STEVEN RAY GREEN AND ASSOCIATES 

NATIONALLY CERTIFIED COURT REPORTERS 

404/733-6070 

THE U.S. DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES 

PUBLIC HEALTH SERVICE 

CENTERS FOR DISEASE CONTROL AND PREVENTION 

NATIONAL INSTITUTE FOR OCCUPATIONAL SAFETY AND HEALTH 

convenes 

MEETING FIFTY-SIX 

ADVISORY BOARD ON 

 

RADIATION AND WORKER HEALTH 

VOL. III 

DAY THREE 

ABRWH BOARD MEETING

 

The verbatim transcript of the 

Meeting of the Advisory Board on Radiation and 

Worker Health held at the Millennium Hotel, 

St. Louis, Missouri, on June 26, 2008. 
2

C O N T E N T S

June 26, 2008 

WELCOME AND OPENING COMMENTS 7 

DR. PAUL ZIEMER, CHAIR 

DR. CHRISTINE BRANCHE, DFO 

SEC PETITION STATUS UPDATES: 7 

BLOCKSON, MS. WANDA MUNN 7 

ROCKY FLATS PLANT, MR. MARK GRIFFON 63 

CHAPMAN VALVE, DR. JOHN POSTON 65 

TEXAS CITY CHEMICALS, DR. PAUL ZIEMER 97 

AREA IV OF SANTA SUSANA FIELD LABORATORY 115 

MR. MICHAEL GIBSON 

CONGRESSIONAL LETTERS 117 

MR. JASON BROEHM 

SUBCOMMITTEE, WORK GROUP REPORTS 129 

WORK GROUP CHAIRS 

BOARD WORKING TIME: 

STATUS OF SELECTION OF BOARD CONTRACTOR 171 

DR. CHRISTINE BRANCHE, NIOSH 

TRACKING STATUS OF TRANSCRIPTS AND MINUTES 173 

DR. CHRISTINE BRANCEH, NIOSH 

FUTURE PLANS AND MEETINGS 173 

DR. PAUL ZIEMER, CHAIR 

RESPONSIBILITIES OF BOARD’S REPRESENTATIVE TO DOE 180 

COURT REPORTER’S CERTIFICATE 193 

 
3

TRANSCRIPT LEGEND

The following transcript contains quoted material. Such 

material is reproduced as read or spoken. 

In the following transcript: a dash (--) indicates 

an unintentional or purposeful interruption of a 

sentence. An ellipsis (. . .) indicates halting speech 

or an unfinished sentence in dialogue or omission(s) of 

word(s) when reading written material. 

-- (sic) denotes an incorrect usage or pronunciation 

of a word which is transcribed in its original form as 

reported. 

-- (phonetically) indicates a phonetic spelling of 

the word if no confirmation of the correct spelling is 

available. 

-- "uh-huh" represents an affirmative response, and 

"uh-uh" represents a negative response. 

 -- "*" denotes a spelling based on phonetics, 

without reference available. 

-- (inaudible)/ (unintelligible) signifies speaker 

failure, usually failure to use a microphone. 
4

 P A R T I C I P A N T S 

(By Group, in Alphabetical Order) 

CHAIR

ZIEMER, Paul L., Ph.D. 

Professor Emeritus 

School of Health Sciences 

Purdue University 

Lafayette, Indiana 

DESIGNATED FEDERAL OFFICIAL

BRANCHE, Christine, Ph.D. 

Principal Associate Director 

National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health 

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention 

Washington, DC 

BOARD MEMBERS

BEACH, Josie 

Nuclear Chemical Operator 

Hanford Reservation 

Richland, Washington 

1 CLAWSON, Bradley 

2 Senior Operator, Nuclear Fuel Handling 

3 Idaho National Engineering & Environmental Laboratory 

GIBSON, Michael H. 

President 

Paper, Allied-Industrial, Chemical, and Energy Union 

Local 5-4200 

Miamisburg, Ohio 

GRIFFON, Mark A. 

President 

Creative Pollution Solutions, Inc. 

Salem, New Hampshire 
5

1 LOCKEY, James, M.D. 

2 Professor, Department of Environmental Health 

3 College of Medicine, University of Cincinnati 

MUNN, Wanda I. 

Senior Nuclear Engineer (Retired) 

Richland, Washington 

POSTON, John W., Sr., B.S., M.S., Ph.D. 

Professor, Texas A&M University 

College Station, Texas 

PRESLEY, Robert W. 

Special Projects Engineer 

BWXT Y12 National Security Complex 

Clinton, Tennessee 

ROESSLER, Genevieve S., Ph.D. 

Professor Emeritus 

University of Florida 

Elysian, Minnesota 

SCHOFIELD, Phillip 

Los Alamos Project on Worker Safety 

Los Alamos, New Mexico 
6

AUDIENCE PARTICIPANTS

 ADAMS, NANCY, NIOSH 

 BREYER, LAURIE, NIOSH 

 BROCK, DENISE, NIOSH 

 BROEHM, JASON, CDC 

 DEGARMO, DENISE, SIUE/DOW 

 HANSON, JOHN, SIUE/DOW 

 HINNEFELD, STUART, NIOSH 

 KOTSCH, JEFF, U.S. DOL 

 LORD, DAN 

 MAHATHY, MIKE, ORAU 

 MARTINETTE, JANICE W., HONEYWELL 

 MAURO, JOHN, SC&A 

 MCFEE, MATTHEW, ORAU 

 MCGOLERICK, ROBERT, HHS 

 MCKEEL, DAN, SINEW/VI NEWS 

 VOLSCH, JOE, SIUE/DOW 

 ZIEMER, MARILYN 
7

P R O C E E D I N G S

(8:30 a.m.) 

WELCOME AND OPENING COMMENTS

DR. PAUL ZIEMER, CHAIR

DR. CHRISTINE BRANCHE, DFO

1 DR. ZIEMER: Good morning, everyone. We're beginning 

2 day three of the Advisory Board on Radiation 

3 and Worker Health meeting here in St. Louis. 

4 We are pretty much on schedule as far as the 

5 agenda is concerned. I am hopeful that we may 

6 be able to get through all of our items very 

7 close to noon, although I can't guarantee that 

8 in advance, but we do ask everyone to move 

9 along efficiently, if possible. 

10 SEC PETITION STATUS UPDATES

11 We're going to begin this morning with a series 

12 of SEC petition status updates, which will 

13 include reports from some of the workgroup 

14 chairs, and also in some cases opportunities 

15 for petitioners to make comments if they are 

16 present on line. 

17 BLOCKSON, MS. WANDA MUNN

18 Our first one is the Blockson SEC petition. 

19 The workgroup chair is Wanda Munn. Wanda, we'd 

20 be pleased to hear your report. 
8

1 MS. MUNN: All right, thank you. 

2 DR. ZIEMER: I should check and see if any of 

3 the Blockson petitioners are on the line this 

4 morning. 

5 MR. GRIFFON: Paul, also, I don't know if Jim -

6 - is Jim on the line? 

7 DR. ZIEMER: Is Jim Melius on the line? 

8 MS. PINCHETTI: This is Kathy Pinchetti. 

9 DR. BRANCHE: She's a petitioner -- 

10 DR. ZIEMER: Thank you. 

11 DR. BRANCHE: -- or an authorized rep. 

12 DR. ZIEMER: Thank you, Kathy. We'll give you 

13 an opportunity to speak in a moment. 

14 MS. MUNN: A quick review of where we are with 

15 Blockson, the members of the workgroup are 

16 myself, Mike Gibson, James Melius, Genevieve 

17 Roessler, and Brad Clawson is our alternate. 

18 Blockson had two SEC petitions and qualified in 

19 2006. The Technical Basis Document which 

20 serves as the site profile was written -- 

21 completely rewritten after the first one, as 

22 was pointed out to you earlier by the NIOSH 

23 presentations with respect to Blockson. Our 

24 technical contractor, SC&A, reviewed the site 

25 profile, the SEC petition and the evaluation 
9

1 report. Following that they issued seven 

2 findings which the Board undertook to resolve. 

3 Those findings -- these are -- were 

4 considerably more lengthy than this. They 

5 involved the default upper bound of the uranium 

6 inhalation rate, the thorium-232 enrichment 

7 ratio in the process stream, the thorium-230 

8 that wasn't included in the exposure matrix, 

9 the possible thorium raffinate stream hadn't 

10 been addressed. There was a concern about 

11 additional data being needed to support radon 

12 values, and there's a -- wanted to verify 

13 possible exposure from the tailings of that 

14 operation, also concern about the trace level 

15 of radium-226 and its progeny. 

16 The behind-the-scenes workgroups went to work 

17 almost immediately in 2006. Our workgroup did 

18 not have its first official meeting until later 

19 in 2007, but as I pointed out initially, the 

20 entire site profile had to be rewritten and the 

21 technical teams were working behind the scenes 

22 all that time. We also had several meetings 

23 with the workers to discuss as much information 

24 as they could recall -- they were extremely 

25 helpful, as a matter of fact. The workers at 
10

1 Blockson had good memory of what the processes 

2 were like and what the structures -- how the 

3 structures were arranged, so it was very 

4 helpful for us. 

5 Each time that we identified information that 

6 was going to bring one of the issues to closure 

7 or would have some major bearing on our 

8 decision, we tried to see that a white paper 

9 was generated so that we would have a long-term 

10 record of what had been found there. We were 

11 very pleased when each one of the seven 

12 findings that SC&A had presented to us were 

13 resolved to the satisfaction of both NIOSH and 

14 the technical contractor, and the chair had 

15 hoped that that would resolve the major issues. 

16 We had addressed additional questions of detail 

17 as they had arisen -- hold on just a moment; 

18 there's someone on the line. 

19 DR. BRANCHE: Yes. We ask that all phone 

20 participants mute their lines. If you do not 

21 have a mute button, then please use star-6. 

22 When you are ready to speak, then please use 

23 the same star-6 to unmute your line. But we do 

24 ask respectfully that you mute your phone until 

25 you are ready to speak. It's important for all 
11

1 phone participants to do so. 

2 Also, if you must leave the line, please do not 

3 put us on hold but rather hang up and dial back 

4 in. Please do not put us on hold. Thank you. 

5 Ms. Munn? 

6 MS. MUNN: As we identified additional issues 

7 that were of concern, we made every effort to 

8 try to address them in a technical manner. In 

9 January I brought this very briefly to the 

10 Board's attention. I had hoped at that time 

11 that we would be able to have the Board address 

12 it. But that attempt was not successful. 

13 There were two additional actions that were 

14 brought at that time. Jim Melius had concerns 

15 about the quality of the data, and indicated 

16 that Mark Griffon also continued to have 

17 concerns with respect to the radon that was 

18 involved on this particular site. So we went 

19 back to the workgroup and undertook to address 

20 those items again and in greater detail. 

21 We had a workgroup meeting earlier this week 

22 with the hope that we could cover all of the 

23 materials that were of concern to those two 

24 issues, because in the workgroup that we had 

25 had subsequent to the January meeting, we went 
12

1 in with two issues and came out with five. We 

2 had addressed those off-line during the interim 

3 and had responses, we thought, to most of it as 

4 we came into this meeting. At this meeting we 

5 only had four of our five workgroup members 

6 present; Jim Melius was not here. Fortunately, 

7 Mark Griffon had joined us as a non-participant 

8 in the workgroup to help address the issues 

9 that he had with respect to radon so that those 

10 could be discussed with the technical people 

11 who were present at the workgroup meeting. 

12 We were not very successful in getting to where 

13 the chair had hoped we would be. We had the 

14 SC&A review before us. We had the NIOSH SEC 

15 report and we had the site profile, all of 

16 which we were attempting to address. At the 

17 close of our meeting -- which we actually had 

18 to split into two different segments because of 

19 some concerns with respect to the ventilation 

20 of the building in question; we were 

21 specifically zeroed in on Building 40 at that 

22 time -- I asked three questions of the 

23 workgroup, which were the focus of the work we 

24 were expected to do. 

25 The questions that I asked first were that SC&A 
13

1 has identified seven findings of significance 

2 in their review of this site. Following 

3 detailed technical investigation and 

4 interaction with experts and workers, they 

5 report all issues resolved. Do you accept this 

6 report? 

7 I asked for an individual vote from each of the 

8 workgroup members, yes or no. I had four yeses 

9 with respect to accepting the report of SC&A 

10 regarding those seven findings. 

11 The next question I asked was: NIOSH has 

12 sought information in depth for all activities 

13 on this site and has reported they have 

14 adequate data to reconstruct or bound radiation 

15 dose for Blockson workers. Do you accept this 

16 report? 

17 The response was two of our members voted yes; 

18 two of our members voted no. 

19 The third question I asked was: The site 

20 profile has been completely rewritten, reviewed 

21 and revised at length. Do you accept the 

22 current site profile? 

23 Two members voted yes; two members voted no. 

24 Mr. Griffon had additional information that he 

25 wanted to address. I requested that he not 
14

1 attempt to address it at this workgroup 

2 meeting; that instead he wait until this 

3 current meeting today and address it as a full 

4 Board member, as I would expect anyone else who 

5 had not been privy to our workgroup sessions. 

6 Because it seems unlikely that additional 

7 information can be brought to bear, because we 

8 have made every effort to interview the workers 

9 and outside experts with respect to this 

10 process and what had transpired there -- you 

11 recall this is a phosphate plant. 

12 It is the -- the chair is taking as her 

13 prerogative to bring to you today the question 

14 which the full Board is going to need to 

15 resolve, one way or another. You've seen the 

16 three questions that have been asked. My 

17 recommendation would have been that we accept 

18 the NIOSH position, because adequate data 

19 exists to reasonably bound with sufficient 

20 accuracy any radiation exposure which should 

21 have resulted from employment at Blockson 

22 Chemical Company during its contract period as 

23 an Atomic Weapons Employer. I bring this to 

24 you with your full knowledge that the workgroup 

25 is divided on this issue, but it needs to be 
15

1 brought to the Board. I would like to make 

2 this in the form of a motion so that it can be 

3 open for debate and that we can bring a 

4 recommendation to the Secretary, if at all 

5 possible. 

6 That's all I have. 

7 DR. ZIEMER: Okay, would you state your motion 

8 again then? 

9 MS. MUNN: My motion is that we accept the 

10 NIOSH position that adequate data exists to 

11 reasonably bound with sufficient accuracy any 

12 radiation exposure which could have resulted 

13 from employment at Blockson Chemical Company 

14 during its contract period as an Atomic Weapons 

15 Employer, and therefore that the SEC that is 

16 before us be denied. 

17 DR. ROESSLER: I second it. 

18 DR. ZIEMER: Since this is not a recommendation 

19 of the workgroup but rather is your own motion, 

20 that -- 

21 MS. MUNN: That's correct. 

22 DR. ZIEMER: -- does require the second; it has 

23 been seconded. 

24 Now before we have discussion I want to allow 

25 the petitioner a chance to make comments. 
16

1 Now who's on the line? 

2 DR. BRANCHE: She said her name when you asked 

3 -- Kathy -- 

4 MS. PINCHETTI: I have nothing. 

5 DR. ZIEMER: Kathleen, are you on the line? 

6 MS. PINCHETTI: I'm on the line. 

7 DR. ZIEMER: Yes, do you have some comments for 

8 us at this point? 

9 MS. PINCHETTI: No, I think I've -- I've said 

10 everything I needed to say. 

11 DR. ZIEMER: Okay, thank you very much, 

12 Kathleen. 

13 Okay, this motion is open for discussion. Any 

14 -- anyone wish to speak for or against the 

15 motion? Or are you ready to vote? The -- the 

16 motion is basically to accept the NIOSH report 

17 that they can do dose reconstruction, and to so 

18 report. This would be a -- would be so 

19 reported to the Secretary. 

20 No discussion -- 

21 MR. GRIFFON: I... 

22 DR. ZIEMER: Mark? 

23 MR. GRIFFON: You know. I -- I did want to 

24 discuss some of the -- the technical details 

25 yesterday in the workgroup level, but that's 
17

1 fine. It's -- it's fine to discuss it here. 

2 I'm -- I'm going to have to vote -- I'm going 

3 to have to speak against the motion right now, 

4 and I -- I -- I say that -- I -- I sort of have 

5 some -- some problems with that myself because 

6 I think we're getting close and I'm getting 

7 close on the radon thing. This radon model -- 

8 or this radon -- some more assessment on the 

9 radon issue was brought to bear -- you know, I 

10 received this pretty technical analysis of the 

11 radon issue based on source term data and 

12 stuff, and variations and (unintelligible). I 

13 mean we looked at some of the stuff, but it was 

14 all brought to us, you know, yesterday or 

15 whatever -- I'm mixing up the days now, but we 

16 received it at this Board meeting and -- and 

17 some of it depends on -- there's a 1983 

18 Blockson survey. It's a 3-page memo re-- you 

19 know, when you start to peel the layers away a 

20 little bit is where I have some concerns, so 

21 you look at a 1983 study. It was a -- a memo. 

22 There's no real -- there -- there's some 

23 assumptions on how the individual went from 

24 counts to working level. There's one working 

25 level reported. We ratioed (sic) them to get 
18

1 the other working levels; that part's fine. 

2 But I just wonder if -- you know, the -- the 

3 pedigree on that -- that study is suspect. 

4 That's one -- that's one part of it for me. 

5 The other part is if I look at the source term 

6 information and -- and I have several questions 

7 on the -- on the -- the picocuries per liter of 

8 radon that could be in the air in this -- 

9 particularly in the work spaces where they -- 

10 where they would likely have been working, and 

11 there's some assumptions in the model that I -- 

12 I have some questions on. Now at the end of 

13 the discussion, you know, people were telling 

14 me well, this mod-- and -- and even further 

15 than that, the -- this SC&A draft that was 

16 given to me, the -- there's a first -- you 

17 know, you walk through the report and there's 

18 some numbers that I can't even corroborate. I 

19 -- I used their on-line tool that they've -- 

20 gave me access again yesterday, and there's 

21 some numbers that I can't corroborate and, you 

22 know, I'm being told well, forget about all 

23 that; really you want to see if it's a factor 

24 of five different than this '83 survey and if 

25 it -- if it isn't, if the ventilation can't 
19

1 affect it by that much, our approach is still 

2 bounding. Well, then you go back to this '83 

3 survey and I say boy, this memo report where 

4 the guy doesn't even describe his method and 

5 has some concluding remark about a working 

6 level, that's what I'm hanging my hat on, so 

7 I'm a little bit -- you know, I know we've been 

8 at this a long time, and I'm not even on the 

9 working group and I've been at it a long time, 

10 but I -- I feel like, you know, to -- to not 

11 take this to the end -- I also think I -- I 

12 have just -- you know, have had discussions 

13 with the contractor and they're -- SC&A and 

14 they're -- they're telling me that well, you 

15 know, reasonably, even if we use this and -- 

16 this or this approach, you know, the highest 

17 value we're probably going to get is 20, 25 

18 picocuries per liter. Right now the 95th 

19 percentile is at 2.3, so that -- that's 

20 different, you know, and -- that's quite a bit 

21 different in my eyes, and that's not on the 

22 table. So I -- I just feel like, you know, why 

23 this -- this -- over a very -- a pretty 

24 technical issue, why this -- this -- you know, 

25 I -- I think I'm cl-- I think we're close and I 
20

1 would rather see it resolved than just to -- 

2 you know, I guess that's all I have to say. I 

3 would rather see that part resolved. 

4 The other part is that I, in part, presented I 

5 think what were some of Jim Melius's issues, 

6 but I don't think I presented exactly what he 

7 had asked about at the last workgroup level, so 

8 I'm not sure we've really answered his 

9 questions. I know he's not here. I know -- 

10 you know, but -- 

11 MS. MUNN: Well, I do have to object to -- 

12 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah. 

13 MS. MUNN: -- one thing. Almost immediately 

14 following our -- our preceding workgroup, I 

15 sent out an e-mail to everyone involved with 

16 the identification of my interpretation of what 

17 the questions were that were raised. When I 

18 said we went in with two questions, we came out 

19 with five. I sent a brief resume of what those 

20 were and asked anyone who had any interest in 

21 these particular items to please be working on 

22 them. So we made every effort to do that and I 

23 believe that all of the people who were 

24 involved received that message. A great deal 

25 of work was done in the interim. 
21

1 It is true that we did -- obviously I failed to 

2 incorporate you in the discussion that we had 

3 with the workers in the interim. We did have 

4 three different workers that we talked with who 

5 were very helpful with respect to the layout of 

6 the building and to the process and what the 

7 atmosphere was in the building, all of which 

8 fed into the report that we gave. But we made 

9 every effort to cover and to establish that 

10 these were the questions we were going to 

11 attempt to answer. 

12 If those were not the -- correct, if those were 

13 not the correct questions, then we certainly 

14 should have been notified, well in advance of 

15 this immediately-preceding workgroup meeting, 

16 that those questions were not properly couched. 

17 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah, I -- I -- and I -- I don't 

18 know that they weren't properly couched, Wanda. 

19 I'm just saying that -- that a couple of those 

20 I think were Jim's issues and -- I know he 

21 wasn't here, but -- you know, he wasn't here to 

22 discuss them, either, so that was all I was 

23 saying. 

24 MS. MUNN: That's true. We did -- however, he 

25 sent me an e-mail with two questions that he 
22

1 had on it. I read those questions to the 

2 workgroup at our meeting and they were 

3 discussed there. 

4 MR. GRIFFON: That's true. 

5 DR. ZIEMER: Jim Lockey? 

6 DR. LOCKEY: The bounding for the radon, I hear 

7 two and I hear 20. Has that been resolved? 

8 MS. MUNN: Please, John, Jim, either of you -- 

9 DR. ZIEMER: John Mauro? 

10 MS. MUNN: -- would you address that? 

11 DR. MAURO: Yes. The discussions we had had to 

12 do with modeling the ventilation. There was 

13 some technical debate amongst the SC&A 

14 personnel at the first meeting. We had an 

15 opportunity to work through it, and we came 

16 down -- unanimous agreement, yes, the model is 

17 valid. And if you use the bound-- most 

18 (unintelligible), the model holds. 

19 Now the question becomes what input parameters 

20 do you use for the model, and the -- and there 

21 are a range of plausible values one could use. 

22 If you select those input values that would 

23 drive the numbers to the highest plausible 

24 value, you come in with numbers around 20 

25 picocuries per liter. If you move in the other 
23

1 direction, you get much closer to the two 

2 picocuries per liter. 

3 So the way we see it is, that -- that's a -- in 

4 effect, the way we -- way we came out is well, 

5 we have three pieces of information. We have 

6 the Florida information on what the radon 

7 levels were in Florida. We have these 

8 measurements, which have certain weaknesses to 

9 them, as a surrogate. We have certain 

10 information in the 1983 measurements that have 

11 certain weaknesses with them, and in fact, one 

12 of the reasons we went with the model approach 

13 -- we says well, how do we come at this? So we 

14 did develop a model, which SC&A stands behind 

15 unanimously, and that model, depending on -- on 

16 what range of plausible input parameters you 

17 put in, can give you radon concentrations -- 

18 average radon concentrations in the building 

19 which could be as high as 20, but certainly 

20 could be two, also. 

