Chuck Darwin
@cdarwin@c.im
Social and economic justice, technology and tennis. I'll have what @jbf1755 is having. searchable
c.im
The Trump administration is seeking to scrap a decades-old radiation safety principle
that requires companies and institutions using radioactive materials to keep radiation exposure as low as reasonably possible,
even when it is already below legal safety limits.
The proposed change by the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) was published in the Federal Register on July 15.
It would replace the long-standing
"As Low As Reasonably Achievable" ( #ALARA ) principle with a
"graded approach," which the NRC says reduces ambiguity.
The NRC says the changes could allow companies building smaller reactors to act quicker,
without changing the standards for exposure to workers or the public
While critics question whether removing ALARA could raise permissible doses in certain cases
Edwin Lyman, the director of nuclear power safety at the nonprofit Union of Concerned Scientists, argued in a statement that removing ALARA could result in nuclear facility workers and members of the public being exposed to higher levels of radiation than under the current framework.
"In eliminating its use of the ALARA principle, the agency's sweeping new proposed rule would allow nuclear facility workers and the general public to be exposed to higher levels of cancer-causing radiation just to save the nuclear industry money," Lyman said.
"Cancer rates are already rising among younger people, and this change can only increase the risk."
Lyman said that he believed the NRC should improve, rather than eliminate, ALARA,
and noted that the existing principle does allow trade-offs and does not expect radiation exposures to be as low as possible regardless of cost or practicality.
https://www.newsweek.com/trump-admin-moves-to-scrap-50-year-us-radiation-safety-standard-12247989