Report No. 146 – Approaches to Risk Management in Remediation of Radioactively Contaminated Sites (2004)

Report No. 146 (2004) identifies and analyzes current guidance and practices used by the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) under the License Termination Rule (LTR) and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) under the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA, commonly known as Superfund) and the National Oil and Hazardous Substances Pollutions Contingency Plan in the remediation of radioactively contaminated sites. The Report identifies, analyzes and summarizes the significant differences and commonalities in current practices of NRC and EPA, and future implications of current practices as they relate to issues of public perception, uncertainty, measurability, and estimation of radiation dose and risk. The Report discusses the importance of involving state regulators and the public in establishing goals for the decontamination of radioactively contaminated sites. Since Superfund applies to contamination by both radioactive materials and chemicals, EPA’s risk management approach uses cancer risk rather than dose, and this leads to some challenges in comparing the two agencies’ approaches. NCRP believes that the seven conclusions set out in Report No. 146 capture the themes that delineate similarities and differences in regulatory approaches to remediation and decommissioning at radioactively contaminated sites used by the two agencies. The Report serves as an in-depth reference for radiation protection professionals interested in risk management practices applied to remediation of radioactively contaminated sites.

Excerpts and Related Information

Table of Contents
Preface
Errata