Summary: $/Person-Rem

["John R. Laferriere 671-8316" <John.R.Laferriere@dupontpharma.com>]

Radsafers:

Thanks to everyone who responded to the question I posted a week ago regarding 
an appropriate monetary valuation of a person-rem saved in an occupational dose 
ALARA effort.  I will try to summarize your feedback and some interesting 
questions raised.

Most of the references people mentioned cited values for PUBLIC dose, which 
ranged from $40 to $2000 per rem saved.  One good reference which came across 
on a private email was the February '97 Health Physics journal (Estimated cost 
of person-sievert exposure, C.F.Guenther and C. Thein, vol. 72, No. 2), which 
derives values ranging from $180 to $6300, with a best estimate of $2000/rem.  
This paper also states that the NRC has recently revised their recommended 
value up to $2000/rem of public dose.  

As far as real values being used in an occupational setting, the most concrete 
information came from folks in the nuclear power industry, who quoted values 
ranging from a minimum of $5k to a maximum of $27k for actual occupational 
ALARA engineering decisions.  The widely accepted average value seems to be 
$10k.  These values are pretty inevitable if you have to hire extra people to 
finish a high dose job.

Although I don't have ready access to all the references cited, what I didn't 
see right off the bat was a NRC recommended value for OCCUPATIONAL dose.  Does 
one exist?  Perhaps it is assumed that the public dose value will be adequate 
for occupational dose as well.  The obvious question raised by this and by 
several radsafers is, should there be a difference in value assigned for public 
vs occupational dose?  On the one hand, it could be argued that public dose is 
involuntary and received by individuals of all ages, and industries should 
therefore spend more to prevent it.  On the other hand, routine public dose 
from effluents is almost always much less than a millirem per person, whereas 
occupational dose can reach 2-5 rem per person, depending on what country you 
work in.  To me, 10,000 members of the public getting 0.1 millirem is less of a 
concern risk-wise than one worker getting 1000 millirem.  (I guess my assumed 
threshold is somewhere between 0.1 and 1000 mrem/yr.)

Another issue raised by a few (anti-LNT's?) was "Can you justify spending money 
to reduce dose when there is no proof of detriment at occupational dose 
levels?"  As an HP working at a site with significant occupational exposures, 
my answer to that is that regardless of the LNT debate, ALARA is a regulatory 
requirement.  There is an expectation on the part of both the regulators and 
workers that opportunities for dose reduction be seriously considered and 
pursued when the overall economics (value of dose saved, plus productivity 
enhancements, plus reduced operating costs, etc) look reasonable.  To me, 
$2000/rem is reasonable.  Facilities with tighter budgets and/or lower doses 
may reach different conclusions.

Here are a few interesting exercises to try:

1. If you were a radiation worker getting 2 rem per year, how much would you 
expect your employer to spend if they had an opportunity to cut your dose in 
half with enhanced engineered controls?  How much would you be willing to pay 
out of your own pocket to cut your dose in half, if you were a self-employed
radiation worker?  (True hormesis believers will pay to get MORE dose.)

2. Divide your total radiation protection budget by your site's total 
person-rem/yr and see what is currently being spent to manage the dose and 
safety program necessitated by the presence of radioactive materials.

The bottom line seems to be that, although there is no single number applicable 
to all sites and all situations, $2000/rem seems like a reasonable value that's 
useable without any additional justification to help assess whether a proposed 
ALARA effort or facility modification makes sense.  Industries with deep
pockets and more extreme dose control challenges will use much higher values.

*I would have used person-sieverts, but I didn't know the S.I. unit for money!

John R. Laferriere, CHP
Medical Imaging Division,
DuPont Pharmaceuticals Company
john.r.laferriere@dupontpharma.com
(978) 671-8316

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