Radiation filtering proposed for water

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

Radiation filtering proposed for water

(Washington Post, March 11, 2004)

Option favored for subdivision



Charles County officials proposed a solution this week to eliminate 

radiation from the Chapel Point Woods community water supply by 

installing a pressurized filtration system.



In a meeting Monday night at the Bel Alton Volunteer Fire Department, 

the Charles County Board of Commissioners discussed the radiation 

problem in the 95-house subdivision with officials from the Maryland 

Department of the Environment and the county health and public utilities 

departments.



In February, the Department of the Environment sent commissioners a 

letter outlining three options to clean the water, which has tested 

about three times above the federal standard for gross alpha radiation. 

The options included drilling a new well, using an ion exchange system 

that feeds sodium into the water and precipitates impurities, or 

installing the reverse osmosis filtration system.



"Because of the uncertainty of drilling the well and because of the 

problems of adding sodium or salt to water, which causes other health 

risks in cases, we've decided that the surest bet is the reverse 

osmosis," said commissioners President Murray D. Levy (D-At Large).



Residents of Chapel Point Woods were first alerted to the elevated 

radiation levels in October. But the cause of the radiation, which comes 

from three wells that tap the Patapsco aquifer, had been a mystery to 

state and local officials until recently. Tests by the National 

Institute of Standards and Technology in Gaithersburg found that 

polonium and radium, naturally occurring elements, were likely 

responsible for the radioactivity, Department of the Environment 

officials said.



The filtration system will take nine month to a year to complete, 

officials said. After the briefing at Monday night's meeting, Levy said, 

"If there are no objections, we'll get started immediately."



Ben Movahed, an engineer with Watek Engineering Corp., said the 

filtration system would cost about $200,000. Levy said that the cost 

would be borne by the users but that he did not expect any significant 

increase in water rates.



One explanation for the detection now of elevated radiation levels is 

that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's rules for water-quality 

testing changed four years ago, said Nancy Reilman, division chief of 

the state Department of the Environment's water-supply program. Under 

the old procedures, water samples sat for about a year to 18 months 

before being tested, she said. Because polonium has a relatively short 

half-life, about 138 days, the element broke down before testing and had 

not been identified, she said.



The first wells in Chapel Point Woods were installed in the mid-1980s, 

said Jerome L. Michael, the county's director of public utilities. 

Reilman said the radiation likely was there all along but uncovered only 

with the newer tests.



The subdivision's water supply tested at an average of 39.4 picocuries 

per liter of gross alpha radiation during nine tests, well above the 15 

pCi/l federal standard. Phil Heard, a state health adviser, said the 

levels were "well within the range of normal background radiation and 

generally create a small risk, though there is a risk nonetheless."



No other area in the county was found to have elevated radiation, 

officials said.



Paul Charp, a senior health physicist at the federal Agency for Toxic 

Substances and Disease Registry in Atlanta, said that at much higher 

levels, polonium has been known to lead to bone cancer, soft tissue 

tumors and lymphomas in animals. He said the International Agency for 

Research on Cancer, under the World Health Organization, says 

information is inadequate to classify polonium as a carcinogen in humans.



"There's just not enough information out there," Charp said. He cited a 

study from 1969 that looked at 10 children who ingested polonium and 

were followed for 46 months. The researchers noticed no changes in the 

children's general health, he said.



Reilman said that her department never told Chapel Point Woods residents 

to stop drinking the water because the radiation was not at acute levels 

and that any potential health problems were associated with lifetime 

consumption of 70 to 80 years.



At Monday's meeting, residents were generally pleased that a solution 

seemed at hand.



Jody Nyers, a member of the Chapel Point Woods homeowners association, 

said she was concerned that some people might have been drinking the 

contaminated water for many years.



"But when you only find out now, what can you do about it?" she said. 

(complete text)



-- 

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

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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