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وكالة حماية البيئة الأمريكية تتدخل في موضوع نشر النفايات المشعة بالقصيم
From: Setlow.Loren@epamail.epa.gov < Setlow.Loren@epamail.epa.gov >
Date: Oct 18, 2007 6:17 PM
Subject: Drinking Water Treatment Residuals
To: save our environment <save.our.qassim@gmail.com>
Cc: Shields.Glenna@epamail.epa.gov, Nawar.Madeleine@epamail.epa.gov
Dear Qassim,
This is in response to your recent request to EPA for assistance
concerning radiation contamination from water treatment wastes at
Buraydah, Saudi Arabia. We appreciate your effort to provide background
information on this and related sites, as well as the independent
consultants' report on levels of radiation at these locations. While
having a copy of the complete consultant's report would have been
helpful, our assistance to you is limited to providing information on
United States and international standards/guidance for radiation
protection and radioactive waste management for contaminated drinking
water treatment residuals.
Drinking water treatment residuals, such as greensands and activated
charcoal, which are contaminated with radium, uranium, and other
radionuclides may only be disposed in certain facilities in the United
States. The most commonly approved locations, depending on radiation
levels, are sanitary sewers if the sewer facility is willing to accept
the waste, on-site lagoons, deep underground formations (injection
wells), or licensed radioactive waste disposal facilities. Our report "A
Regulator's Guide to Management of Radioactive Residuals from Drinking
Water Treatment Technologies" discusses the U.S. EPA recommendations
for, among other things, handling and disposal of contaminated wastes
from that industry. You may obtain a copy of the ******** on the
Internet at: http://www.epa.gov/radiation/docs/te...6-r-05-004.pdf
Dumping of radioactive wastes in open fields is viewed as inappropriate
in the United States and by international advisory bodies such as the
International Atomic Energy Agency. We could not determine from the
supporting material you provided whether any members of the public are
living adjacent to the wastes or holding facilities containing the
drinking water residuals. However, the recommended radiation protection
standard from the International Conference on Radiological Protection is
to limit radiological exposures for a member of the public to 1
millisievert/year or lower from all sources of radiation (excluding
background, such as radon) and all exposure pathways. In the United
States we strive to reduce risks from individual sources of controllable
radiation such that an individual has a risk of dying from cancer of
less than 1 in 10,000 to 1 in 1 million as a result of such exposures.
While we could not verify the results, if radiation measurements cited
in the consultants' report for most of the sites are accurate, the
levels could be potentially hazardous for the risk of cancer over a
period of many years to any member of the public who lives in the
immediate vicinity of the waste sites, or were to build a home on such a
site. The risk of direct exposure to the radiation or ingestion of
suspended radioactive particles in the air directly at the sites would
be much greater than for someone who lives at increasingly farther
distances away and would only be exposed to suspended windblown
particles.
Removal of the wastes to an approved and licensed site, and cleanup of
the site to background levels of radiation would be one preferred option
for remediation in the United States. However, we are not as familiar
with the appropriate legal requirements for such contaminated sites
Regards,
(Mr.) Loren Setlow