Commisioner Dicus' Speech

["Rad. Health Unit"<raldrich@emi.com>]

	NRC Commissioner Greta Dicus recently took the opportunity of addressing 
a meeting "oriented to nuclear power plant issues" (Regulatory Information 
Conference, April 2, 1997), to make comparisons between nuclear power plant and 
other radioactive materials programs.  Commissioner Dicus told the largely 
nuclear power audience that:  the average U.S. nuclear power plant worker dose 
is less than that of some categories of materials licensee workers; that while 
NRC has no record of any nuclear power plant operation or incident causing an 
exposure to the public exceeding regulatory limits, "there is a history of 
radioactive materials incidents that have resulted in overexposures of members 
of the public," and that "some of these overexposures were of sufficient 
magnitude to cause acute radiation injuries."

	The examples given of this history are a 1979 industrial radiography 
accident, the 1992 Indiana, Pennsylvania brachytherapy source incident, and a 
1996 Texas incident in which radiography cameras were stolen.  In the 1979 
incident a dislodged radiography source caused localized radiation injuries to 
several people.

	Another materials licensee problem reviewed by Commissioner Dicus is 
loss of control over radiation sources (gauges), and "virtually all of the 
cases" are described as involving sources, or devices containing sources.  She 
did note, however, that contaminated metal scrap was improperly released from a 
U.S. nuclear power plant in 1997.

	The Commissioner also mentioned to this nuclear power-oriented audience, 
that NRC will continue to regulate the use of nuclear materials in medicine and 
"is willing to expand its regulatory responsibilities to include higher risk 
activities involving the use of other sources of radiation in medicine."  She 
gave no information on how NRC proposes to implement this expansion, however, or 
whether anyone wants them to do so.  This seems a peculiar topic to broach to 
this audience in any case.  

	This strikes us overall as a very unusual speech to give to such an 
audience.  We are also puzzled by the repeated comparisons of the selected 
safety records of nuclear power vs. non-nuclear power licensees, which seem very 
much apples and oranges given the differences in the sources used, and in how 
they are used.  We wonder what the point of the speech was:  to make power plant 
folk feel that they are performing better than other materials licensees, to 
spread the word about NRC's plans for expansion?  If it was the latter, perhaps 
a group oriented toward radiation medicine would have been a more appropriate 
and productive audience for this speech.  

	A copy of the full speech can be found in NRC "News Releases" of April 
4, 1997.  We could also send you a copy if you E-mail us your mailing address.  
     
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Rita Aldrich                  "Rad. Health Unit"<raldrich@emi.com>
Principal Radiophysicist       voice:    518-457-1202
NYS Dept. of Labor             fax: 518-457-5545
Radiological Health Unit      
Blg. 12, Rm 457
State Office Campus
Albany, NY 12240
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