21 We also discussed the fact that -- and it was 

22 an important point brought up by Mark -- that 

23 well, listen, you know, the radon 

24 concentrations are not going to be uniform 

25 throughout the building, and -- because even 
24

1 though you come up -- let's say you say 20 is 

2 an upper bound, but there could be locations 

3 within the building where it's higher and some 

4 locations where it's lower, just because of the 

5 way in which the -- the ventilation system 

6 works. You don't get instantaneous uniform 

7 mixing. So one of the questions then -- I 

8 don't know if you recall -- that I posed to one 

9 of the folks we interviewed -- 

10 MS. MUNN: One of the workers -- 

11 DR. MAURO: -- the workers -- 

12 MS. MUNN: -- actually two of them. 

13 DR. MAURO: -- and I deliberately, 'cause I 

14 realized this could be important, is were there 

15 workers working in the same location all the 

16 time. And he said there were -- his exact 

17 answer was -- exactly as I recall, there were 

18 about six to 10 workers in the building at any 

19 given time, and they generally were in 

20 different locations at different times. So -- 

21 MS. MUNN: And this jives with information that 

22 we had from the workers in -- in the Blockson 

23 group meetings that we had there -- 

24 DR. MAURO: Right, so -- 

25 MS. MUNN: -- as well. They indicated that a 
25

1 shift in that building was -- 

2 DR. MAURO: Right. 

3 MS. MUNN: -- usually six people, sometimes -- 

4 DR. MAURO: Right. 

5 MS. MUNN: -- as many as eight or nine. 

6 DR. MAURO: So -- so when I hear that -- and we 

7 -- again, SC&A's -- yeah, when you hear that, 

8 that means okay, perhaps there is going to be 

9 some kind of gradient within the building by 

10 elevation, and maybe laterally. If the per-- 

11 if people are more or less walking around, 

12 they're really going to experience, over the 

13 course of a year, something closer to the 

14 average than -- than let's say what might be 

15 the high end. So we come away with the sense 

16 that we -- we really can't nail down the exact 

17 right number, but -- but some number someplace 

18 between two and 20 seems to put the problem in 

19 a box as being pic-- the average picocuries per 

20 liter of radon that these workers might have 

21 experienced, and that's where SC&A comes in, 

22 and that's the level of precision that we're 

23 operating at. 

24 MS. MUNN: Thank you, John. Jim, would -- 

25 MR. GRIFFON: Again, can I just -- 
26

1 MS. MUNN: -- would you -- 

2 MR. GRIFFON: -- can I just -- 

3 MS. MUNN: Yes. 

4 MR. GRIFFON: -- say one thing to -- to -- 

5 MS. MUNN: Certainly. 

6 MR. GRIFFON: -- Dr. Lockey's first question? 

7 The model does not vary dependent on -- the 

8 model that we're considering on the Board does 

9 not vary depending on input parameters. It's a 

10 -- it's a distribution, so we're back to -- you 

11 know, we're back to Florida data in a 

12 distribution, with a 95th at 2.33 or something 

13 like that. We use these other things -- I 

14 agree with John, but we use the other models, 

15 and these are models based on through-put and 

16 building consideration, ventilation 

17 considerations, sort of as reality checks. 

18 DR. NETON: Right. 

19 MR. GRIFFON: And you know, we're -- that's 

20 where I'm hung up is that I'm concerned that my 

21 reality checks are not -- you know, and I -- 

22 and I will admit that I'm -- that I'm, you know 

23 -- I th-- I thought we were getting close to 

24 there, but when I don't get numbers to add up, 

25 when I don't -- and when I had questions about 
27

1 the '83 survey yesterday, you know, there was 

2 no time to get answers for -- I asked Chick 

3 Phillips on the side, and he was actually 

4 heading to the airport so the-- you know, there 

5 was just -- but when I saw that report, I -- I 

6 don't even see a method described in that 

7 report, and he's telling me it's a Kusnetz 

8 count technique, which given the table, it 

9 seems plausible that that's what they did. But 

10 again, there's no equations and there's -- 

11 there's no -- nothing to show how they 

12 calculated from counts per five minutes to 

13 working level, and it's -- it's a 3-page memo 

14 report. And you know, that, along with the -- 

15 this model that I was literally trying to run 

16 whi-- during the meeting yesterday and -- and 

17 look at the parameters and, you know, I have 

18 concerns about the -- the -- some of the 

19 baseline assumptions that SC&A offered when 

20 they ran that model and whether they are -- at 

21 least, you know, if I'm going to do something 

22 like that, there's so many variables in that -- 

23 in that size building, I would think you'd want 

24 to pick a conservative assumption on the 

25 building volume and things like that, and -- 
28

1 and I'm -- I have a difference of opinion there 

2 I think than maybe some others, but there's 

3 where I -- I come down on it and I just wanted 

4 a little -- you know, I wanted to go through 

5 that and -- and come to grips with that before 

6 I had to vote on it. 

7 MS. MUNN: Chick Phillips and Tom Tomes worked 

8 together at considerable length to produce that 

9 paper. Jim? 

10 DR. NETON: I guess I come at this somewhat 

11 differently, although I come out with the same 

12 conclusion that SC&A has, in that originally we 

13 -- we had the 1983 data and that -- those data 

14 were low, and -- and Mark expressed some 

15 concerns that they were low, they were down 

16 around tenths of picocuries per liter, I 

17 believe, and -- and Mark said well, geez, it 

18 would be nice to validate that somehow with -- 

19 with a source term model or something of that 

20 effect. 

21 So fortunately we have good source term 

22 information here. We have the through-put of 

23 ore through the building. We know the 

24 concentration of radium in the ore, which is 

25 very low. One hundredth of one percent of that 
29

1 ore is uranium, so it's a very, very low 

2 concentration. In my mind, that -- that 

3 indicates numbers should be low. We have the 

4 phosphate industry data which indicated it was 

5 very low. So SC&A developed this source term 

6 model. And in my mind, the way to look at this 

7 is -- given that model, with reasonable input 

8 terms into that model -- does that come into 

9 agreement with the data that we have in the 

10 measurements from 1983; and the answer is yes. 

11 You would have to put some values out of the 

12 norm to get -- well, if you -- you know, we 

13 didn't have to put values outside of what we 

14 believe to be normal operating conditions to 

15 match the values that were measured in the 

16 plant. I think that's an important point. You 

17 can -- you can get any number you want with 

18 this source term model because a lot of it 

19 depends, as Mark said, on the input parameters. 

20 But given the values that we have measured in 

21 1983, using reasonable values for the models, 

22 they match. And I think that, to some extent, 

23 helps validate that the numbers are going to be 

24 low. 

25 We believe two picocuries per liter is a 
30

1 bounding value. However, certainly it's open 

2 for discussion. But I certainly believe we 

3 could bound -- it can be bound, given the 

4 source term and the other information that we 

5 have. And that's, I think, the relevant issue 

6 for a Special Exposure Cohort determination. 

7 DR. ZIEMER: Jim? 

8 DR. LOCKEY: John, go -- run through how you 

9 did this and why you think it's claimant 

10 favorable, would you? 

11 DR. MAURO: It's -- the model -- do it by hand. 

12 For instance, it's not a complicated model, sit 

13 there right now and do it. It's a box model -- 

14 this room. Here's the room. Let's make 

15 believe this is Blockson. It's probably about 

16 the height and perhaps twice the size. Okay? 

17 You got -- we know how many tons per day of ore 

18 is coming in that door. 

19 DR. LOCKEY: What's the present-- 

20 DR. MAURO: Pardon me? 

21 DR. LOCKEY: What would -- is this the 

22 equivalent to phosphate? Is that what you're -

23 - 

24 DR. MAURO: Yeah, phosphate rock. 

25 DR. LOCKEY: Okay. 
31

1 DR. MAURO: Phosphate rock comes in. It's put 

2 in a big silo, and then it's brought in the 

3 door. Okay? I mean this is concep-- it's very 

4 conceptual. 

5 Now trapped inside that rock is the radon. 

6 Okay? It's brought in, it goes into the -- one 

7 end of the building is a grinder. It 

8 pulverizes, grinds the rock to a powder. At 

9 that point we're going to assume that all the 

10 radon now comes out of the rock -- okay? -- and 

11 becomes airborne, so all these atoms -- so for 

12 -- you know, all the tons are coming in. We 

13 know -- we -- we know the -- we know the -- the 

14 composition of the ore, how much uranium is in 

15 there. That means we know how much radium is 

16 there. We know how much radon is in there. We 

17 so know the number of atoms per second coming 

18 into this building. We're going to put all 

19 those atoms per second in the air. Okay? So 

20 it's entering the air, continuously. Okay? 

21 Now what -- it's a simple box model that we use 

22 all the time, and you're saying all right, we 

23 know the input. Okay? Well, we need two other 

24 pieces of information: The volume of the room 

25 and the air turnover rate. Okay? Now the 
32

1 volume of the room is uncertain, but we did get 

2 some feedback that it's a two-story building, a 

3 little -- a little bit smaller than a football 

4 field, so it's a pretty big building. There's 

5 uncertainty there. 

6 Also the radon coming in, we're saying well, 

7 we're going to put all those atoms in the air 

8 as they come in. Well, we know that -- there's 

9 a lot of literature on what's called the 

10 emanation coefficient. That is, when -- when 

11 the radium atom that's trapped in the particle, 

12 whatever the particle is, whether it's soil or 

13 -- the -- as soon as it decays, it turns from 

14 radium into radon. Not all of it leaves the 

15 soil matrix. It's sort -- the radi-- some of 

16 the radon is -- stays trapped inside this 

17 little particle and decays away and stays there 

18 and never becomes airborne. And the -- you 

19 look into the literature and that radon 

20 emanation coefficient -- a typical number, for 

21 example, for soil is about 30 percent, so only 

22 30 percent actually leaves the particle and is 

23 available to become airborne. But we said 

24 well, you know, we don't really know what the 

25 radon emanation coefficient might be for this, 
33

1 and given that they're deliberately pulverizing 

2 this thing and grinding it down to a powder -- 

3 'cause that's the form you need it to get into 

4 in order to digest it and get your -- get your 

5 phosphate -- let's go with 100 percent, so it 

6 can't be more than that. 

7 So we're putting this in the air. All right? 

8 Now -- so we've got the volume of the building, 

9 more or less. We're using a bounding 

10 assumption regarding the rate at which the 

11 radon's going into this box, so you don't have 

12 -- you don't need this computer program, just 

13 do it by hand; it's I over lambda, it's -- you 

14 know, it's equilibrium. 

15 Now, what happens then is -- all right, we've 

16 got one more parameter, and this is the one 

17 that really troubled us, we didn't know -- is 

18 the air turnover rate, 'cause what is the air 

19 turnover rate? You know, turnover per hour. 

20 When we first did it, and I was on the phone 

21 with Chick and Tom, I said listen, as a first 

22 cut, I could tell you that, from my experience 

23 in building air turnover rates, even a building 

24 without any ventilation, just a natural 

25 breathing -- you know, one air turnover per 
34

1 hour. Let's just see what happens if we run 

2 that number. 

3 So we ran it, and at tha-- under those 

4 circumstances and we said okay, so we're coming 

5 in with these assumptions on the order of about 

6 20 -- that's where the 20 comes. I call up -- 

7 and I said listen, this thing hangs on this air 

8 turnover rate, and -- and if we're wrong on 

9 that by an order of magnitude, we're off the 

10 charts, throw it away. 

11 So I instituted two steps. I said -- I asked 

12 one of our engineers to go into the literature 

13 on building ventilation -- old, large, 

14 industrial building ventilations. I didn't 

15 think he'd come back with anything, so I said 

16 go see what you can find on air turnover rates. 

17 So he runs off and does that. 

18 Meanwhile I pick up -- I call Mort Lipman, my 

19 industrial hygiene professor at NYU, got him on 

20 the phone at NYU. And I said Mort -- he 

21 remembered me, remembered Jim, we both had him 

22 as a professor. I said listen, I've got a 

23 problem. I said -- I told him -- I told him my 

24 story, and I said I used one air turnover per 

25 hour. He goes it's much bigger than that. 
35

1 It's got to be bigger than that. My experience 

2 is, that would place an upper bound, what -- in 

3 -- I said would you mind if I say this to the 

4 Board in public? He says absolutely. 

5 So meanwhile, the other fella, [Identifying 

6 Information Redacted], who's looking into this, 

7 he comes back with a report -- on line, you 

8 could download it. There it is, a table of 

9 different vintage buildings of different -- 

10 fundamentally different designs. The simplest 

11 and the worst design for a industrial building 

12 is the way they designed the Blockson building 

13 -- fans in the ceiling exhausting right at the 

14 ceiling without -- you know, not collection. 

15 Fans in the ceiling going out and air coming in 

16 through windows, either opened or closed. If 

17 they're closed, it's less; if it's open, it's -

18 - you know, so you're sucking this -- so you -- 

19 basically, air's coming in through the -- the 

20 walls where the windows are and going up and 

21 out. 

22 The numbers that are in the report, two to four 

23 air turnovers per hour is the -- is the kind of 

24 numbers. So when I do this kind of work, I say 

25 okay, we got two to four out of the literature. 
36

1 We got Mort Lipman, who I trust as be-- you 

2 know, from experience, says about one. My 

3 personal experience on air turnover in 

4 buildings for radon problems or private 

5 residences, one. So I said listen, let's -- 

6 let's -- to -- to put this problem in a box, 

7 and this is how I come at everything, almost 

8 like a common sense thing, what have we got? 

9 Well, if you go with the 100 percent radon 

10 emanation, you go with a building size of about 

11 the size of a football field two stories high, 

12 and you go with one air turnover per hour, you 

13 get the -- you get the high end number around 

14 20. 

15 Now built into that, of course, the air 

16 turnover rate may very well have been closer to 

17 two to three. The radon emanation coefficient 

18 may very well have been closer to 30 percent. 

19 So right off the bat, you know, we get about a 

20 six-fold effect there. You know, the size of 

21 the building, we might have been off by 30, 40 

22 percent, you know, so -- but that -- see, to 

23 me, now it becomes marginal. We -- you know, 

24 wouldn't -- now we're wor-- we're worried about 

25 orders of magnitude right now, factors of two 
37

1 or three, not 20 percent, so this -- it -- it 

2 sounds so crude, but these kinds of problems 

3 you have to come at that way and say -- 

4 And then you say okay, this is one way to come 

5 at it. And this is -- by the way, this 

6 approach is very consistent with the four-step 

7 approach for surrogate data because what really 

8 is happening here, remember, is we're using 

9 data from Florida that's ha-- that's -- has 

10 problems with it. In other words, it was 

11 collected in Florida in -- under their 

12 conditions, and the buildings that were there 

13 seem to be more or less open, where this 

14 building is closed. So you know, say hmm, it's 

15 got some weaknesses there. Then we're saying 

16 okay -- oh, no, but what about the da-- we have 

17 some measurements made in 1983. I asked Mort, 

18 I said by the way, if I had some radon 

19 measurements in '83 for the same process, would 

20 you think those radon measurements would be -- 

21 given the same process -- applicable to an 

22 earlier building? 'Cause you know, a lot had 

23 happened between the '50s and the '80s in 

24 improving ventilation design, whether or not 

25 there were upgrades made. But there are 
38

1 reasons to believe that maybe the numbers in 

2 '83 may have been -- well, perhaps higher or 

3 lower. Higher because the through-- apparently 

4 the through-put went up as time went on, they 

5 saw the process more. Okay? But apparently 

6 there was some ventilation system upgrades that 

7 went along with that. 

8 So there -- so in other words -- so you got -- 

9 so in effect what we have is three different 

10 sources of information, and I think that is -- 

11 we got some measurements in '83 in Blockson. 

12 We got some measurements in Florida. And now 

13 we got this model. 

14 The thing that brings me to where I am now is 

15 that I think we put the problem in a box. In 

16 other words, in the end I'd like to get to a 

17 point where I said I think I've got my arms 

18 around it. It's someplace -- yeah, it's less 

19 than 20. Is it two? Maybe not. Maybe two is 

20 good, maybe it's not good. But I could tell 

21 you that I -- right now I would say -- but we 

22 know it's le-- twe-- less than 20, you know. 

23 So that's the level of precision that we bring 

24 to the table and why SC&A is coming out where 

25 it's coming out. Where -- what the right 
39

1 number is in that distribution -- you know, a 

2 lot of judgment there, and some -- and that's 

3 where the sensibility consensus has to find 

4 itself. But we believe you can put this 

5 problem in a box and place a plausible upper 

6 bound. 

7 DR. ZIEMER: Thank you. Yes, Robert? 

8 MR. STEPHAN: John, can you help us understand, 

9 for the benefit of the workers who may be on 

10 the phone, particularly [Identifying 

11 Information Redacted] (sic) who called in last 

12 night I think during the workgroup time, the 

13 issue of the air turnover? She was testifying 

14 that, having spoken to some of the workers -- I 

15 think her father being one of them -- that 

16 during the wintertime the vents were closed at 

17 the top of the building. So can you, you know, 

18 explain for us how that relates to your air 

19 torn-- turnover model? 

20 DR. MAURO: A good way to think about it is one 

21 of the problems people have in their homes when 

22 you go in -- if you go into a radon test -- I 

23 do a lot of radon -- you go to a home, you do 

24 it on closed house conditions in the winter. 

25 You get the radon -- you get your detector, you 
40

1 put it in the basement, you close up your house 

2 and -- and it's the wintertime, and it's under 

3 those circumstances that you have -- you have 

4 created a circumstance that will give you the 

5 highest levels of radon because you're 

6 minimizing the air turnover and -- because 

7 you've closed all the windows. And under those 

8 circumstances is when -- they do it on purpose, 

9 and that's when you get your about one air 

10 turnover per hour, you know. So what I'm 

11 saying is the one air turnover per hour is the 

12 natural breathing rate of a building when you 

13 really don't deliberately try to ventilate it. 

14 And so yes, when you close those windows in the 

15 winter -- and they did do that, they closed the 

16 windows -- that's going to reduce the air 

17 turnover rate. You open the windows, you get a 

18 little better turnover. But you know -- so 

19 that's why -- you know, as best I can, I -- I 

20 picked out one, you know, but -- 

21 DR. ZIEMER: Your one value is your worst-case 

22 value. 

23 DR. MAURO: Yeah, I consider that to be your 

24 worst-case situation, yeah. That's it. 

25 DR. ZIEMER: Robert? 
41

1 MR. STEPHAN: And before you vote, for the 

2 benefit of the workers, can you explain the -- 

3 the input scenario you were discussing was the 

4 ore coming in being crushed, and then the 

5 workers would have a question about all of the 

6 yellowcake that was being hauled around in the 

7 barrels at different points in time, so just -- 

8 just discuss for us your -- your thoughts and 

9 maybe NIOSH's thoughts on how that relates to 

10 the scenario you just discussed. Thank you. 

11 DR. MAURO: We're talking about Building 40 -- 

12 MS. MUNN: A single building. 

13 DR. MAURO: -- where the rad-- not -- not 

14 Building 55. Think of it like this. All of 

15 the radium and the radon, its -- its problem is 

16 in Building 40. One -- once -- once that phos17 - the -- the liquor is produced, what -- you're 

18 at the point now where the -- the radium is not 

19 in there anymore, so the -- what's going off 

20 with Building 55 is this monosodium phosphate 

21 liquor that has the radium and has the thorium 

22 and doesn't have the ra-- did I say radium? 

23 I'm sorry -- it has the uranium and the 

24 thorium. The radium, which is the source of 

25 the radon, that's left behind in Building 40. 
42

1 It's -- and/or the stacks, the phosphogypsum 

2 stacks. So Buil-- so Building 55 -- you're not 

3 going to expect to see very much radon there. 

4 You're going to get uranium and you're going to 

5 ha-- that's -- that's going to be your problem. 

6 But the radon problem is not in Building 55. 

7 The radi-- the ura-- the uranium issue is 

8 Building 55, but you certainly have the 

9 potential for a radon problem in Building 40, 

10 so -- so that's why they separate. 

11 MR. STEPHAN: Thank you. 

12 DR. ZIEMER: Other comments, Board members? 

13 MS. MUNN: I just need to point out to the 

14 Board that this is one of the few instances we 

15 have seen where both the agency and our 

16 contractor agree that this is not an 

17 intractable situation, that it can be bounded. 

18 In many cases it can be accurately assessed for 

19 an individual. At the very least, it can be 

20 bounded and well-bounded. It's rare that we 

21 get that kind of agreement from the experts 

22 both in NIOSH and in SC&A. 

23 DR. ZIEMER: Thank you. Jim, another comment? 

24 DR. LOCKEY: John, I appreciate your comments. 

25 My concern, as I -- I think the -- the Board is 
43

1 concerned, is that we -- we have to make sure 

2 that we're claimant favorable. And it sounds 

3 like one exchange is a -- at a level of 20 

4 picocuries, that that's what every -- is said 

5 is a -- is a claimant-favorable position to 

6 take on this upper bounding. Based on the 

7 award rate for cancer in this program, which is 

8 about 34 percent, when you compare that to the 

9 British results -- which is about ten percent -

10 - and you compare that to the medical 

11 literature in relationship to cancer mortality 

12 in uranium workers, I think we are very 

13 claimant favorable and that's the proper 

14 approach and we should always continue to do 

15 that. And I think -- that's why I was 

16 concerned is that you -- you sort of took the 

17 worst-case situation for that building, and -- 

18 and -- and they can be bound. Thank you. 

19 MR. GRIFFON: But -- but again, I -- and Jim'll 

20 probably speak to this, too, but that's -- 

21 that's not the model before us, you know, so -- 

22 the 20 is not on the table as far as -- 

23 DR. NETON: Well -- 

24 MR. GRIFFON: -- this decision. 

25 DR. NETON: I think it's -- it's not on the 
44

1 table currently, but again, that could become a 

2 site profile issue. I mean we've done this in 

3 the past where if there's disagreement between 

4 NIOSH and SC&A as to what the exact value is, 

5 yet we both believe that it's a tractable 

6 problem, then we can come to some consensus 

7 eventually. And I think that's where we're at 

8 with this. 

9 Speaking to the cancer -- lung cancer issue, I 

10 would point out, and this is interesting, in 

11 the Blockson case that the concentration of 

12 radon that's assigned to the workers at 

13 Blockson Chemical will have very little bearing 

14 on the compensability of any cancers at 

15 Blockson. That's because the uranium 

16 inhalation model that we've developed for the 

17 workers -- that everyone gets assigned, whether 

18 they worked in Building 55 or not -- creates an 

19 extremely high compensability rate for lung 

20 cancers to start with. 

21 In other words, if you have lung cancer and 

22 worked any appreciable extent of time at 

23 Blockson Chemical, you're very likely to be 

24 compensated under this program, purely from the 

25 uranium exposure. So whether radon is two or 
45

1 20, in my opinion it will make an extremely 

2 small difference in the compensability. It's 

3 not really a consideration, but just an 

4 interesting site fact. 

5 DR. ZIEMER: Other comments, pro or con? 

6 Anyone wish to speak against the motion, or for 

7 the motion? 

8 MR. GRIFFON: I -- I mean I think -- I don't 

9 disagree with Jim's last point, but as he said 

10 at the end, it's irrelevant. I mean this is a 

11 Special Exposure Cohort, so we're not looking 

12 at disease cohorts here, so -- but -- but it is 

13 what sort of drives me to want to close this 

14 radon issue out because, you know -- just 

15 because of what he stated. I mean it's -- it's 

16 a lung cancer issue only and -- and I -- and I 

17 -- just one word to what Wanda said. I mean I 

18 know we have agreement with the contractor and 

19 NIOSH, but I think you said yesterday -- you 

20 know, we have to keep in mind that SC&A is our 

21 contractor and we -- we are doing the review. 

