking between 10 and 50 ppm

>arsenic in their drinking water for decades -- generations (the source is

>natural) -- with no noticeable effect at all, I'd look at the cost of

>remediating to 10 ppm (just as the city of Albuq. is doing.

>

>40 CFR Part 191 (which now applies only to the WIPP) is a perfectly

>reasonable standard for a HLW repository.  The allowed releases were based 

>on

>those from an unmined uranium ore body.  It was an expensive standard to

>implement, but not nearly as expensive as the new standard for spent 

>nuclear

>fuel repositories.

>

>Those are the sort of things I would use as guidelines in setting 

>standards.

>Ruth Weiner, Ph. D.

>ruthweiner@aol.com



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