Activist Groups Hold Their Own ‘State of the Site’ Meetings
WC Monitor
3/27/2015
Four Pacific Northwest groups are holding their own versions of Hanford State of the Site meetings after learning that the Department of Energy did not plan any this spring. Columbia Riverkeeper, Hanford Challenge, Heart of America Northwest and Washington Physicians for Social Responsibility have organized the meetings in three Washington communities. A meeting has been held in Spokane and meetings are planned in Vancouver and Walla Walla. The DOE Hanford State of the Site meetings have provided a chance for DOE and its regulators to update the public on cleanup progress, and they give workers, retirees and the public a chance to raise issues and ask questions of top Hanford officials. The State of the Site meeting held in the Tri-Cities near Hanford last spring drew a crowd of 250 people with questions about preserving Hanford’s shrub steppe wildland, protecting workers from tank vapors and the shutdown of the Waste Sampling and Characterization Facility, among other topics.
The meetings have been held sporadically in recent years. A series of regional meetings planned in fall 2013 were canceled because the federal government was shut down because of federal budget issues. Previous State of the Site meetings were held in 2011 and 2008, but the Hanford Advisory Board recommended in 2012 that DOE resume annual meetings. The meetings “create a unique environment, unlike the environment one typically finds during more formal public comment periods, for the discussion of Hanford cleanup issues,” the board said in a letter of advice sent to DOE and its regulators. The less formal atmosphere of the State of the Site meetings helps establish the working relationship among DOE and its regulators, the Environmental Protection Agency and the state of Washington, improving understanding when they have formal comment periods and hearings on specific projects, the board said.
DOE to Hold Budget Workshop in Late April
DOE has pointed out that although it has scheduled no State of the Site meetings this year, it will hold a public budget workshop at 5:30 p.m. April 28 at the Richland Public Library. DOE will discuss projects and budgets, which is the same type of information it would discuss at a State of the Site meeting, according to DOE. The meeting is in conjunction with a public comment period that starts April 28 on DOE’s fiscal 2017 budget and cleanup priorities. Budget meetings will not be held in other communities, but people can participate remotely via the internet.
The groups organizing the unofficial State of the Site meetings this spring have scheduled them in communities that have not had many Hanford meetings in the last decade. Hanford cleanup is a statewide and national issue, said Daniel Noonan, project manager for Washington Physicians for Social Responsibility. EPA and the Washington State Department of Ecology have representatives participating and giving presentations at the meetings, and EPA has encouraged DOE to do the same. DOE has no apparent plans now to participate. It has said it is looking at opportunities and resources to see if it makes sense to hold the next round of State of the Site meetings.
Spokane Meeting Had Low Turnout, But ‘Rich Conversation’
The unofficial Spokane meeting this spring had a small turnout — about 10 people — but yielded a “rich conversation,” said Dennis Faulk, EPA Hanford program manager. Questions were asked about the budget, tank vapors, continued delays at the Hanford Waste Treatment Plant, why cleanup takes so long and costs so much, and small modular nuclear reactors, said Dieter Bohrmann, the Department of Ecology lead for Hanford public involvement. Advocates of the small reactors have proposed their use to provide power for the Waste Treatment Plant. “We feel it is important to address public concerns in an open forum, whether hosted by agencies or stakeholder groups,” Bohrmann said. Faulk echoed that, saying any time EPA staff can support a legitimate public meeting, it will. Faulk said he is an advocate of State of the Site meetings, but they fall on DOE to organize and require significant work by DOE.
The agencies planning the unofficial State of the Site meetings this year said in an announcement that environmental cleanup progress had been made, but missed deadlines and worker safety concerns continue to plague Hanford. “Residents through the Pacific Northwest have a huge stake in the cleanup effort at Hanford and we are reaching out to help give them a greater voice in the process,” said Dan Serres, conservation director for Columbia Riverkeeper. It is critical that decisions about how much contamination to clean up and how much to leave behind are informed by community values, said Liz Mattson, outreach director for Hanford Challenge. “Citizen engagement in this process helps to ensure that human health and safety is the highest priority at Hanford, both today and hundreds of years from now, Noonan said. The Vancouver meeting will be held 9:30 a.m. to noon March 28 at the Marshall Community Center. The Walla Walla meeting will be held 7 to 9 p.m. April 29 at the Maxey Auditorium of Whitman College.