22 The Board is tasked -- or, you know, authorized 

23 under the legislation to do this. And you 

24 know, I just think that to get this model -- 

25 again, I'm not getting the numbers. We hear 
46

1 statements made on -- on the mike here that we 

2 can bound it with 20, but it's not on the 

3 table. The '83 study -- you know, I -- maybe I 

4 should have looked at that earlier. I was 

5 taking those numbers and -- and looking on the 

6 other end and -- and hadn't saw the source 

7 documents so I -- my apologies there, but 

8 there's a lot of documents to look at. And 

9 then you compare -- the only other thing I'll 

10 say is I -- I look at '83, this 1983 study, 

11 which I -- you know, suspect -- or -- or at 

12 least not many details in the -- in the memo 

13 report, and compare that to a -- I believe a 

14 later survey in Building 55, I -- somebody can 

15 correct me if I'm wrong, but there was a buil-- 

16 a survey in Building 55 and the radon con-- and 

17 we just heard how -- from John that the -- 55 

18 wasn't an issue as far as radon. Radon levels 

19 were slightly higher in that building on the 

20 survey than in Building 40 on this 1983 survey. 

21 So I guess someone can say well, they're all 

22 seven-year background, that's reality, you 

23 know. But when I'm -- you know, when I get 

24 this -- this last source term model to sort of 

25 do a reality check and I have some differences 
47

1 of opinion on -- and I mean I'm not even -- I'm 

2 not even saying that it necessarily can be 

3 bounded, but I'm saying that I've got these 

4 three final factors basically to corroborate 

5 the model and -- and I'm not getting numbers 

6 that jive with what our contractor or NIOSH 

7 have gotten, then -- you know, even this 

8 printed report -- I mean I -- you know, John 

9 did say -- I mean the -- there's a couple of 

10 different sections to this so maybe I -- but 

11 the initial parameters that I was running some 

12 calculations on show a release fraction of .3. 

13 I think he examined different release fractions 

14 so that might be what he's talking about with 

15 the one, but it -- it didn't always assume 100 

16 percent -- you know, he looked at different 

17 parameters, which is fine; that's the way I 

18 would have done it. But it also shows a 

19 production rate, which I had some questions 

20 about, that assumes 6,000 pou-- pou-- tons per 

21 week, equally distributed, assuming 24-hour 

22 operation. And I don't know, was -- if it was 

23 24/7 days, if that was necessarily -- averaging 

24 over the year, it may not even impact it. But 

25 that's a question -- but then when I take these 
48

1 parameters and I run them in -- in this first 

2 little -- you know, do the first thing, which 

3 is to generate the -- the radon per second, I'm 

4 getting different numbers than in this re-- in 

5 this report that was handed out to me 

6 yesterday. So I'm trying to cor-- you know, I 

7 -- I do want to -- to see an end to this, but 

8 when I'm not getting numbers to add up and I 

9 have questions on parameters, I just feel like 

10 I'm not -- I'm not there yet and I -- so that's 

11 why I'm speaking against the motion. 

12 DR. ZIEMER: Okay, any others? Yes, Brad. 

13 UNIDENTIFIED: Hello? 

14 DR. ZIEMER: Go ahead, Brad. 

15 MR. CLAWSON: Okay. One of my things that I 

16 look at on this, and I'm looking at this as if 

17 I was a individual that was at Blockson or 

18 whatever, and I'm sitting there listening to 

19 how they've reconstructed my building and so 

20 forth like that, and -- and it's a wonderful 

21 thing, it's wonderful science. But it's a -- 

22 what we call in the science also kind of a 

23 slag. 

24 We -- we are using an awful lot of speculation, 

25 and I realize that that's what we have to be 
49

1 able to do. But before we ever put our name 

2 onto it, we -- or I need to always feel that I 

3 have made this as claimant favorable as 

4 possible. I think as if I had a child or a 

5 mother or a father that's in this building. 

6 And the petitioners have brought up so many 

7 times well, these vents were closed, this was 

8 that, the information you're using is from a 

9 completely different state, the facility was a 

10 little bit different. Well, you have a little 

11 bit of magic here and a little bit of smoke and 

12 mirrors here, you can -- you can come up to a 

13 fairly close one. But my thing is is I don't 

14 think that we have fully addressed all the 

15 issues and really looked at it and made it the 

16 -- as claimant favorable as possible because we 

17 are using a lot of speculations. 

18 DR. ZIEMER: Okay, thank you. Jim, another 

19 comment? 

20 DR. LOCKEY: Brad, maybe I can address that. 

21 Based on what John has said, he's taking an ore 

22 that has very low radon content. He's assuming 

23 100 percent release, which you don't get -- you 

24 don't get. And he's assuming essentially no 

25 air exchange in the building. You can't get 
50

1 any more conservative than that. I mean that -

2 - that probably is over-estimating the 

3 exposures by a factor of ten to 20, but it is a 

4 very claimant-favorable approach. It really 

5 is. I mean it is -- it is, from what I'm 

6 hearing anyway, and that's why I was asking the 

7 question how -- how did he come up with that 

8 model. And if you take a box model with no air 

9 exchange -- 

10 DR. MAURO: No, one air exchange. 

11 DR. LOCKEY: -- one air exchange and an ore 

12 where you're -- you're not going to get 100 

13 percent radon release unless you grind it into 

14 a fine powder, that -- that's a pretty 

15 conservative approach. 

16 DR. ZIEMER: Okay, Gen and then Mike. 

17 DR. ROESSLER: I think I would question the use 

18 of your word "speculation". This really is not 

19 speculation. That makes it seem like you're 

20 just pulling everything out of the air. 

21 They're starting with facts, pretty solid 

22 facts, and from that point trying to put 

23 together perhaps what you would call a worst24 case scenario, so it's not speculation. 

25 DR. ZIEMER: Okay. Michael? 
51

1 MR. GIBSON: Someone correct me if I'm wrong, 

2 but the numbers on the report are looking like 

3 30 percent of the radon -- if -- if we're going 

4 to talk these numbers of -- bounding limit of 

5 20, then that's when you're talking about one 

6 air turnover per hour and a hundred -- a 

7 hundred percent resus-- yeah. 

8 MR. GRIFFON: Release fraction. 

9 DR. ZIEMER: John? 

10 DR. MAURO: If I may try to hel-- it's -- it's 

11 -- the report you -- you're seeing, in the 

12 first case, was -- okay, let's go with the 30 

13 percent because that's sort of conventional, 

14 not bad. But at the same time, the re-- so we 

15 looked at that and varied some parameters and 

16 see what happens when you use that as your -- 

17 the starting point, the 30 percent radon 

18 emanation coefficient. But then we said but 

19 wait a minute, you know, we are -- there are -- 

20 are aggressively -- it's not like we're talking 

21 about soil now, soil sitting there. We're 

22 going to take this stuff and we're going to 

23 grind it and pulverize it and make it into a 

24 powder. I don't know what the radon emanation 

25 coefficient is for that, so I say let's do 
52

1 another case. Let's go with 100 percent, so 

2 this -- and could -- maybe it was, I don't know 

3 -- it has a factor -- it's proportional. You 

4 know, it -- air turnover -- everything is 

5 proportional, so it's -- you know, so you want 

6 to -- if you want to go from, you know, 30 

7 percent to 100 percent -- well, it's a factor 

8 of three. Air turnover rates, if you want to 

9 go one air turnover rate -- no, we want to go 

10 with two, it's a factor of two. So in other 

11 words, it's all multipliers. So you could see 

12 -- when we come up with the 20, I -- someone 

13 sa-- and that was on one air turnover. If I 

14 say no and now I want to go with two, all 

15 right, it's ten. Well, wait a minute, I don't 

16 want to go -- I want to -- I -- you know, I 

17 want to go with 30 percent, divide that by 

18 three. Now we're down -- which may be the 

19 realistic one, you know. You know where we 

20 are? We're right around three, which is the 

21 number that -- so you know -- you see how I get 

22 -- how I get there. 

23 DR. NETON: I'd also like to just point out one 

24 thing that I remembered, is that the location 

25 where SC&A assumes there was a 100 percent 
53

1 release of the radon from the ore in the 

2 grinding operation, we've interviewed a number 

3 of people and everyone we've interviewed that's 

4 talked about it has indicated that there was 

5 local exhaust ventilation directly over the 

6 grinding operation because it was kind of a 

7 dusty operation. So that in itself had its own 

8 capture velocity to ventilate the radon out of 

9 the building itself. So that -- that would 

10 even make the model slightly more conservative 

11 than it really is. 

12 DR. ZIEMER: Michael, another comment? 

13 MR. GIBSON: Let me restate my question. The 

14 numbers that are on the table that we're going 

15 to be considering, or that we are considering, 

16 is two, not 20. Is that correct? 

17 DR. NETON: That's currently what is in our 

18 site profile. 

19 MR. GIBSON: Okay. 

20 DR. NETON: But again, this is an SEC 

21 evaluation and the determination is whether or 

22 not it could be adequately bounded. 

23 DR. ZIEMER: Robert? 

24 MR. STEPHAN: John, can you just submit 

25 something for the record -- a source, you know, 
54

1 some piece of literature; I'm sure you have 

2 plenty -- that relates to the one turnover per 

3 hour? You know, af-- after the fact. 

4 DR. MAURO: Yes, I can. I have -- 

5 MS. MUNN: Thank you. 

6 DR. MAURO: I brought it with me. It's a page 

7 out of a report that's on the web. What -- 

8 unfortunately, what you have is a handout, this 

9 report. That -- first of all, it shouldn't be 

10 distributed. It was something that was 

11 produced on Friday. We weren't going to hand 

12 it out. A request was made by one of the Board 

13 members would like to look at it. This was our 

14 internal work and it's really -- 

15 DR. ZIEMER: It's not an official SC&A -- 

16 DR. MAURO: It's not an SC-- it's not an 

17 official SC&A deliverable. I checked it, what 

18 numbers were done, and then I did a hand cal to 

19 -- we normally do more than that. It does have 

20 the literature behind it. I -- I saw the 

21 citation as I -- other words, so -- what I'm 

22 getting at is, in effect, you're looking at a 

23 work product that is not an official SC&A 

24 deliverable. It was produced for the purpose 

25 of helping me come to the table with some -- of 
55

1 -- information of value that could be useful to 

2 the Board, but it's not -- so what I would like 

3 to do, given the weight apparently that this is 

4 starting to take, is to turn it into a 

5 deliverable that can be put on the web, with 

6 all the citations, so that anyone could go in 

7 and check the numbers and convince themselves 

8 that the values are -- 

9 DR. BRANCHE: That would be appropriate. 

10 DR. MAURO: -- correct. I think that's -- yeah 

11 -- so -- yeah, I think that's very important 

12 because really it has not received your -- it 

13 has not received official SC&A peer review. 

14 The review it got was when Chick finished it, 

15 wrote it up -- again, I -- and in fact, I 

16 originally started by doing my own hand cal. 

17 Then I brought it to Chick's attention. Chick 

18 did it a little bit more sophisticated, doing a 

19 parametric analysis. 

20 DR. ZIEMER: Okay. Thank you. 

21 DR. BRANCHE: Do you want to collect the copies 

22 that have been distributed back? 

23 DR. MAURO: I'd like to do that, yes. Thank 

24 you. Thank you. 

25 DR. ZIEMER: Josie? 
56

1 MS. BEACH: I personally would like to see this 

2 tabled until the next meeting to give a chance 

3 for this new information and some of the other 

4 -- the other topics we're discussing this 

5 morning time to -- for all of us to understand 

6 what the issue is, so... 

7 DR. ZIEMER: Are you making a motion to table? 

8 MS. BEACH: I would like to table. I don't 

9 know if I can make a motion to do that. 

10 DR. ZIEMER: Sure, you can make a motion to do 

11 that. 

12 MS. BEACH: Then I would like to make a motion 

13 to table this until our next -- 

14 MR. SCHOFIELD: Second. 

15 MS. BEACH: -- meeting. 

16 DR. ZIEMER: It's been seconded. This is not a 

17 debatable motion. We will immediately vote. 

18 It takes a majority to table. We'll take a 

19 roll call vote. 

20 DR. BRANCHE: Roll call vote? This is for the 

21 motion to table. 

22 Ms. Beach? 

23 MS. BEACH: Yes. 

24 DR. BRANCHE: Mr. Clawson? 

25 MR. CLAWSON: Yes. 
57

1 DR. BRANCHE: Mr. Gibson? 

2 MR. GIBSON: Yes. 

3 DR. BRANCHE: Mr. Griffon? 

4 MR. GRIFFON: Yes. 

5 DR. BRANCHE: Dr. Lockey? 

6 DR. LOCKEY: No. 

7 DR. BRANCHE: We'll have to get Dr. Melius's 

8 vote, I guess -- 

9 DR. ZIEMER: No, you don't. 

10 DR. BRANCHE: Not for this one. Ms. Munn? 

11 MS. MUNN: No. 

12 DR. BRANCHE: Mr. Presley? 

13 MR. PRESLEY: No. 

14 DR. BRANCHE: Dr. Poston? 

15 DR. POSTON: Yes. 

16 DR. BRANCHE: Dr. Roessler? 

17 DR. ROESSLER: No. 

18 DR. BRANCHE: Mr. Schofield? 

19 MR. SCHOFIELD: Yes. 

20 DR. BRANCHE: Dr. Ziemer? 

21 DR. ZIEMER: The Chair votes no. So what -- 

22 what's the... 

23 DR. BRANCHE: I think it's a tie. One second. 

24 (Pause) 

25 No, it can't be a tie 'cause Dr. Melius is not 
58

1 here. 

2 DR. ZIEMER: It can't be a tie. 

3 (Pause) 

4 I think the no -- or the yeses have it. 

5 DR. BRANCHE: The yes to table have it by one. 

6 DR. ZIEMER: Okay. The -- the motion to table 

7 is successful, and that then ends this 

8 discussion. 

9 DR. BRANCHE: I have a question, though, one -- 

10 DR. ZIEMER: John Poston. 

11 DR. POSTON: Well, you beat me to it, but I 

12 voted in favor of the motion, with the 

13 understanding that we were all going to see 

14 this report. None of us -- I haven't seen it, 

15 so I couldn't make a -- you know, I understand 

16 and was certainly inclined to vote to deny the 

17 SEC, but I haven't seen the report. I can't 

18 make -- you know, I -- 

19 DR. ZIEMER: That's fine. 

20 DR. POSTON: -- and so I assume that this 

21 action that's -- follows this vote is that 

22 we're going to see that report. 

23 DR. ZIEMER: I think the commitment has been to 

24 turn the -- the unofficial document into a 

25 deliverable, and can we so task him to do that? 
59

1 DR. BRANCHE: Yes. My question, Dr. Ziemer, is 

2 is this being tabled until the telephone 

3 conference call in August, or the face-to-face 

4 Board meeting in September? 

5 DR. ZIEMER: The motion had no date associated 

6 with it. It comes off the table when someone 

7 moves to remove it from the table. 

8 DR. BRANCHE: Thank you. 

9 DR. ZIEMER: That can occur at the next 

10 meeting. It can occur a year from now. But I 

11 think in principle this is going to have to be 

12 like any others, we've got to move forward on 

13 this. We cannot keep tabling things 

14 indefinitely. 

15 Yes, Mark. 

16 MR. GRIFFON: Can I ask -- just a -- this may 

17 be -- just to clarify. This -- this 

18 deliverable for SC&A -- I know we've had 

19 discussions before on what SC&A's work and 

20 tasks should be, and what they are not. And 

21 this is a -- a analysis to demonstr-- to sort 

22 of confirm the model in the ER report, or to 

23 val-- you know, to substantiate, I guess is a 

24 better word. I'm not sure it's not -- it 

25 shouldn't be a NIOSH work product. It's 
60

1 defending their position of -- and I know that 

2 -- that -- I think SC&A and NIOSH, Tom Tomes, 

3 sort of collaborated on this, but I'm not sure 

4 who should pro-- you know, it might be a small 

5 point, but I think it might be important. 

6 DR. ZIEMER: Well, I think what happened here 

7 was a document, which I guess was like tabletop 

8 scratchings at the workgroup, took on a life of 

9 its own and ended up here. I've not seen the 

10 document that's being discussed myself, but it 

11 -- it has become a focus of discussion because 

12 it apparently helped capture the thought 

13 process for how one can approach the radon 

14 issue. So in that sense, I think all we're 

15 asking John to do is put this in a form that 

16 everybody -- I mean the work has been done, so 

17 we're asking for a copy of that and the 

18 citations and official delivery to the Board 

19 through the normal channels. 

20 DR. MAURO: If you give me a week I'll get it 

21 to everyone electronically. We could even get 

22 it PA reviewed if it could be -- it's very 

23 short. 

24 DR. BRANCHE: It should be PA reviewed. 

25 DR. MAURO: It's very short. 
61

1 MS. MUNN: It's only two pages and -- and the 

2 citations, and it's already in a deliverable 

3 form in terms of format. The only thing that 

4 is lacking is it was not PA reviewed. It was a 

5 late-breaking document. 

6 DR. NETON: I have a process question. Does 

7 this report then be-- is it distributed to the 

8 full Board and then it will take up the issue 

9 again at the Board meeting, or does this go 

10 back to the working group for further 

11 deliberations? 

12 MS. MUNN: That was going to be my question, 

13 Jim. I wanted to make very sure that there's 

14 no instruction being given to the workgroup. 

15 And if there is, what is that instruction, and 

16 whether there is any subsequent -- 

17 DR. ZIEMER: Well, it seems to the Chair that 

18 this issue has been vetted before the Board now 

19 and people are asking to see the -- the 

20 underlying document, so certainly this is a 

21 Board issue at this point. 

22 Now since the tabling has occurred, I -- I 

23 recognize that that gives -- Mark, it gives you 

24 the opportunity to try to come to closure on 

25 some of your issues and that may be something 
62

1 you need to do yourself. Do you need the help 

2 of the workgroup on -- on that or is it a 

3 matter of -- 

4 MR. GRIFFON: No. 

5 DR. ZIEMER: -- being able to look at the -- 

6 the documentation -- 

7 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah, I don't -- I don't -- I 

8 don't think so, no -- no. 

9 DR. ZIEMER: So the Chair would ask, in that 

10 case -- and if there are others who have those 

11 concerns that Mark articulated, to be sure to 

12 work with him, and please seek whatever 

13 clarification you need from either NIOSH or 

14 SC&A to make sure that -- that we're on the 

15 same page there as far as interpreting and 

16 collaborating on that data. 

17 DR. BRANCHE: One additional point of order. 

18 You did hear the discussion that Dr. Mauro 

19 would like those draft copies back. It is -- 

20 it requires more than simply returning it. You 

21 said it was some scratch notes for your own 

22 use, and we really don't need to have that 

23 interim document that was distributed to the 

24 workgroup members treated as if it were tru-- a 

25 true deliverable from SC&A. So if -- if you 
63

1 would please re-- turn those back in to Dr. 

2 Mauro or a member of his team, I'd appreciate 

3 it. Thank you. 

4 DR. ZIEMER: So unless the Board believes that 

5 there's additional work for the workgroup to 

6 do, I -- I believe it's a matter of getting 

7 this documentation to the Board members for 

8 their perusal. And if that comes in a timely 

9 fashion, then I -- I would hope we could do -- 

10 do the vote at our next meeting, but it would 

11 require a vote to remove it from the table, and 

12 then action on the original motion, which is 

13 the motion to con-- to -- the motion was to 

14 support the NIOSH position. 

15 MS. MUNN: The workgroup chair will be more 

16 than happy to take the responsibility to see 

17 that it's removed from the table at the next 

18 meeting. 

19 DR. ZIEMER: Thank you. 

20 ROCKY FLATS PLANT, MR. MARK GRIFFON

21 Next on our agenda is the Rocky Flats plant 

22 then. Mark, do you have some items to report 

23 to us there? 

24 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah, the -- the only -- we had a 

25 workgroup call. I -- I am at a loss to 
64

1 remember when, it was recently. And really 

2 what we had at that workgroup call was a 

3 presentation from -- 

4 DR. BRANCHE: The 17th of June. 

5 MR. GRIFFON: -- 17th of June, thank you. We 

6 had a -- a presentation from the Department of 

7 Labor on the implementation of the SEC class at 

8 -- at Rocky Flats, particularly related to the 

9 -- how were neutron workers identified. And at 

10 that point -- at the end of the meeting I 

11 agreed that I would write a -- a draft memo and 

12 run it by the workgroup first, and then bring 

13 it back to the Board. I haven't had a chance 

14 to do that yet, and I still want to -- I'm 

15 actually in the process of collecting more 

16 facts on this, quite frankly, before I put a 

17 memo together. My -- I had a question to 

18 Department of Labor during the meeting and I've 

19 talked to Jeff a little bit off line about 

20 this, but it -- it appears that -- that the 

21 implementation of this -- that the cases that 

22 are sort of not being included in the class are 

23 -- are ver-- based on the neutron worker 

24 criteria, anyway -- if they fit in the years 

25 and everything else, based on that criteria 
65

1 alone, it seems like a very limited number of 

2 cases. And I guess there's been some 

3 discussions about the nature of those 

4 particular cases and so -- so I -- I don't want 

5 to -- you know, it -- it may be that I need to 

6 just get some more of those facts before I put 

7 any memo before the Board, you know, 'cause I 

8 don't know that we need an action and I want to 

9 make sure before we do anything that -- I have 

10 all the facts, so... 

11 DR. ZIEMER: Board members, do you have any 

12 questions on this issue with Mark? 

13 (No responses) 

14 And the petitioners in Rocky Flats are being 

15 kept apprised of -- of what's going on there, I 

16 assume. I know they were concerned there about 

17 how the -- the class was being implemented and 

18 so on. 

19 MR. GRIFFON: Right, and -- 

20 DR. ZIEMER: Right. 

21 MR. GRIFFON: -- I believe the petitioners have 

22 been represented on the workgroup calls, so 

23 they've been following the process, yes. 

24 CHAPMAN VALVE, DR. JOHN POSTON

25 DR. ZIEMER: Okay, let's move on to Chapman 
66

1 Valve and Dr. Poston. 

2 DR. POSTON: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I -- I 

3 bring you sort of the same problem that Ms. 

4 Munn presented -- 

5 UNIDENTIFIED: We're on Chapman. Yeah, I 

6 picked it up just so I could -- 

7 DR. BRANCHE: If all participants by phone 

8 would please mute your line. 

9 MR. GRIFFON: I think that's Jim Melius. 

10 DR. BRANCHE: Dr. Melius, is that you? 

11 (No responses) 

12 MR. GRIFFON: No. 

13 DR. BRANCHE: If all participants participating 

14 by phone would please mute your line. If you 

15 do not have a mute button, then please use 

16 star-6. Also, I ask all phone participants, do 

17 not put this line on hold. If you must leave 

18 the line, then please hang up and dial back in, 

19 but do not put us on hold. It makes for a lot 

20 of unnecessary noise on the line, disturbing 

21 every-- disrupting everyone's ability to be 

22 able to hear. Thank you. 

