Ottawa conference Sr-90 study update

["Franta, Jaroslav" <frantaj@aecl.ca>]

At 07:21 PM 7/26/99 -0700, you wrote:
>Here is my letter to the editor of this paper:
>
>The Ottawa Citizen published this without verifying its accuracy. This
>tabloid journalism raises people's stress levels, making them sick. I
>believe that you have caused more illness than the nuclear plants.
>
>John Hughes
>jsong123@home.com
>San Clemente, California
>
NUCLEAR NEWS FLASHES - Friday, July 30, 1999
--A CANADIAN REGULATOR SHARPLY DIFFERED WITH THE CO-AUTHOR OF A U.S. STUDY.
Janette Sherman told an Ottawa conference earlier this week that a Long
Island study linked increased strontium-90 levels to breast cancer. Robi
Chatterjee, head of the Atomic Energy Control Board's health physics
division, said, "I have not seen any reference that links breast cancer with
strontium-90, but the level of strontium-90 we have sampled in milk amounts
to something like 10 microsieverts [1mrem] effective [annual] dose compared
with our
regulatory limit of 5,000 microsieverts [500mrem], that is about a fifth of
1% of the
regulatory limit." Chatterjee cited milk samples taken in proximity to
Ontario Power Generation's Darlington, Pickering, and Bruce stations in the
1992-98 period.
<><><><><><><><>

also,
> Eisenbud's Environmental Radioactivity, 4th Ed., has a pretty
> comprehensive review of the Sr-90 fallout situation in chapter 9 (pp. 291
> to
> 306); huge atmospheric H-bomb tests such as Bravo, in the Marshall
> Islands,
> sent a great deal of fallout over North America, but deposition rates
> there
> varied a lot, depending on local climates - eastern N.America, incl. New
> York, got more than San Francisco, because of the latter's drier weather,
> etc.; for instance (Table 9-4), in 1982 the dietary intake of Sr-90 in
> N.Y.
> was 1,978pCi (73Bq), whereas that of San Franciscans was only 967 pCi
> (36Bq); in 1966, New Yorkers were getting 7,170pCi (42% of it due to milk,
> 22% due to bread, 25% due to potatoes & vegetables), but the Soviets were
> getting 12,990pCi (55% of it due to black bread, 12% due to milk and 20%
> due
> to potatoes & vegetables); the highest concentration of Sr-90 in milk ever
> reached in N.Y. was in 1963, at 25pCi per gram of Calcium (930Bq/kg-Ca);
> maximum Sr-90 in adult human bones in N.Y. was 2.2pCi/gm-Ca in 1965,
> declining to just under 1.0pCi/gm-Ca in 1982; by way of a comparison,
> natural radioactive substances have the following concentrations relative
> to
> their non-radioactive kin:
> Potassium-40: 30,000Bq/kg-K
> Carbon-14:          220Bq/kg-C
> ( 1 Bq = 27 pCi )
> 
jaro
frantaj@aecl.ca
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