Re: 15 or 25 mrem per year?

[John Jacobus <crispy_bird@YAHOO.COM>]

While the NRC may (or may not) accept the LNT, their regulations are based on ALARA, which says that costs to reduce exposures are to be weighted against benefits gained.  I think that they represent two difference philosophies of action.  Do others see it this way?



BLHamrick@AOL.COM wrote:In a message dated 2/12/2004 1:20:26 PM Pacific Standard Time, jjcohen@PRODIGY.NET writes:

Of course I agree with your assessment of the situation --- and I

suspect the vast majority of radiation safety professionals would also

agree. If this is the case, perhaps someone can explain how such

regulations, that are clearly not in the best public interest, evolve into

public policy. Is something wrong with the system?

First I want to make perfectly clear that today is a holiday for California State employees.  I am not at work.  I am not supposed to be at work.  I am at home, exercising my right to free speech as a private citizen.

 

That said, I hate to be a broken record, but this problem all goes back to the LNT.  Take this statement from the Public Citizen organization:

 

"The NRC accepts the validity of the linear, no-threshold (LNT) model of human exposure to radioactivity, which holds that "any increase in dose, no matter how small, results in an increase in risk" to human health."

 

Full text at:

http://www.publiccitizen.org/cmep/energy_enviro_nuclear/nuclear_power_plants/reactor_safety/articles.cfm?ID=4439

 

Or, included in any number of environmental organizations' legislative analyses, you will find something like this statement:  "There is no safe level of exposure to ionizing radiation: we must prevent all unnecessary exposures."

 

Full text at:

 

http://www.eany.org/capitolwatch/memos/2002/097.html

 

Even the EPA has fallen prey to this mythology, though I'm guessing that's more a reflection on the large number of non-science policy wonks they hire than the quality of the relatively few hard scientists that work for them:

 

"There is no safe level of radon--any exposure poses some risk of cancer."

 

Full text at:

 

http://www.epa.gov/radiation/radionuclides/radon.htm



 

This is what the public hears and the politicians hear over and over and over.  There is "no safe level."  That derives directly from the use and abuse of the LNT, and it drives the limits to zero.  If the only "safe" level is zero then the difference between 15 and 25 millirem becomes enormous.

 

Barbara, reminding you that I'm at home, because it's a holiday.







+++++++++++++++++++

"The care of human life and happiness . . . is the first and only legitimate object of good government."

Thomas Jefferson



-- John

John Jacobus, MS

Certified Health Physicist

e-mail:  crispy_bird@yahoo.com



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