23 DR. POSTON: Our most recent face-to-face 

24 meeting was May 1st in Cincinnati. At that 

25 time we put together some questions that were 
67

1 transmitted to the Department of Energy for 

2 answer, and we also asked Dr. Neton to continue 

3 with an initiative that he had started in 

4 contacting the -- the folks at Oak Ridge 

5 National Lab regarding the one sample at 

6 Chapman Valve that was slightly elevated -- I 

7 believe it was on the order of two percent 

8 enriched uranium. 

9 We also at that meeting decided that we needed 

10 to request removal of the Dean Street facility 

11 from our consideration because we were unable 

12 to find any information on -- on that facility 

13 that would allow us to do anything. And that 

14 subsequently was a motion that I -- or a 

15 request that I made in our telephone confer-- 

16 conference call that we had after that May 1st 

17 face-to-face meeting. 

18 Most recently we met yesterday to discuss these 

19 issues. We have a lengthy letter from Mr. 

20 Folle* from Oak Ridge National Laboratory 

21 regarding the -- the sample. He basically has 

22 confirmed that the sample, as far as he can 

23 ascertain, was an actual sample of two percent. 

24 I don't think I'm mischaracterizing his -- his 

25 position that he didn't have an explanation for 
68

1 it, although he did speculate in his letter 

2 that there was some Department of Defense work 

3 that occurred at Chapman Valve associated with 

4 the Nautilus program. No date was assigned, 

5 but that was roughly in the -- in the late 

6 '50s. The Nautilus went to sea in 1957, as I 

7 recall -- '57/'58 -- which is outside of the 

8 time frame considered. So -- so we have this 

9 one sample which indicates there was some 

10 activity going on site at the -- during some 

11 undefined period in which there was slightly 

12 enriched uranium where -- 

13 So the response from DOE which we received the 

14 day -- the evening before our workgroup meeting 

15 basically provided no new information, and so 

16 we were left with Mr. Folle's letter confirming 

17 the sample and the situation, in which we 

18 basically I think never disagreed, that the 

19 external dosimetry could be done by NIOSH, but 

20 the major contention was the internal 

21 dosimetry. 

22 So the committee is -- or the workgroup, I'm 

23 sorry, is somewhat split. We were able not to 

24 -- we were not able to reach an agreement on 

25 the internal dose. NIOSH is proposing what 
69

1 could be considered a very, very conservative 

2 bounding of the internal dose. The -- if we 

3 even bring into the equation consideration of 

4 enriched material, we'd perhaps double the 

5 dose, but that would still provide an upper 

6 bound for the dose. 

7 But this is a troubling situation and -- and 

8 members of the workgroup felt that it was -- it 

9 was just too much of uncertainty to recom-- or 

10 to have a recommendation to the Board, and so 

11 we basically did not have a motion of any 

12 action to bring to you. It's an -- I hate to 

13 lay this at your feet, but this is the 

14 situation where basically we're not -- want to 

15 reach an agreement, based primarily on our 

16 uncertainties associated with this enriched 

17 uranium. And I would ask, if I haven't 

18 characterized that correctly, that members of 

19 the workgroup who want to certainly correct it. 

20 I -- I think I did a reasonable job of... 

21 DR. ZIEMER: Let me ask this question, based on 

22 your statement that it was indicated to you -- 

23 apparently by NIOSH -- that one possibility 

24 would be to include the U-235 in the bounding 

25 calculations. And was this discussed by the 
70

1 workgroup and, if that were done, does the 

2 workgroup agree that bounding can occur? 

3 DR. POSTON: It was -- it was only part of the 

4 conversation. It was -- we didn't ask NIOSH to 

5 do that. It was an estimate by those of us who 

6 knew something about internal dose -- Jim Neton 

7 and so forth -- and we speculated that -- that 

8 it would increase the dose, perhaps as much as 

9 a factor of two. So -- but we -- we didn't do 

10 those calculations, no. And we basically -- 

11 gee, whiz, I just had a senior moment. I 

12 forgot the rest of your question. 

13 DR. ZIEMER: Well, I -- what I was wondering 

14 was was there any agreement in the workgroup 

15 that bounding could occur with the inclusion of 

16 U-235, if that was the issue. Jim? 

17 DR. POSTON: Oh, no, the -- there was no 

18 agreement. In fact, the -- again, we were in a 

19 same situation as Ms. Munn's -- half and half 

20 basically saying we could and the other half 

21 said they were concerned about -- I think the 

22 word that was used was "speculation." 

23 DR. ZIEMER: Okay. Jim? 

24 DR. NETON: Yeah, I -- I agree with Dr. Poston. 

25 It was discussed whether -- you know, if -- if 
71

1 we were to assume that the uranium that was 

2 processed in -- in Building 23 were two percent 

3 enriched, the doses would approximately double. 

4 But I think the central question is, is it 

5 likely that two percent enriched uranium was 

6 even processed in Building 23 in '48 and '49, 

7 and I -- it's NIOSH's position still that -- 

8 that that's very unlikely. But it is true that 

9 if it were two percent enriched uranium, it 

10 would double the dose. We see no evidence that 

11 any enriched uranium at all was handled in -- 

12 at -- at Chapman Valve in 1948 and '49. 

13 DR. POSTON: I failed to -- 

14 DR. ZIEMER: Do we have a phone person? 

15 DR. BRANCHE: You can ask. There might be. 

16 DR. POSTON: I failed to mention that one of 

17 the things that I think -- I'm speaking 

18 personally. One of the things that I hung my 

19 hat on was there's this huge report from H.K. 

20 Ferguson regarding the -- the activities at 

21 Chapman Valve during this period, it's 

22 extremely detailed, and -- about everything 

23 that we assumed was going on there originally -

24 - and there's no mention of any activities or 

25 any elevated concentrations of uranium. It was 
72

1 all associated with machining the rods for the 

2 Brookhaven reactor. 

3 DR. ZIEMER: Thank you. I -- I'm nonetheless 

4 going to call for a motion in just a moment. I 

5 want to determine whether any petitioners are 

6 on the line. 

7 DR. POSTON: Mike has a -- 

8 DR. ZIEMER: Hang on, Mike, let's see if 

9 there's a petitioner on the line, then we'll -- 

10 are there any petitioners on the line from 

11 Chapman Valve? 

12 (No responses) 

13 Apparently not. Okay, Michael. 

14 MR. GIBSON: Just as a member of the workgroup, 

15 you know, one of the concerns was not only the 

16 one sample, it was the lack of the origin of 

17 that sample and the history thereof, and what 

18 other operations may have went on. So it's -- 

19 it's not just including that one sample, in my 

20 opinion. 

21 DR. ZIEMER: Brad? Hang on -- yes? 

22 MR. BROEHM: Dr. Ziemer, I just wanted to 

23 remind you that Sharon Block from Senator 

24 Kennedy's office is on the phone and I think -- 

25 DR. ZIEMER: Oh, she is on the line, okay. 
73

1 MR. BROEHM: -- wants to make a statement. 

2 DR. ZIEMER: Let-- let's hear from Sharon if 

3 she's on the -- Sharon, are you there? 

4 MS. BLOCK: I am. 

5 DR. ZIEMER: Oh, would you have some comments 

6 for us? 

7 MS. BLOCK: Yes, and -- and thank you for 

8 recognizing me. I mean Senator Kennedy's, you 

9 know, position on this has been clear 

10 throughout and I think he -- he continues to 

11 believe that the petition should be granted, 

12 that, you know, too much time has passed and it 

13 -- it's time to give some, you know, 

14 compensation and closure to the -- to the 

15 workers of Chapman Valve. The program -- and 

16 he knows, since he was there when the program 

17 was designed, was supposed to make timely 

18 decisions. But if today the Board isn't 

19 prepared to grant the petition, you know, we 

20 think it's really important that the Board take 

21 the time, even if it means more time, to make 

22 the right decision. And -- and one thing that 

23 -- that our office has been very concerned 

24 about is that the petitioners and -- and our 

25 office have not been getting information in a 
74

1 timely manner. We saw the Folle report that -- 

2 that was just being discussed just last night 

3 and my understanding is that the petitioners 

4 didn't get it really until later last night and 

5 that -- that has been a pattern and -- and it's 

6 a concern because I think it goes to the 

7 confidence that especially the petitioners have 

8 in this process where they, you know, feel that 

9 they've been left out of some of the 

10 information. So to -- to have had that 

11 information circulated so -- so recently and 

12 then to have, you know, an ultimate vote on the 

13 petition I think would be very troubling for 

14 them, especially considering, as -- as the 

15 Board was just discussing -- how much 

16 uncertainty there is around what happened at 

17 Chapman Valve. So Senator Kennedy's position 

18 has remained consistent. He thinks it's time 

19 to have the petition granted, but if that's not 

20 going to happen, then there needs to be, you 

21 know, some -- some feeling of resolution and 

22 confidence for the petitioners in -- in the 

23 Board's decision, and that can only happen if 

24 there is some resolution of this uncertainty. 

25 I thank you for the opportunity. 
75

1 DR. ZIEMER: Okay, thank you for your input on 

2 that. 

3 Let's see, we have a comment from Brad Clawson 

4 and then from John Poston. 

5 MR. CLAWSON: Every time we start talking about 

6 this, and -- and me and John's had some very 

7 heart-to-heart talks on this, one of the things 

8 is I like to use a percentage instead of just 

9 one or two samples because what we've got to 

10 realize is this one sample is 50 percent of 

11 what we have for our data. It has been proven 

12 by the Folle letter. It's gone through all 

13 this, and I just -- yes, I'm the one that used 

14 the term "speculation" and maybe that wasn't 

15 the best words, but the thing is is we cannot -

16 - we cannot just discard this sample, and this 

17 has always been a big issue. We -- we came up 

18 with the Dean Street, and as many of these 

19 sites that we have found, we have ended up with 

20 finding that we -- we can't get all the 

21 information for it, and -- and I realize that. 

22 But we just can't discard this sample, either. 

23 DR. ZIEMER: John, and then Jim. 

24 DR. POSTON: Yeah. Well, Brad, that -- what 

25 you say is true, if you regard the samples that 
76

1 were taken outside the building. But that's 

2 not true in terms of the external dosimetry, 

3 it's not true in terms of the internal 

4 dosimetry 'cause we have plenty of air 

5 monitoring results and so forth, which were the 

6 basis of the -- of the NIOSH evaluation for the 

7 intakes associated with the workers. We're 

8 talking about the workers that are inside the 

9 building, and that's what we're trying to 

10 assess, their dose. The sample was not inside 

11 the area that we're concerned about. And you 

12 know, the speculation -- regardless of what it 

13 is, the speculation is that it probab-- it came 

14 from the DOE -- DoD operations at a time period 

15 well after the -- the period of time in 

16 consideration. 

17 I'm going to do what Ms. Munn did and I'm going 

18 to make a motion so that we can discuss this 

19 further. I would move that -- as a -- as an 

20 individual; this is not a workgroup motion. I 

21 would move, as I did before, that based on the 

22 information that the workgroup -- that we have 

23 reviewed, that it's my opinion that we should 

24 deny the petition -- the SEC petition. 

25 DR. ZIEMER: And that is your motion? 
77

1 DR. POSTON: That's the motion. 

2 DR. ZIEMER: And is there a second? 

3 DR. ROESSLER: I second that. 

4 DR. ZIEMER: And seconded. This motion is now 

5 open for discussion. And Jim, you were at the 

6 mike a moment ago. Did you have a comment 

7 or... 

8 DR. NETON: I think Dr. Poston substantively 

9 addressed what I was going to say, which is 

10 that the -- the 50 percent issue has been 

11 raised, but the one sample that was taken near 

12 the loading dock that was enriched was not in 

13 the -- necessarily in the workplace. And the 

14 fif-- the other sample that was taken in the 

15 workplace was natural uranium. And every 

16 indication we have from every report that we 

17 have for -- for Chapman Valve indicates that it 

18 was natural uranium that was sent over to 

19 Brookhaven and processed. So I think that's 

20 pretty well substantiated. 

21 DR. ZIEMER: Thank you. Gen Roessler? 

22 MR. GRIFFON: The enriched sample was -- was 

23 outside the building, Jim? 

24 DR. NETON: No, it was -- it was near the 

25 loading dock, just inside the door. 
78

1 MR. GRIFFON: But it was in the building. 

2 DR. NETON: It was in the building, right, but 

3 not in the work processes where the -- the 

4 grinding and the machining and the milling 

5 operations took place. And if you read the 

6 Folle report carefully, the reason they took 

7 the one sample near the loading dock is because 

8 it had some unusual characteristics -- some 

9 unusual beta-to-gamma ratios. I think it was 

10 elevated differently than what they saw in the 

11 -- in the rest of the building, or what they 

12 expected. That's why they took the one sample. 

13 And the other sample they took in the workplace 

14 they took to confirm that it was natural 

15 uranium, which is what they expected and is 

16 what they found. 

17 MR. GRIFFON: Right. 

18 DR. ZIEMER: Thank you. Gen Roessler? 

19 DR. ROESSLER: Since we talk a lot about weight 

20 of evidence, I'd just like to read a couple of 

21 sentences out of the Folle report because we're 

22 -- we're trying to determine what that sample 

23 meant. And in this report he says -- just 

24 putting the whole thing in perspective, I think 

25 -- (reading) It is highly unlikely that any 
79

1 work with enriched uranium could have taken 

2 place at this site without leaving a paper 

3 trail. There was very little of this material 

4 available at the time this work was done at 

5 Chapman. It is also unlikely because of 

6 security concerns. Few, if any, private 

7 companies would have been allowed to work with 

8 enriched material because, as far as I know, 

9 only government facilities were allowed to 

10 handle it. 

11 DR. ZIEMER: Thank you. Other comments? We're 

12 -- we're discussing now the motion that's 

13 before us. Yes, Mark? 

14 MR. GRIFFON: Just a -- I -- I mean I just 

15 wanted to remind us all that -- and this was 

16 true for the Blockson case, but it's also true 

17 here -- that -- Paul, you asked the question 

18 about did we consider, if the two percent were 

19 used, could we bound. And -- and NIOSH 

20 responded correctly. NIOSH's criteria is to 

21 demonstrate that they have sufficient 

22 information to bound doses. But we as a Board 

23 put in place procedures that said we want to 

24 see example dose reconstructions that show that 

25 they can bound. And so therefore these models 
80

1 and this -- this discussion of 20 picocuries 

2 per liter for the radon or, in this case, you 

3 know, using two percent, are not on the table, 

4 in my opinion. I mean -- well, in reality, 

5 they're not on the table. So you know, that -- 

6 that's just one thing for people, to remember 

7 our own procedures. We -- we've asked that in 

8 this SEC process we get examples and -- and 

9 have demonstration that -- and it's a -- I 

10 agree, it's above and beyond the criteria 

11 established for NIOSH, but we've set that in 

12 place for ourselves. 

13 The second comment is that I think when -- when 

14 John presented -- and I think we -- we have 

15 all been using that word a little bit, that 

16 "speculation", and I think John presented -- 

17 which I think is true, as well, Folle 

18 speculates, I think you -- you said in your -- 

19 in your presentation, that it could have been 

20 from Naval operations after. I mean there -- 

21 there's a bunch of -- of theories we've had 

22 discussed around the workgroup and speculation 

23 on how this sample might get there. The one 

24 reality now at this point I think we -- we can 

25 all come to a conclusion on is that it is an 
81

1 enriched sample, so it came from somewhere 

2 else. And was it likely during that time 

3 period? You know, I -- I think it's less 

4 likely, for sure. I will agree to that. But 

5 we don't have an answer on where it could have 

6 come from and I'm a little uneasy to vote on -- 

7 on speculation at this point that -- and also 

8 the fact that we haven't had another proposal 

9 of well, it's a real piece of data, maybe we 

10 need to reconsider that in the way we bound our 

11 doses. That hasn't been offered. So for those 

12 two reasons, I'm -- I'm voting against the mo-- 

13 or I'm speaking in -- in -- against the motion. 

14 DR. ZIEMER: Okay. Wanda, and then Brad. 

15 MS. MUNN: I think Brad was up first. 

16 DR. ZIEMER: Oh, Brad first? Okay. 

17 MR. CLAWSON: Well, I'm going to fin-- finish 

18 the rest of the statement that Guinevieve (sic) 

19 started. (Reading) And other Massachusetts 

20 sites were surveyed, forerunners of the MAD 

21 group. This site was found to have various 

22 uranium enrichments. This was a 

23 (unintelligible) landfill, I believe 

24 (unintelligible) was an individual. The report 

25 was published on the landfill, but I do not 
82

1 know the actual title of the report. I don't 

2 know of any conditions between facilities, but 

3 it does indicate that other contamination 

4 sources are present in the general area. 

5 I can tell you today that I have product from 

6 other facilities that you would never find a 

7 paper trail. The only thing it shows up on is 

8 my criticality controls because I don't own 

9 that product, but I am storing it. So you 

10 cannot tell me that there couldn't be something 

11 else that could have came in there or anything 

12 else. This is pure speculation. Now -- and we 

13 can say everything we want, but you know as 

14 well as I do that all of these DOE sites, from 

15 one site to the other, shared different stuff, 

16 research, everything else like that, and the 

17 paper trails, as we have seen in many things, 

18 is not the best. And that's why -- that's why 

19 I can't accept it and that's why I'm voting 

20 against it. 

21 DR. ZIEMER: Wanda Munn? 

22 MS. MUNN: I just had a -- a thought with 

23 respect to something that Mark said. My memory 

24 -- which is not always perfect, unfortunately -

25 - led me to believe that we had been speaking 
83

1 of a specific site when we had asked for NIOSH 

2 to demonstrate that they could or could not do 

3 something or -- I didn't realize that we had 

4 adopted that as -- 

5 MR. GRIFFON: It's in our procedure. 

6 MS. MUNN: -- as a procedure for the Board. We 

7 -- we have done that? 

8 MR. GRIFFON: Yes, yes. 

9 MS. MUNN: I need to go back and reread that. 

10 I had thought that we had been working with a 

11 specific site at that time. 

12 DR. ZIEMER: Jim -- Jim can speak to that 

13 issue. 

14 DR. NETON: I think Mark's -- Mark's correct on 

15 that, but I want to reiterate that NIOSH has 

16 not indicated that we would double these doses. 

17 We have indicated that if it were two percent 

18 enriched uranium and determined to be two 

19 percent enriched uranium, then the dose would 

20 double. But we're not suggesting that we're 

21 going to double the doses to two percent in the 

22 -- 

23 MR. GRIFFON: Well, I'm just saying I hear that 

24 discussion around the table. I'm not saying 

25 you -- you know, but I'm saying I hear that as 
84

1 -- 

2 DR. NETON: Yeah, agreed. 

3 MR. GRIFFON: -- you know, if this was done, 

4 couldn't it be bounded and -- 

5 DR. NETON: Right, but I just want to make 

6 clear, we're not suggesting at this point that 

7 we would double the doses merely to make this 

8 problem go away. That's not the situation. 

9 MR. GRIFFON: Okay. 

10 DR. ZIEMER: Okay, other comments, pro or con, 

11 supporting or against the motion? Or are you -

12 - okay, Phil? 

13 MR. PRESLEY: Paul, can I speak? 

14 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah, Robert, then Phil. 

15 MR. PRESLEY: We're talking about enriched 

16 uranium, and at the time that this was 

17 supposedly to have happened, this country was 

18 just beginning to enrich uranium. And every 

19 minute particle of enriched uranium that was 

20 produced was captured and the material that it 

21 was captured off of was washed and checked and 

22 cleaned and checked -- not to say that some of 

23 it got out, but at that time that we were 

24 producing that type of material, there were 

25 procedures in place because we were trying to 
85

1 get every gram that we possibly could to make a 

2 weapon. And the possibility of something like 

3 that getting up there is very, very minute 

4 because of the procedures that were taken at 

5 Oak Ridge to capture all of the material that 

6 they could make just as fast as they could make 

7 it. And that's -- that's a little history. 

8 DR. ZIEMER: Okay. Phil? 

9 MR. SCHOFIELD: I just -- until that issue is 

10 completely settled, I -- I still have a little 

11 heartburn because we're talking about the 

12 potential for increased dose to people who 

13 actually worked with the stuff on a daily 

14 basis. We're talking about real people here, 

15 we're not talking about air -- you know, the 

16 air or the ground contamination, but rather 

17 we're talking about potential for the people to 

18 ingest it or inhale it, which would make a 

19 difference in their -- whether they -- they 

20 could receive compensation or not. 

21 DR. ZIEMER: Okay. Let's see, who was next? 

22 Jim, are you next? 

23 DR. LOCKEY: Was there -- in the Ferguson 

24 report was there any mention of any process at 

25 this facility utilizing enriched uranium? 
86

1 DR. NETON: No. No, there's a very detailed 

2 description of all the activities in Building 

3 23. It's a hundred-page report or so, and 

4 there's noth-- no indication that there was any 

5 enriched uranium in 1948 and '49 processed at -

6 - at this facility. And DOE has searched their 

7 records quite a bit most recently and have 

8 found no contracts or any indication that 

9 anything other than this process occurred at 

10 Chapman Valve in those two years. 

11 MR. GRIFFON: Ji-- Jim, it's a very -- you said 

12 of -- it's a very detailed description, which I 

13 will agree, of all the activities that went on 

14 in Building 23 during this time period? I 

15 think it's a very detailed description of this 

16 project that went on in Building 23. 

17 DR. NETON: Well, yes, right. That's -- that's 

18 true. This -- this contract with the AEC to 

19 process these slugs in that time frame. But 

20 there is no indication that any other 

21 radiological activities occurred in that 

22 facility, and I think that's the central issue. 

23 This is what made this site an AWE in the first 

24 place, this operation, and we believe we've 

25 bounded the doses for this operation. We have 
87

1 found no indication of any other radiological 

2 operation funded by the AEC in 1948 and '49, 

3 none. And the sample that was taken decades 

4 later, we have no idea where it came from. 

5 DR. ZIEMER: Okay. John, then Josie. 

6 DR. POSTON: I'd like to try to summarize again 

7 for -- for everybody. There -- there -- I 

8 don't think there's every be-- ever been any 

9 discussion or dissension that the external 

10 doses could be reconstructed because of the 

11 film badge data that's available for the site. 

12 The -- the approach taken by NIOSH to 

13 reconstruct the internal doses is what in our 

14 business we call conservative, but -- but it -- 

15 it -- one could also characterize it as a huge 

16 overestimate, because what they did was they 

17 took the highest concentrations and assumed 

18 that those concentrations existed over the 

19 entire period of consideration, even though the 

20 operation, in my recollection, only lasted a 

21 couple of months. 

22 So here we have these workers who are assumed 

23 to be chronically exposed at the highest level 

24 that was measured over this entire period. And 

25 as I told the workgroup, if the probability of 
88

1 causation then doesn't exceed 50 percent, it 

2 will never exceed 50 percent, so that -- 

3 regardless of what you do. And I understand we 

4 have this one sample. But again, it was not 

5 taken in the work area. The sample that was 

6 taken in the work area, if you want to say fif7 - talk about percentages, Brad, the sample that 

8 was taken in the work area showed no enriched 

9 uranium. So -- I mean I -- I have concern, 

10 too, but it seems like we're just marching down 

11 this road. We -- we owe it to the folks to 

12 make a decision. 