Compensation Rules to be Eased for Some Former Site Workers
WC Monitor
3/27/2015
The Advisory Board on Radiation and Worker Health voted unanimously this week to create a new special exposure cohort for employees of Hanford construction contractors from 1984 through 1990 and any subcontractor during that period. The Energy Employees Occupational Illness Compensation Program requires that radiation exposure be estimated to determine if it likely caused cancer and a worker or survivors are eligible for $150,000 in compensation. If too little information is available to estimate exposure for groups of workers, they may be designated a special exposure cohort with eased rules. Workers in those special exposure cohorts can be automatically compensated if they were employed for at least 250 days at Hanford and then developed certain cancers that medical research has linked to radiation exposure.
The advisory board, which was meeting near Hanford this week, next will send a letter to the secretary of Health and Human Services, Sylvia Mathews Burwell, who must accept the recommendation. If Congress does not object within 30 days, the special exposure cohort designation becomes final. The process takes about three months. Then any previously denied claims for people in the special exposure cohort will be screened to see if they qualify for compensation under the eased rules. Hanford already has the eased claim process for most Hanford employees from Oct. 1, 1943, through 1983.
Companies May Not Have Done Adequate Monitoring
The National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health recommended the additional special exposure cohort be approved after questioning whether adequate radiation monitoring was done for construction workers after 1983 through the end of 1990. J.A. Jones Construction Services Co. held the Hanford contract for construction work from 1984 through Feb. 28, 1987, followed by Kaiser Engineers Hanford from March 1, 1987 through the end of 1990. Their employees were assigned to a broad range of work to support research, fuel handling, plutonium processing, decontamination and decommissioning, and reactor outages at Hanford. They worked in N Reactor, the PUREX reprocessing facilities, research laboratories and the Plutonium Finishing Plant.
J.A. Jones appeared to do little monitoring of workers’ internal radiation. Bioassays were sometimes done before workers started a job, but not when the job was completed, said Samuel Glover of the NIOSH Division of Compensation Analysis and Support. When Kaiser took over the construction contract in March 1987, it was with a plan to improve worker monitoring, but a budget shortfall caused the monitoring improvements to be delayed. Not until 1991 did internal radiation monitoring for construction workers become adequate for workers’ radiation exposure to be estimated by the compensation program, according to a NIOSH report.
Hanford prime contractors during the years that would be covered by the possible new exposure cohort were responsible for their own radiological control programs. It is unclear now who was responsible for subcontractor employees from 1984 through 1990 and they are being included in the special exposure cohort. It also is not clear which subcontracted employees performed construction work. J.A. Jones and Kaiser each had a small group of permanent employees they supplemented with other employees, Glover said. Hanford had 300,000 subcontractors during its history, some of them single-person companies, Glover said. From 1984 through 1990, there may have been 60,000 subcontractors.
New SEC Does Not Cover DOE Employees, Prime Contractor Workers
The newly recommended special exposure cohort does not include Department of Energy workers or the workers for prime contractors. The excluded contractors include Battelle, Westinghouse and Hanford Environmental Health Foundation from 1984 through 1990 and Rockwell Hanford Operations, UNC Nuclear Industries and Boeing Computer Services Richland from 1984 through June 28, 1987. The cancers covered by special exposure cohorts, with some restrictions, include bone and renal cancer, some leukemias, lung cancer, multiple myeloma, some lymphomas, and primary cancers of the bile ducts, brain, breast, colon, esophagus, gall bladder, liver, ovary, pancreas, pharynx, salivary gland, small intestine, stomach, thyroid and bladder.
Employees of Kaiser, J.A. Jones and subcontractors who developed cancers not covered by the special exposure cohort may still apply for compensation, and their exposure will be estimated to determine if it likely caused the cancer. The companies did keep records on external radiation exposure. However, one former subcontractor attending the advisory board meeting questioned the reliability of those records. He always left his badge with a dosimeter in his car because it would swing on its cord and get caught if he worked, he said. NIOSH is continuing to look at whether there is adequate information to estimate radiation exposure for other groups of workers after 1983. Knut Ringen, of the Center for Construction Research and Training, told the advisory board the process is taking too long. “These are old workers. They are frail and sick workers. The process has to speed up,” he said.
