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Germany’s Asse Rad Dump 

Nukewatch Quarterly Fall 2013

A new law in Germany requires the cleanup of 126,000 barrels of various types of radioactive waste dumped into the defunct Asse II salt mine in Lower Saxony. The century-old Asse salt mine shut down in 1964, then barrels of waste were dumped in its cavities. The Munich-based German Research Center for Environmental Health flooded the salt mine with a magnesium chloride solution in 2007 raising citizen concern for area drinking water. Since the ‘70s, the barrels have likely been rusting, seeping and off-gassing. Slow, exploratory drilling through a 66-foot-thick wall is underway to assess the radioactive and potentially explosive environment in the first of 13 chambers. After seven months of work not a single chamber has been found, perhaps because the salt moves continuously. Workers stand in a hermetically sealed space to prevent the spread of radiation. The prospective schedule for removing the radioactive waste says it will take at least until 2033 and carry a price tag of $5.3 billion. No new repository site for the waste has been selected. — Deutsche Welle, May 20 & Der Spiegel, Feb. 21, 2013

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Profiteering Doctors Overusing Dangerous CT Scans

Nukewatch Quarterly Fall 2013

DAVIS, California — New research published in June’s American Medical Association journal Pediatrics suggests that one year’s worth of CT scanning in the United States “would produce 4,879 future cancers in children under 15.” Lead author Diana Migliorette, from the University of California, Davis, found that in seven US health care systems, four million CT scans were conducted on children under age 15 between 1996 and 2010. Averaging the dose of radiation delivered, the scientists found that as many as 25 percent (one million) of the children got 20 millisieverts or more from a single abdominal scan. A chest X-ray’s average dose is only 0.1 millisieverts. 

In a related shocker, Congressional investigators from the Government Accountability Office report that doctors with a financial interest in radiation treatment centers are “much more likely to prescribe such treatments for prostate cancer” than those without stock in the facilities. The GAO said that even though alternate treatments may be just as effective and less expensive, a similar pattern of docter-recommended but unnecessary scans is evident, “when doctors owned laboratories and imaging centers that billed Medicare for CT scans…” 

Senator Max Baucus, D-Montana, told the Times, “When you look at the numbers in this report, you start to wonder where health care stops and profiteering begins.” Representative Sander Levin, D-Michigan, said “this analysis confirms that financial incentives, not patients’ needs, are driving some referral patterns.” 

— New York Times, July 16 & Aug. 19; NationalPublic Radio, June 11, 2013

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Radioactive Pizza Returns to Home Territory

Nukewatch Quarterly Fall 2013

CUMBRIA, England — A pizza delivered to the Italian Embassy in London could have had an expiration date of 26,005. Eight years after Cumbrians Opposed to a Radioactive Environment (CORE) delivered the “Cumbriana” pizza — topped with contaminated seaweed and soil — to the Italian Embassy, it has returned to home territory. The pizza has now been disposed of at the Drigg low-level waste dump near where it was created. The toppings, cesium, americium and plutonium., were collected from a footpath near the Esk River estuary, six miles south of the highly contaminated Sellafield site on England’s west coast. The “pizza delivery” action by CORE spotlighted the importation from Italy of highly radioactive waste reactor fuel to Sellafield/ Levels of radiation on the pizza exceeded Italy’s allowable contamination limits. Sellafield is responsible for massive contamination and huge waste stockpiles. The Environment Agency collected the pizza from the Italians in 2005 and held it at the Atomic Energy Research Establishment at Didcot, Oxford for eight years. — CapitalBay Online, May 1; The Mirror, May 2; Whitehaven News, Apr. 18, 2013

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Austrian Workers Contaminated with Americium

Nukewatch Quarterly Fall 2013

SEIBERDORF, Austria — The Austrian firm Nuclear Engineering Seiberdorf consults on decommissioning, safety, operations and decontamination of nuclear sites and materials. In spite of its expertise, two employees were contaminated with americium-241 on May 3. Americium-241, a beta radiation emitter, has a half-life of 432 years. The workers opened a mislabeled transport container and had to be hospitalized after coming into contact with the radioactive material. The mislabeled container came from the Institute of Chemistry and Radiochemistry at the University of Innsbruck, which, two weeks after the Seiberdorf accident, was itself found to be tainted with the isotope. Two workers at the Institute were also contaminated. The contamination at Seiberdsdorf is widespread enough that the building where the incident occurred will need to be demolished and rebuilt at a cost of $662,000. 

— Austrian Times, May 5; Austrian Independent, May 23; IAEA, May 24, 2013

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DOE Transport Contaminated with Plutonium

Nukewatch Quarterly Fall 2013

HANFORD, Washington — The Washington State Department of Health is investigating the discovery of radioactivity outside the plastic packaging of a recent shipment from the Hanford Site. Contaminated “glove boxes” — used to manipulate plutonium during past nuclear weapons production — arrived at Perma-Fix Northwest in Richland, Washington, a company that prepares rad waste for disposal. On June 19, state regulators were informed of the plutonium contamination, but according to Perma-Fix, no plutonium escaped the garage where the waste was unloaded. A report uncovered by King 5 News in Seattle tells a different story. 

According to the state health department, the truck’s rigging system, a forklift and several spots at Perma-Fix were contaminated with plutonium. Workers weren’t wearing protective clothing when handling the packages. The Energy Department (DOE), which runs the US nuclear weapons program, said the plutonium contamination was minor and that liability for the contamination rested not with the DOE but with Perma-Fix and the state. The accident followed one in March 2012, when a mislabeled container from Hanford, caused a radioactive spill on a concrete floor which then had to be jackhammered, packaged and disposed of as radioactive waste. Perma-Fix has a $23 million contract for waste disposal with the DOE at Hanford. — King 5 News, July 2 & 30 & June 15; Seattle Times, June 26; Tri-City Herald, June 25 & 28, 2013 

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