13 DR. ZIEMER: Josie? 

14 MS. BEACH: Once again I would like to point 

15 out that we're discussing a document -- a six16 page report that I just received this morning 

17 in its entirety and haven't really had a chance 

18 to look at. I would like to table this motion 

19 also. 

20 DR. ZIEMER: Are you making a motion to table? 

21 MS. BEACH: Yes. 

22 DR. ZIEMER: There's a motion to table. Is 

23 there a second to the motion to table? 

24 MR. GIBSON: I'll second. 

25 DR. ZIEMER: It's been seconded. Okay, we will 
89

1 vote on the motion to table. 

2 DR. BRANCHE: Ms. Beach? Regarding -- 

3 Regarding to table, Ms. Beach? 

4 MS. BEACH: Yes. 

5 DR. BRANCHE: Mr. Clawson? 

6 MR. CLAWSON: Yes. 

7 DR. BRANCHE: Mr. Gibson? 

8 MR. GIBSON: Yes. 

9 DR. BRANCHE: Mr. Griffon? 

10 MR. GRIFFON: Yes. 

11 DR. BRANCHE: Dr. Lockey? 

12 DR. LOCKEY: No. 

13 DR. BRANCHE: We'll get -- no. Ms. Munn? 

14 MS. MUNN: No. 

15 DR. BRANCHE: Mr. Presley? 

16 MR. PRESLEY: No. 

17 DR. BRANCHE: Dr. Poston? 

18 DR. POSTON: No. 

19 DR. BRANCHE: Dr. Roessler? 

20 DR. ROESSLER: No. 

21 DR. BRANCHE: Mr. Schofield? 

22 MR. SCHOFIELD: Yes. 

23 DR. BRANCHE: Dr. Ziemer? 

24 DR. ZIEMER: No. 

25 DR. BRANCHE: The noes have it. 
90

1 DR. ZIEMER: Motion fails, so the original 

2 motion is back before us. Further discussion? 

3 MR. GRIFFON: I just want to -- one thing that 

4 we had discussed a little bit at the workgroup 

5 meeting and now with Folle's letter, you know, 

6 it seems to have maybe added importance -- in 

7 my mind, anyway -- and -- and -- is this notion 

8 of the Naval operations which could have 

9 happened, which -- which are -- I -- just for 

10 everyone on the phone or in the room, I mean 

11 that wouldn't be covered exposures. So you 

12 know, if -- and -- and we -- I think we kind of 

13 dead-ended it at the workgroup that there -- 

14 there'd be no way to -- to verify with the Navy 

15 or with DoD. It could end up, you know, being 

16 a lengthy process, but I don't know if -- if -- 

17 is -- in -- you know, I've -- I've worked at 

18 several of these facilities and -- and I've 

19 seen this in more than one instance, and it 

20 wouldn't surprise me if this was a result of 

21 later operations in-- involved in the Navy. 

22 But again, I'm in this speculation situation 

23 and if -- if -- if there's any way -- I mean I 

24 don't know if NIOSH has made any -- I don't 

25 think we asked them to, but I don't know if 
91

1 they have an opinion on that, on whether it 

2 would take months, years, it would take -- you 

3 know, if there were any way to follow up on -- 

4 and Mr. Folle gave a little more precise 

5 information or -- or at least his memory was a 

6 specific submarine op-- you know. 

7 I also did -- from correspondence with the Army 

8 Corps of Engineers on -- on the cleanup side, I 

9 -- I did also get some sense that there was 

10 some work for the Navy, but it didn't talk 

11 about any -- I was looking for some information 

12 that might have said they worked with nuclear 

13 fuels, but there was no indication of that, it 

14 was more valve work. But again, they could 

15 have been, you know, contaminated or whatever, 

16 so I -- let Larry respond. 

17 DR. ZIEMER: Larry. 

18 MR. ELLIOTT: We have not asked the Navy for 

19 any information about activities that were done 

20 for the Department of Defense under their 

21 auspices for this particular site, but we have 

22 for other sites. And we've -- in those 

23 instances, we've consistently received a lot of 

24 reluctance and reticence in our responses. 

25 There is no regulatory way that we have to 
92

1 compel them to respond, and we hit a brick wall 

2 in each and every instance where we have gone 

3 to approach them. So, you know, I just throw 

4 that in for the Board's consideration. 

5 DR. ZIEMER: Thank you. Other comments? 

6 Anyone else wish to speak for or against the 

7 motion? 

8 (No responses) 

9 Then we're going to proceed to vote. We will 

10 vote -- 

11 DR. ROESSLER: Please restate the motion. 

12 DR. ZIEMER: The motion as made by Mr. (sic) 

13 Poston was to accept the recommendation of 

14 NIOSH relative to this site. That 

15 recommendation essentially says that NIOSH 

16 believes that they can reconstruct dose, and if 

17 the motion carried it would support that 

18 position and it will -- it takes a majority of 

19 the members voting, including Dr. Melius, to 

20 pass that motion. 

21 Okay, are you ready to vote? By roll call. 

22 DR. BRANCHE: Ms. Beach? 

23 MS. BEACH: No. 

24 DR. BRANCHE: Mr. Clawson? 

25 MR. CLAWSON: No. 
93

1 DR. BRANCHE: Mr. Gibson? 

2 MR. GIBSON: No. 

3 DR. BRANCHE: Mr. Griffon? 

4 MR. GRIFFON: No. 

5 DR. BRANCHE: Dr. Lockey? 

6 DR. LOCKEY: Yes. 

7 DR. BRANCHE: Ms. -- Doc-- Ms. Munn? 

8 MS. MUNN: Yes. 

9 DR. BRANCHE: Mr. Presley? 

10 MR. PRESLEY: Yes. 

11 DR. BRANCHE: Dr. Poston? 

12 DR. POSTON: Yes. 

13 DR. BRANCHE: Dr. Roessler? 

14 DR. ROESSLER: Yes. 

15 DR. BRANCHE: Mr. Schofield? 

16 MR. SCHOFIELD: No. 

17 DR. BRANCHE: Dr. Ziemer? 

18 DR. ZIEMER: Yes. 

19 DR. BRANCHE: And then we will correspond with 

20 Dr. Melius to get his vote. 

21 DR. ZIEMER: I believe the count at the moment 

22 is six in favor and five opposed, and since we 

23 lack one of the votes, there's a possibility 

24 for a tie vote here -- 

25 DR. BRANCHE: That's true. 
94

1 DR. ZIEMER: -- and so I cannot announce the 

2 outcome. We -- we will not know the outcome 

3 until we obtain Dr. Melius's vote. If Dr. 

4 Melius votes no, that would be a tie vote and 

5 the motion would be lost. If Dr. Melius voted 

6 yes, then the motion would carry. We will 

7 await that -- yes? 

8 MR. GRIFFON: Can -- I just wanted to make a 

9 comment that if it does result in a tie vote, I 

10 -- I think -- you know, my sense, anyway, is 

11 that we're not -- it's not a lost cause here. 

12 I think this is as close as Blockson was, in my 

13 mind, and -- you know, we may -- there may be a 

14 way to resolve this, so I don't want -- just -- 

15 just for the sake of the Board, I don't want -- 

16 DR. ZIEMER: I'd simply point out that -- 

17 MR. GRIFFON: -- everybody getting frustrated 

18 about this, you know. 

19 DR. ZIEMER: -- if it's a tie vote, we have no 

20 recommendation -- 

21 MR. GRIFFON: Right. 

22 DR. ZIEMER: -- to make to the Secretary. I -- 

23 I guess I would need coun-- advice from 

24 counsel, and maybe from the Designated Federal 

25 Official, as to whether or not such an outcome 
95

1 needs to be reported to the Secretary. We are 

2 -- we would not be making a recommendation 

3 because we would have none to make. 

4 MR. GRIFFON: Did-- didn't we have a tie vote 

5 before on this? Yeah, so -- and you didn't 

6 report -- 

7 DR. BRANCHE: On this issue? 

8 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah. 

9 DR. BRANCHE: And you continued to -- your 

10 deliberations as a result. 

11 MR. GRIFFON: We went back to the workgroup, 

12 yeah, which I don't know -- 

13 DR. BRANCHE: You certainly have that option. 

14 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah, we had -- we had no -- we 

15 had no recommendation to make at that point. 

16 DR. BRANCHE: Counsel's coming forward. 

17 MS. HOWELL: Should the Board reach a 

18 determination that is a split vote and you do 

19 not believe that you can move forward and reach 

20 another determination -- I think in the 

21 previous instance you turned this back over -- 

22 DR. BRANCHE: To the workgroup. 

23 MS. HOWELL: -- to the workgroup. Should you 

24 have a six-six vote and not believe that there 

25 are any outstanding issues and that there's no 
96

1 further work that the Board can do to change 

2 the outcome, then you could report that to the 

3 Secretary in a letter. 

4 DR. ZIEMER: Thank you. We will await the vote 

5 and, depending -- depending on that, if it ends 

6 up to be a tie there would possibly be an 

7 opportunity to pursue some additional matters, 

8 although it's not clear to the Chair at the 

9 moment whether or not there's anything even in 

10 this most recent letter that -- that helps us 

11 along the way, but we can determine that after 

12 we see where we are on the vote. 

13 Let's see, Santa Susana -- well, let's get to 

14 Texas City Chemicals. Do we need to take our 

15 break? 

16 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah, let's do -- 

17 DR. ZIEMER: Let's take a -- 

18 MR. GRIFFON: -- a break. 

19 DR. ZIEMER: Try to keep it as concise as you 

20 can. Let's try to get it to ten minutes so we 

21 can move forward here rapidly -- ten-minute 

22 break. 

23 (Whereupon, a recess was taken from 10:15 a.m. 

24 to 10:30 a.m.) 

25 DR. BRANCHE: We're going to get started again, 
97

1 and we're going to -- I'm going to ask the 

2 phone participants -- again, it is critical 

3 that everyone participating by phone mute your 

4 lines. As well, it is equally critical that 

5 you not put this line on hold if you have to 

6 step away. It is far better for you to hang up 

7 and dial back in than to put us on mute. Your 

8 putting us -- I'm sorry, your putting us on 

9 hold interrupts the entire line for everyone. 

10 Thanks for your cooperation. 

11 (Pause) 

TEXAS CITY CHEMICALS, DR. PAUL ZIEMER

12 DR. ZIEMER: Dan, are you going to go first for 

13 Texas City, or [Identifying Information 

14 Redacted]? 

15 DR. MCKEEL: (Off microphone) (Unintelligible) 

16 DR. ZIEMER: [Identifying Information Redacted] 

17 going... 

18 DR. MCKEEL: (Off microphone) (Unintelligible) 

19 DR. ZIEMER: Oh, okay. 

20 DR. MCKEEL: (Off microphone) I think she 

21 (unintelligible) on the phone. 

22 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah, she -- she -- 

23 DR. MCKEEL: (Off microphone) (Unintelligible) 

24 DR. ZIEMER: Be what? 

25 DR. MCKEEL: (Off microphone) (Unintelligible) 
98

1 DR. ZIEMER: Okay, sure. 

2 (Pause) 

3 DR. BRANCHE: Dr. Ziemer, the line is open. 

4 DR. ZIEMER: Okay, we're ready to resume. 

5 DR. BRANCHE: Texas City. 

6 DR. ZIEMER: We're going to address the Texas 

7 City Chemicals petition next. You may recall 

8 that the evaluation report for Texas City 

9 Chemical was presented at our last meeting in 

10 Tampa. The surrogate data workgroup was 

11 assigned the responsibility to look at this 

12 particular petition and the evaluation report. 

13 In the meantime -- and they have -- have not 

14 yet addressed that, but in the meantime we will 

15 hear today from the petitioners, and first of 

16 all Dr. McKeel is representing them and, Dan, 

17 welcome you back to the mike. And then we will 

18 hear from one of the petitioners by phone -- 

19 DR. BRANCHE: [Identifying Information 

20 Redacted]. 

21 DR. ZIEMER: -- [Identifying Information 

22 Redacted]. 

23 DR. MCKEEL: Well, good morning to the Board 

24 again, and thank you for letting me update you 

25 on our activities pursuing what I thought was 
99

1 our assignment from the last meeting. 

2 I did have one question to just refresh me on -

3 - and I can't remember, I know that the 

4 surrogate data group was going to look at this 

5 petition, but was SC&A tasked to do any sort of 

6 review? I -- 

7 DR. ZIEMER: You know -- 

8 DR. MCKEEL: -- that's a confusing -- 

9 DR. ZIEMER: -- Dan -- 

10 DR. MCKEEL: -- point in my mind. 

11 DR. ZIEMER: -- I will have to check the -- I 

12 don't think they were, but I will have to 

13 double-- 

14 DR. MCKEEL: Okay. 

15 DR. ZIEMER: I think we were -- I think Dr. 

16 Melius asked that the workgroup look at it 

17 first and determine what tasking was needed -- 

18 DR. MCKEEL: That's fi-- 

19 DR. ZIEMER: -- was my recollection. 

20 DR. MCKEEL: That's fine. 

21 DR. BRANCHE: It was -- it was the petitioner's 

22 request that they be assigned it, but -- 

23 DR. ZIEMER: No, but I -- I think we can check 

24 the minutes, but my recollection is that Dr. 

25 Melius didn't want to task SC&A until the 
100

1 workgroup had a chance to look at it and define 

2 what the tasking would be. 

3 DR. MCKEEL: Tha-- that's fine. Dr. Melius did 

4 write me an e-mail and let me know that at the 

5 -- I believe the last, or maybe the first, 

6 surrogate data workgroup meeting they had to 

7 spend the time on defining those criteria and -

8 - 

9 DR. ZIEMER: Right. 

10 DR. MCKEEL: -- would not have time to get to 

11 Texas City, so we're all updated on that part. 

12 So in the meantime, I mention to all of you all 

13 that we were looking for a set of records that 

14 really fell into two categories: Permits and 

15 court records from two subsequent owners of the 

16 Texas City Chemicals site, Borden and the 

17 subsequent owner after that, Amoco. And Borden 

18 and Amoco were involved in a long-running 

19 lawsuit which started about the time that the 

20 plant itself was shut down in the late 1970s, 

21 somewhere around '78 the court suit started, 

22 ran at least until 1990. And so there are 

23 really quite a few documents related to that, 

24 and -- and the reason I thought getting those 

25 records was probably going to be germane to 
101

1 what we're all working on is that the issue was 

2 contamination at the site, who would pay to 

3 have it removed. And so hopefully that -- 

4 those records would get into radioactivity 

5 associated with the phosphogypsum piles related 

6 to the uranium recovery operations from the AEC 

7 back in the '50s when the recovery building was 

8 built and -- and used for that purpose. 

9 Subsequently there were a lot of interim 

10 negotiations, but Congressman Nick Lampson's 

11 office got involved and his staff person, Kathy 

12 Guillory -- and Ray, that's G-u-i-l-l-o-r-y -- 

13 and they were really instrumental in talking to 

14 some of the legal counsel at I think British 

15 Petroleum now owns the site. Anyway, they were 

16 able to get a number of those court records. 

17 They sent me a copy and then I suggested that 

18 they forward all those court records to both 

19 NIOSH and the Board so you would also have 

20 them. And very recently I sent Dr. Ziemer a -- 

21 an excerpt showing that in fact those records 

22 do contain radioactivity measurements that I 

23 think will be really helpful in bounding the 

24 dose at Texas City or -- or at least getting us 

25 farther along that -- that road. 
102

1 As the Board well remembers, this is a really 

2 interesting site where basically there -- there 

3 is no real data of any kind. There's certainly 

4 no film badge monitoring, but no air sampling 

5 data, no -- no any-- no urin-- bioassay data, 

6 so -- so the doses which NIOSH says they can 

7 reconstruct are being constructed from models 

8 and from extrapolation of other sites, and 

9 that's why I think the Board felt like this 

10 would be a good case to send to the surrogate 

11 data group because it's a great test case. 

12 So anyway, that part of the data capture 

13 efforts was successful and -- and hopefully 

14 those documents will be useful. 

15 The permits we were seeking were two in 

16 particular. One, the Department of Energy 

17 facility description ends the uranium residual 

18 period at 1977, and that date coincides with 

19 the date that a lot of workers really severed 

20 their relationships with the plant. We have at 

21 least three people who know the recovery 

22 building was still standing in 1977. What we 

23 have never elicited in any of the worker 

24 meetings down there, the town hall meetings or 

25 my interactions with the workers, is anyone who 
103

1 knows precisely when that recovery building was 

2 torn down. Three people at least know that it 

3 was there in 1977. But we thought it would be 

4 useful to know when it was actually demolished 

5 and hauled away, as possibly a better end point 

6 for the residual period. So that was one 

7 permit or set of permits that we were looking 

8 for. 

9 The other ones had to do with the phosphogypsum 

10 piles, and it was quite clear that when Borden 

11 bought the plant from Texas City Chemicals, 

12 Texas City went bankrupt, their first decision 

13 was -- they knew the -- they knew the -- the 

14 piles were radioactively contaminated beyond 

15 simply the -- the natural uranium from the 

16 uranium ore that's in phosphate rock. But this 

17 product had -- had extra radioactivity 

18 associated with it, so their first decision was 

19 they were going to store it -- I believe at 

20 first temporarily -- on-site. But you know, 

21 like those temporary storage things get to be, 

22 basically it got to be a permanent site on -- 

23 on-site. 

24 Then the subsequent owners -- I think it took 

25 them a while to get through the idea they -- 
104

1 they bought the site as-is, Borden did, and 

2 then they -- then -- now I'm not sure how much 

3 I -- I don't think they really knew very much 

4 at all about the uranium recovery AEC 

5 operations. But anyway, when Borden then sold 

6 it to Amoco, at least by that time they knew 

7 that there was radioactivity on-site that had 

8 to be cleaned up. And for reasons that aren't 

9 clear to me yet from reading those documents, 

10 Amoco decided to buy it anyway. Then they had 

11 second thoughts about it, they want-- oh, well, 

12 they wanted to build a coal-fired plant, and it 

13 was a consortium -- I can't remember, there 

14 were three companies involved -- and they were 

15 -- they had decided that the old TCC site was 

16 the place to build this large coal-fired plant, 

17 and so they were proceeding along and then they 

18 found out that the phosphogypsum piles and all 

19 that were going to be a problem. But the real 

20 problem was the plant cost too much. The cost 

21 doubled or tripled. They abandoned that, and 

22 then they were left with no -- no site for the 

23 coal plant, but all this radioactive material 

24 that they wanted to get off-site, so they sued 

25 each other about who -- who was supposed to pay 
105

1 in that. So anyway, that's where that goes. 

2 Now what we do not have, though -- and yet it 

3 may be in those court records, but I haven't 

4 found it -- is any information about when those 

5 piles were actually removed. And -- and we 

6 thought maybe the permits would have more 

7 information about the type of radioactivity -- 

8 it might have a bearing on where they could be 

9 disposed of, for example. 

10 So the first thing that Kathy Guillory and 

11 Congressman Lampson's office did was to go to 

12 the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, 

13 TCEQ, who indicated at first that, among about 

14 1,000 records, they -- they thought they 

15 possessed those permits that we were interested 

16 in and -- but they wanted to charge a very high 

17 fee to get those copied and researched. So 

18 Kathy Guillory, trying to save the Texas 

19 taxpayer some money, then elicited the help of 

20 a state representative there, Craig Eiland, E21 i-l-a-n-d, and his staff person, Amanda 

22 Hudgins, and they both then went to TCEQ. They 

23 got me to write an e-mail that defined exactly 

24 what we were looking for, and the end result 

25 was that TCEQ finally said well, they had some 
106

1 records but they don't really think they have 

2 the relevant records that we're looking for. 

3 They then suggested that Representative Eiland 

4 pursue looking for the records at the Nuclear 

5 Regulatory Commission and the State Department. 

6 The latter I don't understand at all, but 

7 Representative Eiland's staff did inquired of 

8 NRC, and NRC said no, we were not the -- the 

9 right agency; you should look for those records 

10 at the Department of Energy. Which did at 

11 least make me smile slightly because that's 

12 where the facility description originated in 

13 the first place. So in fact that's what we 

14 will do is pursue that and see if those permits 

15 exist. 

16 I'm not ready to give up. I think they -- they 

17 must -- there must be State of Texas permits. 

18 So that's basically, I think, where we stand 

19 right now, and I think that's about all that I 

20 have to report. 

21 DR. ZIEMER: Thank you very much, Dan. 

22 [Identifying Information Redacted], the 

23 petitioner, is also on the line and let's hear 

24 from her next. [Identifying Information 

25 Redacted], are you there? 
107

1 UNIDENTIFIED: [Identifying Information 

2 Redacted] is not here. She's ill. We have 

3 some other representatives. 

4 DR. ZIEMER: Was there someone else that was 

5 speaking in her behalf? 

6 UNIDENTIFIED: Yes, sir. 

7 DR. ZIEMER: Was that -- 

8 UNIDENTIFIED: (Unintelligible) 

9 UNIDENTIFIED: I have (unintelligible) you 

10 about the pile that you was discussing. 

11 DR. ZIEMER: Okay, can -- 

12 UNIDENTIFIED: His name is Mr. Watterback. 

13 DR. ZIEMER: Okay. 

14 MR. WATTERBACK: No, my name is Joe Watterback 

15 and I went to work there in January of 1957 and 

16 stayed through November of 1977. And if I 

17 understood Dr. McKeel correctly a while ago, he 

18 was saying that -- don't know when the piles 

19 were removed, what date. But as we speak right 

20 now, the gypsum piles and the piles are still 

21 there, have never been removed. There's about 

22 a 15-acre gypsum pile possibly 30 feet high 

23 that's still standing today, and that's about 

24 all I can tell you on that. 

25 DR. ZIEMER: Okay, thank you for that 
108

1 additional information. 

2 Was there anyone else there that had comments 

3 on the phone line? 

4 UNIDENTIFIED: Yes, sir, just one moment. 

5 MR. INGRAM: My name's James Ingram. I left in 

6 1969 -- 

7 DR. ZIEMER: Give us your name again, please? 

8 MR. INGRAM: James Ingram, that's I-n-g-r-a-m. 

9 DR. ZIEMER: Thank you. Go ahead. 

10 MR. INGRAM: I went to work there in 1957 and 

11 left in 1969, went to work for Amoco. Sometime 

12 during my tenure at Amoco I was called into the 

13 office and asked about the contamination at the 

14 Texas City Chemical plant. At that time I had 

15 no knowledge of anything of that nature even 

16 existed out there. In all the 12 years I was 

17 there, there was nobody ever mentioned it. I 

18 went into this building during that time and 

19 all this strange-looking equipment -- to me, it 

20 wasn't fertilizer-making equipment. I just 

21 wondered what it was. Nobody there got -- 

22 questions I asked was what do they do there? 

23 Nobody knew at this time. Nobody was told 

24 anything. 

25 That's about all I can tell you about that 
109

1 part. 

2 DR. ZIEMER: Okay, thank -- 

3 MR. CELESTINE: This is Frank Celestine and I 

4 worked out there from 1956 until 1970. 

5 DR. ZIEMER: Could you spell your last name for 

6 us, please? 

