Watching for radiation - Detectors at landfills uncover trace amounts

[Susan L Gawarecki <loc@icx.net>]

Watching for radiation - Detectors at landfills uncover trace amounts



By Kathryn Balint 

UNION-TRIBUNE STAFF WRITER

http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/metro/20030606-9999_2m6radiate.html

June 6, 2003



Something in a city trash truck about to enter the Miramar Landfill

yesterday set off the dump's radiation detector, an occasional event

that this time drew some media attention.



Watched by camera crews and reporters, county authorities determined

that the likely source of the radiation was household waste from a

thyroid patient treated with iodine-131, a radioactive element.



They decided it would be safe to bury the truckload in the landfill

rather than dig through the trash to find the cause.



All public landfills in the county have radiation detectors to help keep

out highly radioactive materials. But radiation is found naturally in

low doses everywhere – in water, the human body and even bananas.



Until recently, the state allowed waste that exposed a person to 25

millirems of radiation per year – about the same amount as from three

chest X-rays – to be buried in public landfills.



But then came the discovery in 2002 that Boeing's Rocketdyne laboratory

in

Ventura County had dumped tons of waste with very low levels of

radioactivity at three Los Angeles city landfills.



The outcry over the Rocketdyne waste prompted state legislation that

would have prohibited industrial waste with even trace amounts of

radiation from going to public sites.



Gov. Gray Davis vetoed the legislation, but banned industrial disposal

until the state could develop its own standards.



It's not known how much radioactive waste has ended up in public

landfills across the state.



To get a rough idea, the state Water Resources Control Board last year

for the first time ordered testing at 50 of the state's 500 landfills.



The results showed radioactivity above drinking water standards in or

near 34 landfills, including six in San Diego County.



The radioactive element tritium showed up in levels seven to 15 times

that

allowed in drinking water in the leachate, or liquid, that seeped to the

bottom of the Miramar Landfill, Sycamore Canyon Landfill near Santee and

Las Pulgas Landfill at Camp Pendleton.



Other radioactive elements – uranium, alpha particles, beta particles

and radium – were found at levels several times above drinking water

standards in the groundwater near those three landfills, as well at the

Ramona Landfill, San Onofre Landfill at Camp Pendleton and the Otay

Landfill near Chula Vista.



The source, however, is not known and could be natural, authorities

said.



William Rukeyser, spokesman for the California Environmental Protection

Agency, said the results are "not worth getting alarmed about" but

warrant

further investigation.



No one can say for sure where the radiation is coming from.



Otto Raabe, University of California Davis professor emeritus and an

expert on the health effects of radiation, suspects that luminescent

signs or wristwatches with luminous dials contributed to the tritium

levels at the three local landfills.



"It's obviously coming from something man-made," he said.



Raabe said that radium-226 found at levels three times the drinking

water standard in the Miramar leachate could have come from luminous

dials on old

gauges or naturally from the dirt that is used to cover the trash.



While there's no evidence the radioactivity in the landfills has harmed

anyone, the discovery has fueled an ongoing debate about whether it's

safe to bury waste emitting even trace amounts of radiation in public

landfills instead of at licensed radioactive waste sites.



There is no question that high doses of radiation thousands of times

above an average person's exposure can damage cells or even kill.



But representatives of hospitals, biotech research laboratories and

nuclear power plants that use radioactive materials say there is no

proof that tiny doses pose any health risk at all.



Anti-nuclear activists say even small amounts of radiation in municipal

landfills pose an unacceptable health hazard.



Terry Ghio, who represents BIOCOM, a San Diego trade group of

universities,

research institutions and biotechnology companies, pointed out that

everyone is exposed to radiation continuously. The average San Diegan

gets a dose of 300 millirems a year.



She said it's almost impossible to distinguish between material with

very low levels of natural radiation and that which is caused by

industrial activity.



Some waste generated by industry contains no more radiation than what

naturally occurs in a banana or dirt, Ghio said.



"You don't want something that's going to harm the public going into the

local landfills," she said. "We all agree on that. But what we need to

do is not go overboard here. Let's enter into a scientific debate and

come up with a standard."



Although Ghio sits on the San Diego Regional Water Quality Control

Board,

which ordered the radioactivity tests at local landfills, she said her

comments are not made as a member of that board.



Anti-nuclear activist Daniel Hirsch, president of the Los Angeles-based

Committee to Bridge the Gap, said that putting even slightly

contaminated waste in public landfills increases the risk of cancer for

landfill workers and nearby residents.



"It is completely inappropriate for the nuclear industry to try to save

money by not sending radioactive wastes to places intended for those

wastes, thus increasing the risks to local residents," he said.



Some types of contaminated waste remain radioactive for hundreds or

thousands of years, requiring special facilities to contain it.



There are no licensed disposal sites in the nation for the highest

levels of radioactive waste: spent fuel from nuclear power plants. A

facility is planned for Nevada.



Low-level radioactive waste, such as protective clothing, tools, rags

and medical tubing, goes to one of only two sites in the country, in

South Carolina or Utah.



Waste from nuclear facilities that emits very low amounts of radiation –

25

millirems or less per year – is considered safe for municipal landfills

in 46 states.



The radiation detectors guarding the gates of San Diego-area landfills

are

inconspicuous posts.



On the rare occasion the alarm at Sycamore Canyon Landfill goes off, the

first suspect is the trash truck's driver. Anyone who has undergone

medical diagnostic tests using radioactive materials can emit enough

radioactivity to set off the alarm, said landfill general manager Neil

Mohr.



Diapers from babies or adults who have undergone medical treatment with

a

radioactive material have sometimes been the culprit at Miramar. That's

what county environmental health specialists suspect was in yesterday's

load of trash from Chollas View that caused all the excitement.



County health physicist Ron Yonemitsu said the iodine-131 that was the

likely source of radiation yesterday decays more rapidly than most

radioactive waste and that all traces should be gone within three

months.



Kathryn Balint: (619) 293-2848; kathryn.balint@uniontrib.com

-- 

.....................................................

Susan L. Gawarecki, Ph.D., Executive Director

Oak Ridge Reservation Local Oversight Committee

102 Robertsville Road, Suite B, Oak Ridge, TN 37830

Toll free 888-770-3073 ~ www.local-oversight.org

.....................................................

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