FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: January 9, 2008

DRI Publishes Results of Radioactive Waste Transportation Study
Researchers will share results at public meeting of advisory board

LAS VEGAS – David Shafer and Julianne Miller from the Desert Research Institute will be presenting their study “Characterizing Potential Exposure to the Exposure to the Public from Low-Level Radioactive Waste Transportation by Truck” to the Citizens Advisory Board for Nevada Test Site Programs, Thursday, Jan. 10 in Pahrump. The researchers will answer questions about the study after their presentation. The meeting is open to the public.

WHO: Citizens Advisory Board for Nevada Test Site Programs
WHAT: DRI Transportation Study presentation
WHERE: Bob Ruud Community Center, State Route 160, Pahrump
WHEN: Thursday, 6 p.m.

DRI’s study, published in the December 2007 issue of “Health Physics, The Radiation Safety Journal” addresses public concern about potential exposure to gamma radiation from legal-weight low-level radioactive waste (LLW) truck shipments to the Nevada Test Site. Radiation measurements from the trucks were made with an automated array of four pressurized ion chambers (PIC) that was established for trucks to pass through before they entered the Nevada Test Site. Data was collected from 1,012 trucks used to ship LLW to the Nevada Test Site for disposal in 2003.

“For 483 trucks (nearly half of the survey) calculated net exposure values were equal to less than background radiation, indicating that there was no potential exposure to the public from the trucks,” said David Shafer, Director of the Frank H. Rogers Center for Environmental Remediation and Monitoring.

Cumulative exposure scenarios appropriate for rural transportation routes to the Nevada Test Site were developed, although these scenarios assumed the unlikely case that the same individual was exposed to all of the trucks on a particular route.

“For these scenarios, only a small percentage of the trucks measured dominated the potential cumulative exposure, but even these trucks were well below U.S. Department of Transportation limits for radioactive waste transport,” said Julianne Miller, an Assistant Research Hydrologist at DRI.

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