7 MR. CELESTINE: C-e-l-e-s-t-i-n-e. 

8 DR. ZIEMER: Okay. 

9 MR. CELESTINE: There are a lot of things out 

10 there -- according to what I heard on this 

11 (unintelligible) this morning, there a lot of 

12 things so out of date don't even come up to 

13 what we know as employees out there. Things 

14 happened out there I haven't even heard 

15 anything about in a meeting. But we just need 

16 to get to the fellas that worked out there that 

17 are still alive and can really give you 

18 accurate information. All of this information, 

19 to me, seems nothing but speculation or 

20 somebody trying to give us the runaround in 

21 some kind of way. I -- I can't understand 

22 that. This thing's been going on long enough 

23 to bring it to a conclusion. It looks like 

24 every time somebody started in the right 

25 direction, another person come up with a motion 
110

1 to table. You keep table that thing you will 

2 never get to the bottom of it. You'll never 

3 bring it to a conclusion. Now I don't know how 

4 many meetings there's been on this subject 

5 matter, but I'll tell you a lot of people are 

6 getting tired. 

7 UNIDENTIFIED: And a lot of them are dying. 

8 MR. CELESTINE: And a lot of them are dying. 

9 There are too many people dying with the same 

10 complaint that worked out there to say that we 

11 weren't contaminated or there was nothing out 

12 there to cause their health to deteriorate and 

13 come up with the same complaint, all of them 

14 dying from cancer. And the two or three that's 

15 left don't know how much time they have left 

16 'cause they have cancer. Whoever is trying to 

17 produce this -- or simulation of production 

18 (unintelligible), you will never do that. We 

19 worked there and there was giant fans to blow 

20 all of that dust-like material out of there. 

21 Sometime it was yellow, sometime it was gray, 

22 and God knows whatever color or form it may 

23 have taken. And they had all these big ol' 

24 fans to keep us -- and still we was full of 

25 that stuff. And many times we'd take off our 
111

1 respirator or whatever we wore, it was just 

2 clogged with that stuff. We'd have to go and 

3 get another one and change the filter in 

4 (unintelligible) often. I -- I see why 

5 everybody's dying of cancer, 'cause they all 

6 got, you know, this material out there that's 

7 related to it. Thank you. 

8 DR. ZIEMER: Okay, thank you. Anyone else 

9 there? 

10 MR. WATTERBACK: Yes, this is Joe Watterback 

11 again. 

12 DR. ZIEMER: Yes, Bill (sic)? 

13 MR. WATTERBACK: I was one of two people that 

14 was left out there with Borden after they shut 

15 the plant down. I was maintenance supervisor 

16 and my immediate boss was the superintendent 

17 there, and we were in charge of the contractor 

18 that was removing equipment from the plant to 

19 put on railroads and (unintelligible) to send 

20 to Norfolk, Virginia. And at that time the 

21 recovery building was still standing when I 

22 left there in November of 1977, and the 

23 contractor -- I don't believe the contractor 

24 was in there doing the removal work also tore 

25 the building down. Someone else, I believe, 
112

1 tore the building down but I cannot confirm 

2 that. But the building was still there in 

3 1977. 

4 DR. ZIEMER: Okay, thank you. 

5 MR. WATTERBACK: That's all -- all I have. 

6 DR. ZIEMER: Dr. McKeel here has an additional 

7 comment. 

8 DR. MCKEEL: Just to summarize, I think the 

9 information you've just heard is basically 

10 what's in the worker transcripts, and that's 

11 basically our departure point for the 

12 subsequent studies. And the real question 

13 about the phosphogypsum piles is -- the plant 

14 continued to make fertilizer for a long time 

15 after the AEC operations stopped, so they were 

16 generating phosphogypsum. The point I'm trying 

17 to find out, and I think is relevant to what 

18 we're doing here, is -- is specifically the 

19 phosphogypsum waste that was left over that was 

20 really associated with the '52 to '56 period of 

21 the SEC. So we're trying to see if that's -- 

22 was segregated and if we can track that 

23 separately -- 

24 DR. ZIEMER: Very good. 

25 DR. MCKEEL: -- in any way. Right. 
113

1 DR. ZIEMER: Okay, thank you very much. And 

2 thank you folks on the line. Anyone else on 

3 the line had an additional comment? 

4 UNIDENTIFIED: Yes, one more thing. When the 

5 plant went from Texas City Chemical, it went to 

6 Smith Douglas -- 

7 DR. ZIEMER: Yes. 

8 UNIDENTIFIED: -- and then to Borden. 

9 DR. ZIEMER: Yes, and who -- 

10 UNIDENTIFIED: Okay. 

11 DR. ZIEMER: -- who was speaking there? Could 

12 you identify -- 

13 MR. WATTERBACK: Joe Watter-- Joe Watterback. 

14 DR. ZIEMER: Yes, okay, thank you. Okay, 

15 appreciate that additional clarification. 

16 Okay, I think that -- Board members, do you 

17 have any questions on Texas -- John Mauro here 

18 has a comment on Texas City Chemical. 

19 DR. MAURO: Dr. Ziemer, during the April 

20 meeting in Tampa SC&A was, according to my 

21 notes, given direction to begin a focused 

22 review of the SEC, with emphasis on the 

23 surrogate data strategy where we marry our 

24 typical review with the guidance that the 

25 working group drafted on the four-step 
114

1 criteria. So yes -- 

2 DR. ZIEMER: Okay. 

3 DR. MAURO: -- we have underway a review -- a 

4 focused review. 

5 DR. ZIEMER: Thank you for clarifying that, 

6 John. Dr. McKeel? 

7 DR. MCKEEL: Just one final comment about Dr. 

8 Mauro's idea. I understand that the four 

9 criteria are a Board working document and 

10 probably not in a releasable form, but I would 

11 still ask -- it certainly would help me to 

12 understand the process -- if there's any way to 

13 get a version of that document that -- I 

14 underst-- just -- I'm interested in seeing it 

15 when it can ever be -- 

16 DR. ZIEMER: Actually -- 

17 DR. MCKEEL: -- released. 

18 DR. ZIEMER: -- I think what needs to be done 

19 here is to make sure that you are plugged into 

20 the workgroup's activities so you can 

21 participate, and any working documents that 

22 they have in those workgroup meetings can 

23 certainly be made available, I believe. I'm -- 

24 DR. BRANCHE: Tha-- that -- 

25 DR. ZIEMER: I -- I'm not sure what's -- what 
115

1 the workgroup even has at this point. 

2 DR. MCKEEL: Yes, I understand. 

3 DR. BRANCHE: But because, Dr. McKeel, you are 

4 a co-petitioner -- 

5 DR. MCKEEL: Uh-huh. 

6 DR. BRANCHE: -- so in that capacity you would 

7 also get information -- 

8 DR. MCKEEL: That would -- 

9 DR. BRANCHE: -- as it becomes available, as 

10 all petitioners do. 

11 DR. MCKEEL: That would be wonderful. 

12 DR. BRANCHE: Of course it would be Priva-- you 

13 would receive it after it's Privacy Act 

14 cleared, but -- 

15 DR. MCKEEL: Yes, I understand. 

16 DR. BRANCHE: -- that -- but you -- that's -- 

17 you would receive it as a -- as a co18 petitioner. 

19 DR. MCKEEL: I understand. Thank you. 

20 DR. ZIEMER: Thank you. Okay, Board members, 

21 any questions on that site? 

22 (No responses) 

AREA IV OF SANTA SUSANA FIELD LABORATORY

MR. MICHAEL GIBSON

23 Okay, let's move on quickly to the Santa Susana 

24 Field Lab. There's not going to be very much 
116

1 to report here, but let me also check to see if 

2 we -- we may have someone on the line, but let 

3 me start with Mike Gibson, who's the chair, and 

4 then Mike -- we'll hear also maybe from one of 

5 the petitioners. 

6 MR. GIBSON: Yeah, Santa Susana site SEC 

7 petition 93 was qualified in October. NIOSH 

8 presented their evaluation report to us in 

9 April. SC&A is currently looking over the site 

10 profile, and the working group members are 

11 circulating some dates, trying to get a -- a 

12 meeting together. 

13 DR. ZIEMER: Okay, thank you very much. And 

14 let's see if we have one of the petitioners on 

15 the line. LaVonne -- 

16 MS. KLEA: Yes, I'm here. Can you hear me? 

17 DR. ZIEMER: Yes, very well. 

18 MS. KLEA: This is LaVonne Klea. I just would 

19 like to give you a brief update on what's going 

20 on. I sent you a copy of a lawsuit that was 

21 taken by the City of LA National Defense 

22 Counsel and Committee to Bridge the Gap against 

23 the DOE, requiring them to perform an 

24 environmental impact statement. While they've 

25 done an 800-page data gap analysis, which has 
117

1 been rejected by the federal judge because they 

2 used all the Boeing monitoring data and it's 

3 been rejected because they falsified their data 

4 by incinerating the samples. And so I'm going 

5 to a meeting tonight, a follow-up meeting on 

6 that issue of the rejection of their 800-page 

7 preliminary data gap analysis. 

8 DR. BRANCHE: Ms. Klea. 

9 DR. ZIEMER: Okay, tha-- 

10 MS. KLEA: And that's all I have to report for 

11 now. 

12 DR. ZIEMER: Thank you. I'm -- I'm not sure if 

13 we have a copy of what you referred to. Do we? 

14 DR. BRANCHE: Ms. Klea, this is -- this is Dr. 

15 Branche, could -- I'm not able to put my hands 

16 on a copy of the lawsuit that you sent -- you 

17 sent -- you said you sent copies of? 

18 MS. KLEA: Yes, I did send a copy with my 

19 petition. It's a -- 

20 DR. BRANCHE: Oh, it's with your petition, 

21 okay. 

22 DR. ZIEMER: Oh, with the petition, yes, yes -- 

23 DR. BRANCHE: I understand now. Thank you. 

24 DR. ZIEMER: Yes, okay, we thought this was 

25 something more recent. Okay, thank you very 
118

1 much for clarifying that. 

2 Board members, again, any comments or questions 

3 on Texas City Chemicals (sic)? 

4 (No responses) 

5 CONGRESSIONAL LETTERS

6 Okay. Now a couple of letters we want to move 

7 ahead on. 

8 DR. BRANCHE: Jason. 

9 DR. ZIEMER: Jason has a couple of letters I 

10 think to read into the record regarding various 

11 sites. Jason, what, two Congressional letters? 

12 MR. BROEHM: Yes, two of these that I got last 

13 night from Senator Schumer's office. 

14 DR. ZIEMER: Okay. 

15 MR. BROEHM: The first one is on Linde 

16 Ceramics. 

17 (Reading) Many thanks again to the Board for 

18 affording me this opportunity to discuss Linde 

19 Ceramics' application to have an extended time 

20 frame at their site added to the Special 

21 Exposure Cohort. I understand that these 

22 meetings are very long and I appreciate how 

23 accommodating the Board has been in allowing me 

24 to offer my support for this important 

25 allocation. 
119

1 I'm extremely supportive of the Linde SEC 

2 petition, and I respectfully urge you to 

3 recommend adding the extended time period at 

4 this facility to the SEC. The Linde Ceramics 

5 facility, located in Tonawanda, New York, 

6 produced fuel for the Department of Energy for 

7 years. In the process, many employees, both 

8 during those years and in the residual period, 

9 were exposed to toxic and radioactive uranium. 

10 The site profile for this facility does not 

11 adequately take into account a number of 

12 factors, and there is strong reason to believe 

13 that it will underestimate applicants' exposure 

14 and thus the probability of causation. To risk 

15 uniformly and consistently underestimating the 

16 probability of causation at a site violates the 

17 statutory requirement of a claimant-favor-- 

18 claimant-friendly process. In a case such as 

19 this, it is imperative that the Board 

20 acknowledge the shortcomings of the available 

21 information and recommend adding the site and 

22 time in question to the SEC, especially in 

23 light of the fact that there is already a class 

24 of the SEC at this site. 

25 It is readily apparent to me and to many of my 
120

1 colleagues that there is simply a paucity of 

2 reliable information for this location. It is 

3 unacceptable to delay adding these other time 

4 periods to the SEC as well. 

5 Our country built its nuclear arsenal, and with 

6 it our global dominance, on the backs of Linde 

7 Ceramics plant -- plant's workers. And 

8 everything that our government has done to 

9 these men and women, after everything that they 

10 sacrificed for our continued safety, the -- 

11 deserve compensation for their illnesses. 

12 Again, thank you for allowing me to submit 

13 testimony for your consideration. I 

14 respectfully request that you recommend 

15 granting this petition, and I thank you for 

16 your time and consideration. 

17 And the second letter, also from Senator 

18 Schumer, is relating to the Bethlehem Steel SEC 

19 petition. 

20 (Reading) Thank you for allowing me the 

21 opportunity to address the Board again on the 

22 important issue of the application for 

23 admission to the Special Exposure Cohort for 

24 Bethlehem Steel, located in Lackawanna, New 

25 York. As you all know, I have been strongly 
121

1 advocating the creation of a class in the 

2 Special Exposure Cohort for Bethlehem Steel for 

3 several years now. 

4 The veterans of this facility are sick, and 

5 unfortunately, many are dying. We owe it to 

6 them to recognize their service with admission 

7 to the SEC. 

8 Today members of the Bethlehem Steel Action 

9 Group are here advocating for the site's 

10 admission to the SEC. I am very impressed by 

11 their tenacity and the self-sacrifice of their 

12 members in coming all the way from Lackawanna, 

13 New York. I hope that I and all of my 

14 colleagues in Congress who are supporting this 

15 application are able to live up to the high 

16 standard that these wonderful activists have 

17 set. 

18 In constructing a site profile for Bethlehem 

19 Steel, NIOSH relied very heavily on data from 

20 Simonds Saw -- Simonds Steel in Lockport, New 

21 York to fill in the gaps in the available data 

22 for Bethlehem. In the years since the site 

23 profile was completed it has become apparent 

24 that the use of surrogate data in Bethlehem's 

25 site profile is much higher than in most other 
122

1 profiles. Furthermore, the accuracy of the 

2 comparison between Bethlehem and Simonds has 

3 been challenged time and again by former 

4 workers. 

5 In light of all the unknown variables at this 

6 site, I think it is only reasonable for the 

7 Board to acknowledge that the available data 

8 are not sufficient to create a workable profile 

9 that can live up to the statutory mandate of a, 

10 quote, claimant-friendly, unquote, assessment. 

11 The SEC is the only appropriate course of 

12 action in such a case. Its broad reach is the 

13 only tool that will guarantee former workers of 

14 Bethlehem Steel receive the claimant-friendly 

15 process that Congress has rightly deemed them 

16 to deserve. Please recommend adding a class to 

17 the SEC for this site as quickly as is 

18 reasonably possible. 

19 The men and women who worked for Bethlehem 

20 Steel manufacturing fuel for the nation's 

21 nuclear weapons are truly veterans of America's 

22 brutal Cold War. Their sacrifices in building 

23 our nuclear arsenal created our country's best 

24 (unintelligible) work against armed conflict 

25 with Soviet Russia, and surely saved thousands 
123

1 upon thousands of lives. These heroes deserve 

2 our gratitude and rightful compensation. 

3 With so many of these veterans aging and ill, 

4 it is imperative that this be done as quickly 

5 as possible. 

6 Again, thank you for the chance to address you 

7 again today, and thank you for the careful 

8 consideration you give to this and all of the 

9 petitions you consider. 

10 DR. ZIEMER: Thank you, Jason. Yesterday 

11 during the public comment period we had a 

12 comment by phone from [Identifying Information 

13 Redacted], Nevada Test Site, concerning a 

14 letter which he had but which Board members did 

15 not have. But that letter now will be made 

16 available to us, at least verbally. 

17 Larry, are you prepared to provide -- this is a 

18 -- well, Larry, you describe the letter and -- 

19 MR. ELLIOTT: I hope this is the letter you 

20 want to have read into the record. This is a 

21 letter from Mr. -- or from Patricia Worthington 

22 at DOE to Mr. Pete Turcic at DOL. 

23 (Reading) Dear Mr. Turcic -- and it's dated 

24 June 2nd, 2008. Mr. Turcic, this is in 

25 response to your letter of November 6, 2007 
124

1 requesting information related to the Nevada 

2 Test Site, specifically Area 51. You stated in 

3 our response -- you stated our response will 

4 assist the Department of Labor in addressing 

5 questions related to the proposed Special 

6 Exposure Cohort under the Energy Employees 

7 Occupational Illness Compensation Program Act 

8 for former workers of Area 51. Your letter 

9 purports to extend coverage of the EEOICPA 

10 benefits to workers of Area 51 in Nevada. 

11 The referenced area is one that has 

12 historically been part of NTS. In 1958, under 

13 Public Land Order 1662, approximately 38,000 

14 acres, or 60 square miles of land, was 

15 administratively withdrawn by the Department of 

16 Interior for the use by the Atomic Energy 

17 Commission as part of its NTS. Following its 

18 designation as part of NTS, the area was then 

19 referred to as Area 51. 

20 At some point during its usage by AEC -- see 

21 the enclosed letter dated October 2nd, 1991 -- 

22 from 1958 until 1999 when land was 

23 legislatively withdrawn for the use of 

24 Department of Defense under the Military Lands 

25 Withdrawal Act of 1999, Public Law 106-65, the 
125

1 land was under jurisdiction of AEC and its 

2 successors, the Energy Research and Development 

3 Agency, and later the Department of Energy. 

4 During the period of AEC stewardship of the 

5 land it was used for at least one above-ground 

6 nuclear safety experiment by AEC. Subsequent 

7 environmental characterization activities, as 

8 well as continuing maintenance of utilities, 

9 were also undertaken by our agency. In 

10 general, DOE did not pursue any further 

11 mission-associated activities in that area. It 

12 is our understanding, however, that other 

13 federal agencies did utilize that property. 

14 With respect to AEC and its successor -- 

15 successor's contractor employees, to the extent 

16 that those claimants reference having worked at 

17 Area 51, that would signify they had worked at 

18 NTS. 

19 It is important to note that AEC and its 

20 successors utilized a unique management and 

21 operating contractor paradigm at its sites, 

22 whereby those management and operating 

23 contractors existed solely to undertake 

24 implementation of that specific AEC contract 

25 and were not allowed to enter into separate 
126

1 contracts with other parties. Both the 

2 Reynolds Electric -- Electrical Engineering 

3 Company, and later, in 1990s, Bechtel Nevada, 

4 Incorporated, were such captive contractors 

5 which managed operations across NTS. Thus an 

6 NTS worker who was an employee of these 

7 entities necessarily accomplished such work 

8 for, or on behalf of, its contract with AEC or 

9 its successors. 

10 To the extent that NTS subcontractors were 

11 employed as a result of a subcontract with 

12 those management and operating contractors, 

13 their employees would similarly have conducted 

14 work done under or on behalf of the AEC 

15 contract. 

16 It should be noted that AEC and its successors 

17 also had prime contracts with other entities 

18 for conduct of its NTS activities, including 

19 EG&G; Energy Measurements, Incorporated; Holmes 

20 and Narver, Incorporated; and Wackenhut 

21 Services, Incorporated, among others. 

22 As with all mission activities and contracts 

23 with DOE and its predecessors, there was 

24 associated documentation evidencing such work 

25 and related employment. Such documentation 
127

1 would, of course, be subject to applicable 

2 management under records retention and 

3 destruction requirements, including those of 

4 the general records schedule and any further 

5 agency internal policies and guidance. 

6 With respect to activities conducted by another 

7 agency, however, any associated documents would 

8 necessarily be owned and managed by that 

9 agency. However, such documents would 

10 presumably evidence work conducted by or on 

11 behalf of that agency and not DOE or its 

12 predecessors. 

13 Nevertheless, workers accessing the area 

14 through NTS would have been subject to NTS 

15 requirements. Thus they would have had NTS 

16 badges and dosimeters. 

17 We hope this information has provided further 

18 clarification relevant to your needs. Should 

19 you have any additional questions or concerns, 

20 please contact me -- and it provides a number. 

21 Sincerely, Patricia R. Worthington, Ph.D.; 

22 Director, Office of Health and Safety -- Office 

23 of Health, Safety and Security. 

24 DR. ZIEMER: Thank you, Larry. I'm not sure 

25 what that clarified for me, but could you, in a 
128

1 sentence or two, tell us what the impact of 

2 this is on any of our previous actions relative 

3 to that site or to NIOSH's actions relative to 

4 that site? 

5 MR. ELLIOTT: Well, the salient points here are 

6 two, in my opinion. One, Area 51 is part -- 

7 considered part of the Nevada Test Site during 

8 those years quoted in this letter. And two, 

9 the individuals who would access Area 51 would 

10 have been badged by the contractors at the 

11 site. 

12 We know that we have claims, we have processed 

13 claims which had reported in their interviews 

14 that they did move into Area 51 and back out, 

15 and we have badge data for those individuals. 

16 To answer your other question, however, going 

17 to what this means toward the class that's been 

18 added at Nevada Test Site, we'll have to 

19 evaluate the period and the activities that 

20 were conducted in Area 51 against that class, 

21 and I think we'll have to report back -- 

22 DR. ZIEMER: Right, and if -- 

23 MR. ELLIOTT: -- perhaps we'll have to do an 

24 addendum to our evaluation report. 

25 Additionally I think DOL will have to look at 
129

1 maybe addit-- claimants that may have been -- I 

2 have to leave that to DOL. I don't know 

3 exactly what it means for them. 

4 DR. ZIEMER: That gives me a feel at least for 

5 -- so we will await -- if something -- if you 

6 identify such issues, we will await then your 

7 actions on that. Thank you. 

8 SUBCOMMITTEE, WORK GROUP REPORTS

9 I want to move quickly to the updates from the 

10 other subcommittees -- or other workgroups, 

11 rather. And we're not going to take workgroup 

12 reports from those workgroups that have already 

13 reported in this meeting, which are quite a 

14 number. But while we're doing this, I wanted 

15 to call attention to a draft which was 

16 distributed to you earlier in the week called 

17 "workgroup responsibilities", and you may 

18 recall that at our phone meeting -- which was -

19 - well, whenever our last phone meeting was -- 

20 DR. BRANCHE: May 2nd. 

21 DR. ZIEMER: -- I indicated to you that the 

22 head of NIOSH had requested that all of our 

23 workgroups have specific responsibilities 

24 identified and that we place this information 

25 on the web site. I did ask that all of the 
130

1 workgroup chairs provide me with information on 

2 what they thought their responsibilities were, 

3 since in most cases we hadn't actually spelled 

4 them out in detail. That is, we didn't -- 

5 described for workgroups what their charge was 

6 when they were -- when they were organized, but 

7 in most cases there was not a formal 

8 specification of their -- if you want to call 

9 it charter, but more informally, their 

10 responsibilities. And several of the chairs 

11 did respond to that, although I must tell you 

12 that most did not, which allowed the -- allowed 

13 the Chair of the Board to go ahead and tell you 

14 what your responsibilities are, and here they 

15 are. 

16 Now we're not going to go through these and 

17 debate them. These are what they are. But I 

18 will -- and this is called a draft, and I will 

19 allow the workgroup chairs the prerogative of -

20 - of editorializing a bit, if you wish, before 

21 this goes on the web site if you want to add 

22 anything that you think is pertinent. 

23 DR. BRANCHE: You don't have to -- 

24 DR. ZIEMER: These are broadly general. They 

25 indicate cases where the workgroup is 
131

1 responsible to, for example, review the site 

2 profile, to review the SEC petitions, to work 

3 with the contractor in resolving issues -- that 

4 sort of thing. So in general, they are 

5 somewhat generic, with specificity as needed 

6 from site to site. But if you wish to make 

7 changes, let me know, workgroup chairmen, and 

8 we will send the final copy to be put on the 

9 web site. 

10 MR. GRIFFON: Paul, would it be possible to 

11 send this electronically? We can redline -- 

12 DR. ZIEMER: I will -- 

13 MR. GRIFFON: There's only one thing I -- I 

14 glance at it and see that Rocky Flats says 

15 Nevada Test Site underneath it. 

16 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah, that's -- that's -- 

17 MR. GRIFFON: It's just a cut -- 

18 DR. ZIEMER: -- because of our cut and paste 

19 operation -- 

20 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah, right, right, but I mean -- 

21 DR. ZIEMER: -- probably, right. We don't want 

22 to get those two mixed up, but I -- I will 

23 commit to sending this out electronically when 

24 I get back home. Thank you. 

25 So with that, let's -- and Larry. 
132

1 MR. ELLIOTT: Before you start on that, I would 

2 just like to make one request. Since this will 

3 go on the web site and there is at least one 

4 working group here, I believe, that has 

5 completed its charge, I think it's important 

6 for us to -- when we post these on the web site 

7 we take note of those individual workgroups who 

8 have concluded their -- their efforts and the 

9 charge has been complete, and note that with a 

10 date. 

11 DR. ZIEMER: Actually -- 

12 MR. ELLIOTT: And there's no -- 

13 DR. ZIEMER: -- each one of those is noted; 

14 perhaps the date is not there and -- 

15 MR. ELLIOTT: The date is not there. 

16 DR. ZIEMER: -- and the chairmen can help me 

17 provide that date. But for example, Dr. 

18 Lockey, yours -- 

19 MR. ELLIOTT: The example would be Special 

20 Exposure Cohort petitions that did not qualify. 

21 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah -- 

22 MR. ELLIOTT: It says completed, but I -- and I 

23 think it'd be important to have a date. 

24 DR. ZIEMER: Have a date. 

25 MR. ELLIOTT: Yeah, and I can help with the 
133

1 date if -- if the chair needs it. 

2 DR. LOCKEY: Would you then note the date that 

3 was? 

4 MR. ELLIOTT: Yes, I will. 

5 DR. LOCKEY: I'd appreciate it. 

6 DR. ZIEMER: Thank you. So noted. 

7 DR. BRANCHE: You could let me know, too. That 

8 would help. 

9 DR. ZIEMER: So noted. Thank you. 

10 DR. BRANCHE: You ready? 

11 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah. 

12 DR. BRANCHE: Fernald site profile and Special 

13 Exposure Cohort petition; Mr. Clawson, chair. 

14 MR. CLAWSON: We've had two meetings. We've 

15 asked SC&A to do several things and we've got -

16 - NIOSH is working on some things. We're 

17 looking at setting back up another workgroup 

18 meeting in the next two to three weeks. 

19 Everything is proceeding on and we're working 

20 issues out as we go. 

21 DR. BRANCHE: Hanford site profile and Special 

22 Exposure Cohort petition. Dr. Melius is the 

23 chair, but there are other workgroup members 

24 who are here. Can they provide an update? 

25 DR. ZIEMER: That workgroup has not met since 
134

1 our last meeting, so there is nothing further 

2 to report. I think there -- 

3 MR. CLAWSON: Right, we -- 

4 DR. ZIEMER: Oh -- 

5 MR. CLAWSON: -- we did -- at that one meeting 

6 we selected a certain area that we had that was 

7 called out for a SEC that was accepted, and 

8 went from there. It was certain years. 

9 DR. BRANCHE: Los Alamos National Laboratory 

10 site profile and Special Exposure Cohort 

11 petition; Mr. Griffon, chair. 

12 MR. GRIFFON: Los Alamos is -- at this point I 

13 think -- I don't know if LaVon is still here, 

14 but I think we're still on course for probably 

15 having a workgroup meeting set for early in the 

16 fall of this year, 2008. We're waiting for a 

17 revised site profile, I believe, and -- and 

18 maybe a -- LaVon -- you might even gi-- okay. 

19 Anyway, that's where we stand. We haven't met 

20 since the last meeting, but we expect in the 

21 fall to have -- start on the process. 

22 DR. BRANCHE: Linde Ceramics site profile? 

23 DR. ROESSLER: Our assignment was to carry out 

24 a review of the site profile, along with NIOSH 

25 and SC&A. We had a first meeting in March of 
135

1 2007. SC&A identified around 22 issues. 

2 Throughout the year we have worked through 

3 those. We had one issue that was still 

4 outstanding. We met on Monday and we took care 

5 of that issue. NIOSH and SC&A agreed on the 

6 approach. The workgroup -- we decided that we 

7 have fulfilled our charge, and at this point 

8 I'd like to move that the Board accept our 

9 report. 

10 DR. ZIEMER: And your -- your motion -- this 

11 comes as a recommendation from your workgroup, 

12 as I understand it, that the workgroup agrees 

13 that -- 

14 DR. ROESSLER: The workgroup agreed that we had 

15 fulfilled our assignment and that every -- that 

16 NIOSH -- 

17 DR. ZIEMER: That all the issues of the -- 

18 DR. ROESSLER: All the issues were -- 

19 DR. ZIEMER: -- site profile have been 

20 resolved? 

21 DR. ROESSLER: Right. 

22 DR. ZIEMER: Okay. This -- this is not a 

23 recommendation to send anything to the 

24 Secretary or -- 

25 DR. ROESSLER: No, we just completed -- 
136

1 DR. ZIEMER: -- anything of that sort, it's 

2 simply that the site profile now, in your -- in 

3 the workgroup's opinion, all the needed changes 

4 have been made as -- 

5 DR. ROESSLER: As recommended by SC&A. 

6 DR. ZIEMER: -- issues raised by our contractor 

7 and as agreed upon by NIOSH. 

8 DR. ROESSLER: Right. 

9 DR. ZIEMER: I -- I -- that comes as a motion 

10 from this workgroup then, and we will vote on 

11 that. A second is not required. Workgroup 

12 members, do you have questions for Dr. Roessler 

13 on Linde Ceramics? 

14 (No responses) 

15 In essence, voting to accept this basically 

16 says we believe the site profile is an 

17 appropriate document for NIOSH to use in dose 

18 reconstruction -- if I can paraphrase it in 

19 that manner. 

20 Are you ready to vote? 

21 All in favor, aye? 

22 (Affirmative responses) 

23 Opposed, no? 

24 (No responses) 

25 Abstaining? 
137

1 (No responses) 

2 Motion carries. Thank you very much, and we 

3 can consider the work -- Larry, you have a 

4 comment then? 

5 MR. ELLIOTT: I was just going to ask, is this 

6 workgroup's efforts completed then -- 

7 DR. ZIEMER: Yes, and -- 

8 MR. ELLIOTT: -- and would I note today as the 

9 date -- 

10 DR. ZIEMER: -- as of today, completed. 

11 DR. BRANCHE: We did Nevada Test Site 

12 yesterday. Pinellas Special Exposure Cohort 

13 petition; Mr. Schofield, chair. 

14 MR. SCHOFIELD: We've had our first meeting. 

15 There's a few outstanding issues. 

16 Unfortunately they could have got scrubbed off 

17 my hard drive so I've got to get those 

18 recovered. But once those issues are settled 

19 by -- we get a report back from SC&A, then 

20 we'll schedule another meeting. 

21 DR. BRANCHE: Savannah River Test Site profile 

22 -- sorry, Savannah River site profile; Mr. 

23 Griffon, chair. 

24 MR. GRIFFON: Savannah River has no update at 

25 this point since the last meeting. 
138

1 DR. BRANCHE: Special Exposure Cohort issues 

2 group, including 250-day issue and preliminary 

3 review of 83.14 SEC petition; Dr. Melius, 

4 chair, but other member -- all other members of 

5 the workgroup are here. 

6 DR. ZIEMER: Well, I can report that the 

7 workgroup has not met since our last meeting so 

8 there's no additional update to report. 

9 DR. BRANCHE: Subcommittee on dose 

10 reconstruction; Mr. Griffon, chair. 

11 MR. GRIFFON: The subcommittee -- yeah, we -- 

12 we had a meeting on the 6th set and the 7th set 

13 of cases in Cincinnati. We went through -- we 

14 have -- I think we're very close to closure on 

15 almost all issues on the 6th set of cases -- 

16 I'm trying to remember. I'm sorry, I should 

17 have pre-- prepared more for this report. The 

18 7th set was a -- a -- more of a preliminary 

19 run-through of the findings. Although, as you 

20 might imagine, we do have a lot of overlap with 

21 some findings from past cases, so we actually 

22 were able to get through -- I -- I think we got 

23 al-- we might not have made it through the 

24 entire 7th set of cases, but we put in a good 

25 solid 9:00 to 5:00 day on these -- on these 
139

1 findings. 

2 I -- I still -- I still -- the subcommittee 

3 still has to produce a first-100-cases report. 

4 We -- we have not run through that yet. I plan 

5 to -- to have that for the next subcommittee 

6 meeting, for discussion, to bring back to the 

7 full Board. 

8 And I think, Dr. Ziemer, we have a letter that 

9 -- I just gave you some final edits for the 

10 last review of the 4th and 5th set to get that 

11 finally out to the Secretary, I believe. We 

12 already voted and approved it -- 

13 DR. ZIEMER: The letter to -- 

14 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah. 

15 DR. ZIEMER: -- the Secretary summarizing the 

16 results of cases six-- 61 through 100 -- 

17 MR. GRIFFON: Right. 

18 DR. ZIEMER: -- was approved by the Board at 

19 our last meeting, subject to some polishing of 

20 the presentation and some numbers that NIOSH 

21 had to provide us for the report. And we now 

22 have those and that should be ready to go in 

23 within the next week or so. 

24 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah. 

25 DR. BRANCHE: Use of -- 
140

1 MR. GRIFFON: And I think that's -- 

2 DR. BRANCHE: I'm sorry. 

3 MR. GRIFFON: I'm sorry. That's all I have to 

4 report. Sorry. 

5 DR. BRANCHE: Sorry. Use of surrogate data; 

6 Dr. Melius, chair, but all other workgroup 

7 members are here. 

8 MR. GRIFFON: As I recall, we did have a -- a 

9 phone meeting, didn't we? Yeah, we had one 

10 phone meeting, and I'm not sure where we -- 

11 where we left things, but we had an initial 

12 draft -- right? -- to -- and I think Jim was 

13 going to incorporate some comments from that 

14 call, and some written comments that Wanda had 

15 provided, and revise the draft and send it to 

16 the workgroup again for a possible follow-up 

17 phone meeting, yeah, so -- 

18 DR. LOCKEY: That's correct. 

19 MR. GRIFFON: -- we're moving ahead past the 

20 first draft. 

21 DR. BRANCHE: Last but not least, worker 

22 outreach; Mr. Gibson, chair. 

23 MR. GIBSON: We have not met since the last 

24 meeting. OCAS is continuing to work on and 

25 making progress on their new procedure and the 
141

1 database to capture the information from worker 

2 comments, and we'll probably meet -- I would 

3 hope before the next Board meeting -- and have 

4 some response then. 

5 MS. BEACH: Dr. Branche, you didn't call on 

6 Mound, but we -- 

7 DR. BRANCHE: I didn't call Mound? 

8 MS. BEACH: No -- 

9 DR. BRANCHE: Forgive me. 

10 MS. BEACH: That's okay. We have -- 

11 DR. BRANCHE: Ms. Beach, chair. 

12 MS. BEACH: We have not had a workgroup meeting 

13 since our first one in April, although we do 

14 have a scheduled meeting at this time for July 

15 14th in Cincinnati. 

16 DR. BRANCHE: Forgive me, I got so caught up 

17 with Linde -- I'm sorry, Josie. 

18 MS. BEACH: That's okay. 

19 DR. ZIEMER: Okay, thank you very much. You 

20 have at your places copies of the official 

21 wording of the two petitions that were acted 

22 on, the Y-12 petition and the Spencer Chemical 

23 Company petition. I would be pleased to have 

24 any editorial comments you may wish to make. 

25 Let me point out a couple of corrections at 
142

1 this moment. 

2 On the Y-12 petition, bullet number four, at 

3 the end of the line -- second line there should 

4 be a period rather than a comma. 

5 DR. BRANCHE: That's for Y-12? 

6 DR. ZIEMER: That's for Y-12, end of the -- 

7 fourth bullet, end of the second line. 

8 DR. BRANCHE: End of the second line. 

9 DR. ZIEMER: There should be a period rather 

10 than a comma. 

11 And then if you turn the page over, the very 

12 last paragraph, talking about this -- today's 

13 Board meeting, that should be 2008 instead of 

14 2005. 

15 Likewise on the Spencer Chemical Company -- 

16 clearly I was using the same template, but last 

17 paragraph of the Spencer should indicate the 

18 current date, 2008 rather than 2005. 

19 I've asked Larry to look at the descriptions of 

20 the -- of the class in both of these cases and 

21 he's agreed that they are in accordance with 

22 the class, as described by NIOSH. 

23 Do I need to read these formally into the 

24 record or can I -- can we agree simply to 

25 provide copies to the court reporter and ask 
143

1 him to incorporate them into the record? Can 

2 we do that for -- to expedite? 

3 THE COURT REPORTER: Is that okay with you? 

4 DR. BRANCHE: Yeah, that's why I handed it to 

5 you. 

6 (Whereupon, the exact wording of the referenced 

7 motions is attached hereto:) 

8 Y-12 Petition

9 The Board recommends that the following letter 

10 be transmitted to the Secretary of DHHS within 21 

11 days. Should the Chair become aware of any issue 

12 that, in his judgment, would preclude the transmittal 

13 of this letter within that time period, the Board 

14 requests that he promptly inform the Board of the 

15 delay and the reasons for this delay and that he 

16 immediately work with NIOSH to schedule an emergency 

17 meeting of the Board to discuss this issue. 

18 The Advisory Board on Radiation and Worker 

19 Health (The Board) has evaluated SEC Petition-00098 

20 under the statutory requirements established by 

21 EEOICPA and incorporated into 42 CFR Sec. 83.13(c)(1) 

22 and 42 CFR Sec. 83.13(c)(3). The Board respectfully 

23 recommends Special Exposure Cohort status be accorded 

24 to all employees of the Department of Energy (DOE), 

25 its predecessor agencies, and DOE contractors and 
144

1 subcontractors who worked at the Y-12 Plant in Oak 

2 Ridge, Tennessee from March 1, 1943 through December 

3 31, 1947 for a number of work days aggregating at 

4 least 250 work days, occurring either solely under 

5 this employment, or in combination with work days 

6 within the parameters established for other classes 

7 of employees in the Special Exposure Cohort. This 

8 recommendation is based on the following factors: 

9 The Y-12 facility during this time period was 

10 one of the earliest sites involved in the 

11 production of nuclear weapons and was 

12 constructed and operated during a time when 

13 radiation control and monitoring methods were 

14 still being developed. 

15 Monitoring data as well as information on 

16 sources of radiation exposures and process 

17 information are insufficient for adequate 

18 individual dose reconstruction for the time 

19 period involved. In particular, information 

20 needed for dose reconstruction on the calutron 

21 operations, an important source of exposure, is 

22 incomplete. 

23 A number of other radiological operations 

24 occurred at the Y-12 plant, and NIOSH does not 

25 have information that clearly describes all the 
145

1 buildings where radiological operations 

2 occurred. Consequently, NIOSH is unable to 

3 determine if any specific group of employees 

4 was not potentially exposed to ionizing 

5 radiation. 

6 Only a limited number of individual bioassay 

7 samples are available and NIOSH has concluded 

8 that available data are too limited to support 

9 internal dose reconstruction. Although some 

10 air monitoring data are available, not enough 

11 is known about those samples to support dose 

12 reconstruction. 

13 NIOSH has not located any individual external 

14 monitoring results. In addition, NIOSH has not 

15 obtained any individual external monitoring 

16 data for this period and lacks source-term 

17 information about non-uranium radiological 

18 operations. 

19 In its evaluation report, NIOSH has concluded 

20 that it is likely that radiation doses for this 

21 group of workers at Y-12 Plant during this time 

22 period could have endangered the health of 

23 members of this class. The Board concurs. The 

24 Board also notes that NIOSH is able to 
146

1 reconstruct doses from medical X-rays by means 

2 of existing project technical documents. 

3 Based on these considerations, and on the 

4 discussions and deliberations at our June 24-

5 26, 2008 Board meeting, the Board recommends 

6 that this Special Exposure Cohort petition be 

7 granted. 

8 Enclosed is supporting documentation from the 

9 Advisory Board Meeting held June 24-26, 2008 in 

10 St. Louis, Missouri. This documentation 

11 includes transcripts of the deliberations, 

12 copies of the petition and the NIOSH review 

13 thereof, and related documents distributed by 

14 NIOSH. If any of these items are unavailable 

15 at this time, they will follow shortly. 

16 Spencer Chemical Co.

17 The Board recommends that the following letter 

18 be transmitted to the Secretary of DHHS within 21 

19 days. Should the Chair become aware of any issue 

20 that, in his judgment, would preclude the transmittal 

21 of this letter within that time period, the Board 

22 requests that he promptly inform the Board of the 

23 delay and the reasons for this delay and that he 

24 immediately work with NIOSH to schedule an emergency 

25 meeting of the Board to discuss this issue. 
147

1 The Advisory Board on Radiation and Worker 

2 Health (The Board) has evaluated SEC Petition-00089 

3 under the statutory requirements established by 

4 EEOICPA and incorporated into 42 CFR Sec. 83.13(c)(1) 

5 and 42 CFR Sec. 83.13(c)(3). The Board respectfully 

6 recommends Special Exposure Cohort status be accorded 

7 to all Atomic Weapons Employer employees of the 

8 Spencer Chemical Company/Jayhawk Works from January 

9 1, 1956 through December 31, 1961 for a number of 

10 work days aggregating at least 250 work days, 

11 occurring either solely under this employment, or in 

12 combination with work days within the parameters 

13 established for other classes of employees in the 

14 Special Exposure Cohort. This recommendation is 

15 based on the following factors: 

16 Spencer Chemical Company/Jayhawk Works 

17 conducted chemical processes to produce uranium 

18 and thorium oxides and uranium carbides from 

19 other forms, including uranium hexafluoride. 

20 Physical forms of the material at the site 

21 included fused ceramic pellets and finely 

22 divided powder. 

23 The facility processed several types of uranium 

24 bearing materials for use in the nuclear fuel 

25 cycle, including dissolution and purification 
148

1 of metal scrap to recover uranium oxide; and 

2 hydrolyzation and purification of scrap uranium 

3 hexafluoride to recover uranium oxide. NIOSH 

4 does not have information about the nature of 

5 the thorium operations at the plant. 

6 Although documents from the period indicate the 

7 individuals were on a bioassay program, no 

8 individual bioassay records have been located. 

9 Although documents from the period indicate 

10 that workers wore dosimeters, no dosimetry 

11 records have been discovered other than a 

12 single record for one individual. The lack of 

13 external monitoring records prevents NIOSH from 

14 reconstructing total external dose, although 

15 doses from uranium can be reconstructed from 

16 project technical documents by means of the 

17 procedures set forth in NIOSH Technical 

18 Bulletin TBD-6000. 

19 Although documents from the period indicate 

20 that air monitoring, radiation surveys, and 

21 contamination surveys were conducted, results 

22 from such surveys have not been located. 

23 The lack of information on thorium operations 

24 prevents NIOSH from reconstructing doses from 

25 thorium. 
149

1 In its evaluation report, NIOSH has concluded 

2 that it is likely that radiation doses for this 

3 group of workers at Spencer Chemical Co. during 

4 this time period could have endangered the 

5 health of members of this class. The Board 

6 concurs. The Board also notes that NIOSH is 

7 able to reconstruct doses from medical X-rays 

8 by means of existing project technical 

9 documents. 

10 Based on these considerations, and on the 

11 discussions and deliberations at our June 24-

12 26, 2008 Board meeting, the Board recommends 

13 that this Special Exposure Cohort petition be 

14 granted. 

15 Enclosed is supporting documentation from the 

16 Advisory Board Meeting held June 24-26, 2008 in 

17 St. Louis, Missouri. This documentation 

18 includes transcripts of the deliberations, 

19 copies of the petition and the NIOSH review 

20 thereof, and related documents distributed by 

21 NIOSH. If any of these items are unavailable 

22 at this time, they will follow shortly. 

23 DR. ZIEMER: Are there any other very obvious 

24 editorial changes anyone wishes to make at this 

25 time on these? Otherwise, let me know. We 
150

1 have -- in the next couple of weeks before I 

2 send it. Actually I will distribute the -- the 

3 draft letters to you, as I normally do, so 

4 you'll have another chance to look at them -- 

5 the draft letter to the Secretary -- or 

6 letters. 

7 I want to move on to the Dow -- Dow Madison 

8 planning. We have a couple of issues before 

9 us. One was the issue of assigning tasks to 

10 our -- to our contractor. The other was 

11 involving a workgroup. I have gone back and 

12 checked our minutes from the meet-- the meeting 

13 in -- what's the date here on this meeting -- 

14 it's the -- it's the January meeting when this 

15 was discussed. And at that time -- and I think 

16 Dr. McKeel's memory was correct; he said he 

17 thought it had been assigned to the -- to the 

18 Melius workgroup on -- actually it was the -- 

19 MR. GRIFFON: The SEC workgroup, right? 

20 DR. ZIEMER: It was the SEC workgroup, not -- 

21 not the -- not the workgroup on surrogate data. 

22 It was the SEC workgroup. 

23 DR. MCKEEL: (Off microphone) (Unintelligible) 

24 never went to the surrogate data 

25 (unintelligible). 
151

1 MR. GRIFFON: Right. 

2 DR. ZIEMER: And Dr. Melius had volunteered to 

3 sort of monitor what was going on there, and so 

4 I'm going to confirm that that's where -- 

5 that's where this activity will continue to 

6 reside and to charge that workgroup with 

7 monitoring activities related to Dow Madison. 

8 Now the other part of this was to define a path 

9 forward, and also to determine whether 

10 additional tasking was needed for the workgroup 

11 relative to the petition. I'd like to 

12 basically ask the Board members if you have 

13 recommendations on the path forward and the 

14 issues that you believe should be addressed by 

15 the workgroup, and possibly with the assistance 

16 of the -- the Board's contractor. 

17 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah, I -- I think my -- the 

18 issue I presented yesterday -- I mean was the 

19 primary one I can think of, I -- other people 

20 may have other views, but the model for thorium 

21 and thoron during the residual period is -- is 

22 my -- the main issue I think that the workgroup 

23 should take, you know, to -- to review. 

24 Whether we need contractor support on that is 

25 another question, but... 
152

1 DR. ZIEMER: Okay. And Jim? 

2 DR. LOCKEY: Didn't that revolve about TIB-90, 

3 a technical document? 

4 MR. GRIFFON: It did have a TIB, TIB-70, I 

5 thought. 

6 DR. LOCKEY: TIB-70, and that, to me -- 

7 MR. GRIFFON: TIB-70, yeah. 

8 DR. LOCKEY: -- I think that was -- that was 

9 what we were going to -- whether we need to get 

10 -- put together a separate workgroup to deal 

11 with TIB-70. I think that's what the issue 

12 resolved (sic) around. 

13 DR. ZIEMER: TIB -- TIB-70 itself currently 

14 would fall under the procedures workgroup as a 

15 responsibility, and John, can you remind me 

16 whether or not TIB-70 has already been reviewed 

17 by -- 

18 DR. MAURO: No. 

19 DR. ZIEMER: It has not been reviewed -- 

20 DR. MAURO: It's not on the list for review and 

21 it has not been reviewed. 

22 MR. GRIFFON: They haven't been tasked with 

23 that. 

24 DR. ZIEMER: All right. 

25 MR. GRIFFON: So whether we want to -- I mean 
153

1 we should probably decide it, I -- 

2 DR. ZIEMER: Well -- 

3 MR. GRIFFON: -- if we need to split that off 

4 into procedures and -- and... 

5 DR. ZIEMER: Well, in the interest of time, 

6 rather than -- than wait for the workgroup to 

7 sort of decide that, it seems to me -- it 

8 certainly seems to the Chair that we've got to 

9 have the TIB-70 review regardless, and so I'm 

10 wondering if -- if it would be in order to task 

11 our -- our contractor to initiate that review 

12 and then, when it is completed, for the 

13 workgroup to pick that up and -- in a somewhat 

14 expedited way, realizing that -- 

15 MR. GRIFFON: That's the -- yeah. 

16 DR. ZIEMER: -- we have -- we have this issue. 

17 But I -- I think that will be a little sort of 

18 easier to handle than the broad 6000/6001 

19 issues that -- that you now have given up. So 

20 the trade-off is that you would get this 

21 somewhat lesser task, I guess I'd describe it. 

22 Is there -- is there any objection to tasking -

23 - and we would ask Christine, working with 

24 David Staudt, to make that tasking happen. 

25 DR. MCKEEL: Well, may I make a comment -- 
154

1 DR. ZIEMER: You certainly may. 

2 DR. MCKEEL: -- about tasking of the 

3 contractor? Just to refresh, SC&A did file a 

4 report on the initial NIOSH evaluation report. 

5 DR. ZIEMER: That's correct. 

6 DR. MCKEEL: But they did not -- and in that 

7 report, interestingly, they did evaluate worker 

8 testimony that covered the residual period. 

9 And they really did provide some very valuable 

10 kind of independent assessment of what the 

11 workers said about the activities that went on 

12 there and -- and what I characterize as at 

13 least evidence that the thorium operations 

14 period continued on much longer than the 

15 uranium operations, and then what kind of 

16 activities were going on during the residual 

17 period. But what they did not do was to look 

18 at thorium calculation of internal and external 

19 doses in any form or way. 

20 Then evaluation -- the addendum one came out 

21 from NIOSH and of course this month the 

22 addendum two, and I would just ask please for 

23 the Board to think about, along with TIB-70, 

24 that -- you know, my -- my question yesterday, 

25 what I tried to focus on, was whether the data 
155

1 used for the air intakes and -- and general air 

2 samples and the breathing zone samples are 

3 really appropriately -- appropriate samples to 

4 apply to Dow Madison and -- and just the 

5 general way that NIOSH proposes that now they 

6 can calculate those doses but they couldn't 

7 before. I just think it leaves it very 

8 incomplete unless the contractor also looks at 

9 that question. 

10 DR. ZIEMER: Thank you for -- 

11 DR. MCKEEL: It's just a comment. 

12 DR. ZIEMER: -- that suggestion. Jim? 

13 DR. LOCKEY: John, yesterday we were -- since 

14 TIB-70 is used in a lot of different -- it's 

15 not just for this, it's going to be used 

16 throughout -- I think we were -- we really 

17 wanted that looked at, and how soon can you get 

18 that done? How -- how fast can you move that 

19 up in your agenda? 

20 DR. MAURO: We -- we could start working on it 

21 immediately, but I have to give it a read. I 

22 haven't read it. I don't know how complex it 

23 is, and so it's hard for me to say how long 

24 it's going to take to review. If you -- I 

25 could -- I just want to read -- give -- read it 
156

1 cover to cover, get my mind around the problem 

2 and the right people to do the evaluation. I 

3 could get back to you in a matter of days with 

4 an answer to your question of when I might be 

5 able to have a report -- 

6 DR. LOCKEY: I think that -- 

7 DR. MAURO: -- into your hands. 

8 DR. LOCKEY: -- would be helpful for the Board 

9 to -- 

10 DR. MAURO: Yeah, but I do -- 

11 DR. LOCKEY: We need to -- 

12 DR. MAURO: I haven't read it and I don't -- 

13 DR. LOCKEY: We need to keep the petitioners -- 

14 we need to keep this on the -- 

15 DR. MAURO: Yes. 

16 DR. LOCKEY: -- on the front burner. 

17 DR. MAURO: Yeah, so if you just give me a few 

18 days just to read it and -- and I'm -- how best 

19 -- how best to -- so just e-mail the Board with 

20 my -- my -- 

21 DR. BRANCHE: Your estimated time. 

22 DR. MAURO: -- prospective -- yeah. 

23 DR. ZIEMER: Let's -- 

24 DR. BRANCHE: Yeah, I think that's -- 

25 DR. ZIEMER: Send -- send it to Christine and 
157

1 we'll deter-- 

2 DR. BRANCHE: And then over to -- yeah. 

3 DR. ZIEMER: -- we'll -- we'll get it to the 

4 Board, but I think -- just communicate -- 

5 DR. BRANCHE: I'll confer with Dr. Ziemer when 

6 you send your estimated time to me. 

7 DR. ZIEMER: And then we'll provide that 

8 information for the workgroup and make sure the 

9 Board is aware of it. 

10 DR. BRANCHE: Dr. Ziemer -- 

11 DR. ZIEMER: Christine has a comment here. 

12 DR. BRANCHE: Well, actually I have a question 

13 to -- to you and to the rest of the Board 

14 members. And I understand about how the issues 

15 concerning the 250 days was assigned to the 

16 appropriate workgroup. But Mr. Griffon raises 

17 issues about modeling for thorium and thoride -

18 - I may not have all the technical names 

19 correct -- correctly stated -- 

20 DR. ZIEMER: Thoron. 

21 DR. BRANCHE: -- thoron -- thoron, thank you -- 

22 but I am concerned that that may not be 

23 properly addressed by the 250-day workgroup, so 

24 is that going to be lost? 

25 MR. GRIFFON: Well, I -- 
158

1 DR. BRANCHE: Is that the appropriate place? 

2 MR. GRIFFON: I mean I think it's -- the same 

3 thing applies. It would have to be moved to 

4 the front burner on that group. That -- I 

5 think we -- we had an SEC/250-day workgroup -- 

6 DR. BRANCHE: Yes. 

7 MR. GRIFFON: -- (unintelligible) -- 

8 DR. ZIEMER: The 250-day was -- 

9 DR. BRANCHE: Yeah, inclu-- 

10 DR. ZIEMER: -- one of their issues but not 

11 their only issue. 

12 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah. 

13 DR. ZIEMER: In that sense it was a somewhat ad 

14 hoc workgroup that was available -- 

15 MR. GRIFFON: Right. 

16 DR. ZIEMER: -- and it may be -- 

17 MR. GRIFFON: That we need to -- 

18 DR. ZIEMER: -- that we would have to have a 

19 full workgroup just addressing this. But 

20 insofar as a lot of the -- you know, the -- the 

21 Dow issues, many of them have been addressed. 

22 We had the existing group already address -- it 

23 may be that this -- this workgroup can handle 

24 it, and they're not having to spend a lot of 

25 time right now on the 250-day issue anyway, so 
159

1 I think -- 

2 MR. GRIFFON: Right. 

3 DR. ZIEMER: -- I think they're in a position 

4 to -- to do the work. 

5 DR. BRANCHE: And you're saying it's covered 

6 because it's also actually primarily supposed 

7 to be Special Exposure Cohort issues? 

8 DR. ZIEMER: Yes. 

9 MR. GRIFFON: Right. That was originally the 

10 way we -- 

11 DR. BRANCHE: Well, we'll have to -- 

12 MR. GRIFFON: -- defined -- 

13 DR. BRANCHE: We'll have to monitor and see. I 

14 mean I -- 

15 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah, yeah, yeah -- 

16 DR. BRANCHE: -- prove to me that that's 

17 actually going to hap-- 

18 DR. ZIEMER: Right. 

19 DR. BRANCHE: -- be properly addressed, 

20 especially given that Dr. Melius isn't here. 

21 DR. ZIEMER: But he -- he did volunteer to have 

22 his -- 

23 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah, yeah. 

24 DR. ZIEMER: -- his group monitor this 

25 particular one at -- at the previous meeting, 
160

1 so we give them the opportunity -- 

2 MR. GRIFFON: We'll certainly let him know and 

3 notify -- 

4 DR. ZIEMER: -- and if -- if he believes that 

5 they cannot do that, then we'll have to 

6 reassign it or re-establish another workgroup. 

7 Okay, so we have -- we have the -- I think we 

8 have agreement that the tasking for the -- for 

9 the procedure should be done. The -- Dr. 

10 McKeel has raised some issues. I'd like to get 

11 some feedback from Board members on that in 

12 general. This would require some additional 

13 tasking. Or we could await for the -- the 

14 committee -- the workgroup itself to make their 

15 preliminary evaluation and give them the auth-- 

16 authority to request from Christine that the 

17 tasking be done. Any -- Jim, do you have a 

18 comment on this or -- 

19 DR. LOCKEY: Oh, I'm sorry -- no. 

20 DR. ZIEMER: I take the silence as being 

21 uncertainty as to -- to what you think should 

22 be tasked. Let me ask Christine a question 

23 here -- and John, maybe also, you -- you might 

24 not have a feel for this, but as we do tasking 

25 is -- it's easy for us to sit here and do 
161

1 tasking, but these things start to pile up and, 

2 as one thing comes into play, something else 

3 gets pushed down and so on. You -- you heard 

4 what Dr. McKeel described, and are you in a 

5 position right now to respond to that in terms 

6 of whether that would entail significant time 

7 and effort, to the extent that we're going to 

8 be pushing other priority items back down? 

9 Everything is fighting for priority, obviously. 

10 DR. MAURO: No, in fact I would say that the -- 

11 since TIB-70 is generic, it would be efficient 

12 to, while that person is reviewing TIB-70 -- or 

13 team -- in terms of -- I presume it's some type 

14 of model for -- for projecting exposures as a 

15 function of time and extrapolation, and then 

16 actually apply it and see how well it serves 

17 the -- the Dow use of that model. So I mean it 

18 would -- it would create a situation where we 

19 could sort of move the two of them together and 

20 actually make them linked, so -- so it -- it 

21 will not affect our ability to continue work on 

22 other fronts. 

23 DR. ZIEMER: Thank you, that's helpful. Wanda? 

24 MS. MUNN: Well, as chair of procedures, I have 

25 to weigh in on this, too, and remind the Board 
162

1 that the fact that SC&A can produce their 

2 analysis means that they also are going to be 

3 producing findings. And when they produce 

4 findings, those findings must come to the 

5 procedures group, and it involves the staff at 

6 NIOSH at great length for us to work through 

7 those findings, some of which we can work 

8 through and some of which you reject even when 

9 we bring the resolution to you. Therefore, our 

10 concern -- or my concern, and the concern, I 

11 hope, of the other members of the procedures 

12 group -- is that -- first of all, somebody else 

13 is talking on the line, and if they will get 

14 off the line I will continue with what I'm 

15 saying. It is a very -- borders on the 

16 impossible for us to be able to say that the 

17 working group is going to be able to get 

18 through this in jig time. 

19 One of the things we've been very concerned 

20 about, which I brought to you earlier today and 

21 -- not today, earlier this meeting -- is the 

22 backlog of items, which may not loom great but 

23 which are still awaiting any attention at all, 

24 simply because we've been focused on other 

25 things. One of the other generic procedures 
163

1 that's on the front burner right now, I hope, 

2 is Proc-90, which has absorbed at least three 

3 of the other procedures that we were looking at 

4 and which now needs the attention of both the 

5 contractor and NIOSH in order to reach some 

6 agreement on fine points that need to be 

7 polished with that very large overarching 

8 procedure. 

9 So I'm not trying to discourage this, I'm just 

10 trying to discourage the Board from putting 

11 unrealistic expectations on the contractor with 

12 respect to this single procedure. It's not 

13 just the contractor's weight to bear. 

14 DR. ZIEMER: Right, thank you for that comment. 

15 In the case of the second part of this that you 

16 were addressing, I -- I would think that the -- 

17 the workgroup -- the Dow -- Dow Madison group, 

18 which is the 250-day SEC workgroup, would have 

19 to address issues raised in the analysis of the 

20 Dow situation versus the findings for -- for 

21 the review of the procedures. 

22 DR. MAURO: We have a very similar situation 

23 with regard to Pinellas and OTIB-66, I believe, 

24 whereby there's really -- the solution there 

25 was let's, as part of the closeout process -- 
164

1 we have a Pinellas review. We have a list of 

2 issues we're addressing. One of the issues 

3 deal with a very specific subject that has now 

4 been addressed globally by NIOSH in an OTIB -- 

5 66. And the judgment was made that as part of 

6 the closeout process for that issue for 

7 Pinellas, we will review that TIB as applied to 

8 Pinellas. So we have a similar situation here. 

9 The alternative of course could have been, 

10 since it was a procedure we've never reviewed 

11 before, it could have fell -- so in effect, the 

12 review of OTIB-66 is part and parcel to the 

13 review -- the closeout process for Pinellas. I 

14 guess it's really the judgment of the Board. 

15 We could do a -- do it -- a similar approach, 

16 or -- whereby we would review OTIB-70 as part 

17 of the -- the review of the Dow issue, but -- 

18 in this case of course tha-- this particular 

19 aspect of the Dow review has not been 

20 authorized -- 

21 DR. ZIEMER: Right. 

22 DR. MAURO: -- so I mean -- but it -- we could 

23 -- we could do it either way, as a separate 

24 review, independent, and it would be a stand25 alone work product, which would be a review. 
165

1 And then subsequent to that or in parallel with 

2 that have a report, if you so choose, that 

3 would basically expand our current review of 

4 the Dow -- the 1957 to '60 time period and then 

5 add onto that -- okay, now let's -- let's look 

6 at the resid-- the period that follows. I mean 

7 ei-- either approach could be used. It's 

8 really your choice. 

9 DR. ZIEMER: In my mind it's a parallel thing. 

10 I think the procedures have to go to Wanda's 

11 committee. I think the analysis of the Dow 

12 situation has to go to the other group. And 

13 obviously they're not being done in isolation, 

14 but I don't think we want to ask the procedures 

15 group to get involved specifically in the Dow 

16 issues. 

17 MS. MUNN: I would hope not. 

18 DR. ZIEMER: So -- but it also seems to the 

19 Chair that we -- we do need to task our 

20 contractor to get underway with this, being 

21 aware of all of the items and concerns that -- 

22 that Wanda has raised because they're concerns 

23 not only for this task but for all of our 

24 tasks. And also reminding petitioners and 

25 others involved with them that this is a -- a 
166

1 struggle that we have in terms of our own time 

2 commitments and -- and meeting those. And I 

3 know, Dan, you're aware of that 'cause you're -

4 - you're here at our meetings. So we're trying 

5 to give priority, but also be fair to all of 

6 the groups that are needing attention. So we 

7 will -- will do the tasking for the contractor. 

8 We have the -- the one workgroup getting 

9 underway with the -- with the procedures that 

10 are related, the other workgroup to address the 

11 other issues, particularly the one that Mark 

12 raised and other issues that they can certainly 

13 identify based on the discussion that was had -

14 - that was held earlier in the meeting. 

15 Josie? 

16 MS. BEACH: And I -- sorry if I missed this -- 

17 did we task SC&A to look at the addendum one 

18 and two of the Dow? 

19 DR. BRANCHE: No. No, that has not -- that 

20 task has not been assigned. 

21 MS. BEACH: Is that a task that we can assign 

22 at this time? SC&A looked at the original 

23 document. 

24 DR. BRANCHE: But not the two addenda. 

25 MS. BEACH: But not the two addendums (sic). 
167

1 DR. ZIEMER: That's correct. In my mind that 

2 was sort of tied in with what we were talking 

3 about here. I think -- 

4 MS. BEACH: I thought so, but I wanted to make 

5 sure we were clear. 

6 DR. ZIEMER: That was your understanding, I 

7 assume, John, as well. Right? 

8 MR. GRIFFON: There are more parts to those 

9 addenda so I (unintelligible). 

10 MS. BEACH: Yes. 

11 DR. MAURO: My understanding right now is that 

12 SC&A has been tasked to review 70, and I will 

13 get back to you very shor-- shortly about how 

14 long that will take. 

15 Right now it sounds to me that -- we have not 

16 been tasked to look at addendum one and two and 

17 that approach for doing dose reconstruction 

18 post-1960. We have not been tasked to do that 

19 and that -- and certainly the two will -- are 

20 inter-related and it -- 

21 DR. BRANCHE: They're related, but no 

22 assignment has been made yet. 

23 DR. MAURO: But right now we have not been 

24 tasked to do that. 

25 MR. GRIFFON: -- I thought we did, but 
168

1 anyway... 

2 DR. ZIEMER: Well -- 

3 MS. BEACH: It was not clear. 

4 DR. ZIEMER: Okay, let's include that -- 

5 DR. BRANCHE: Let's make it clear. 

6 DR. ZIEMER: -- include that, that's -- that's 

7 what we're -- partially -- partially what we're 

8 talking about when we're talking about that 

9 analysis, including with -- including the 

10 description that Dr. McKeel made there a moment 

11 ago. 

12 We don't have a specific time line -- I don't 

13 think we can today. I think and I will state 

14 for the record and for the petitioners, for 

15 Robert, that we -- it is our intent to move 

16 ahead on these as rapidly as we can. 

17 DR. BRANCHE: Okay. 

18 DR. ZIEMER: Okay. 

19 MR. GRIFFON: (Off microphone) Can we 

20 (unintelligible). 

21 DR. ZIEMER: Huh? 

22 MR. GRIFFON: I -- I know you're -- are we 

23 almost close to the end or can we take a break? 

24 DR. ZIEMER: I'm going to suggest that people -

25 - 
169

1 DR. BRANCHE: Go as they need. 

2 DR. ZIEMER: -- take their own comfort breaks 

3 as their level of discomfort reaches a point -- 

4 we're -- we're very close to the end, but we 

5 need to establish another workgroup and that is 

6 to address the issues of -- of OTIB-6000 and 

7 6001. I think we agreed earlier in the meeting 

8 that this should be done. That workgroup would 

9 have responsibility initially for those two 

10 generic OTIBs, plus Appendix BB right now. 

11 DR. BRANCHE: That would be included. 

12 DR. ZIEMER: Would be included. And in 

13 principle, all of the appendices, but right now 

14 Appendix BB is on the -- on the -- 

15 DR. BRANCHE: Okay. 

16 DR. ZIEMER: -- screen. So I would -- I would 

17 hope that at least a couple of the individuals 

18 on this workgroup would be individuals -- 

19 DR. BRANCHE: From procedures. 

20 DR. ZIEMER: -- who have been familiar with the 

21 6000 and 6001 work from procedures, so let me 

22 ask for volunteers and -- okay, we've got 

23 Josie. Who else? 

24 DR. BRANCHE: Griffon. 

25 DR. ZIEMER: Griffon. I'm going to volunteer 
170

1 for this one. 

2 DR. BRANCHE: Ziemer, that's two from 

3 procedures. 

4 DR. POSTON: I'll volunteer. 

5 DR. BRANCHE: Poston. 

6 DR. ZIEMER: John Poston. 

7 DR. BRANCHE: That's four. 

8 DR. ZIEMER: We could have an alternate? 

9 MS. MUNN: I wouldn't mind serving as the 

10 alternate as long as I didn't have major 

11 responsibilities for -- 

12 DR. ZIEMER: Munn as alternate. 

13 DR. BRANCHE: And who will be the chair? 

14 DR. ZIEMER: Well, let's see, John Poston, can 

15 you handle this as chair? 

16 DR. POSTON: Sure. 

17 DR. ZIEMER: I know you can handle it, in terms 

18 of ability. I'm really asking about time. 

19 DR. POSTON: Well, it'd be better if someone 

20 else chaired it 'cause I'm on a National 

21 Academy committee right now and I just don't 

22 have time. 

23 DR. ZIEMER: Okay. Josie? 

24 MR. GRIFFON: What about you, Paul? 

25 DR. ZIEMER: Huh? 
171

1 MR. GRIFFON: How about you chair it? Can you 

2 chair this one? You can appoint yourself 

3 maybe. 

4 DR. ZIEMER: Well, I can appoint myself. 

5 MS. BEACH: I would agree with that 

6 appointment, Paul. 

7 DR. ZIEMER: I've been outvoted. I will -- I 

8 will chair this, okay. 

9 DR. BRANCHE: Okay. 

10 DR. ZIEMER: I've been avoiding these. 

11 DR. BRANCHE: I noticed. 

12 MS. MUNN: Wisely so. 

13 DR. ZIEMER: Okay, that will take care of that 

14 one. 

BOARD WORKING TIME:

15 STATUS OF SELECTION OF BOARD CONTRACTOR

16 Selection of Board contractor, status report. 

17 DR. BRANCHE: There was a solicitation for -- 

18 sorry, a synopsis of a solicitation -- that 

19 means an announcement letting people know that 

20 an announcement is about to come -- and that 

21 was issued on June 6th. I've checked in with 

22 David Staudt, hoping that he would be able to 

23 join us for the call, but he's unable to do 

24 that today. He has provided me with an update, 

25 and that is early next month all Board members 
172

1 will receive a draft. You all asked for an 

2 opportunity to review it. I suspect that you 

3 will not have very much time to review it. 

4 I've asked him to give you a hard deadline so 

5 that things can keep moving forward, but the 

6 announcement is expected to go out in July. 

7 The solicitation for the contractor is expected 

8 to go out in July, and that's my update. 

9 UNIDENTIFIED: Thank you. 

10 DR. ZIEMER: Okay. 

11 DR. BRANCHE: I think I'm still on. 

12 MR. GRIFFON: When you -- when you send that 

13 draft, is there any way you can send the 

14 previous version, just so we have side-by-side? 

15 Is that possible? 

16 DR. BRANCHE: I have to -- 

17 MR. GRIFFON: 'Cause that -- I -- 

18 DR. BRANCHE: See, I have to work with David 

19 'cause I don't have a copy of the previous 

20 version. I can ask him. I -- 

21 MR. GRIFFON: Well, since there's a lot -- a 

22 lot of -- 

23 DR. ZIEMER: That would be helpful. 

24 MR. GRIFFON: -- language -- 

25 DR. BRANCHE: I know it would be helpful. 
173

1 MR. GRIFFON: -- similar -- 

2 DR. BRANCHE: Yeah, I just want to make certain 

3 that we honor the first request, which was to 

4 get it out to you. And that, in an attempt to 

5 get the other in detail, we don't delay getting 

6 the solicitation out 'cause time is ticking. 

7 MR. GRIFFON: Yep. 

8 DR. BRANCHE: I think I'm still on here, which 

9 is -- 

10 DR. ZIEMER: Yes, you've got -– 

11 TRACKING STATUS OF TRANSCRIPTS AND MINUTES

12 DR. BRANCHE: -- the tracking of minutes and 

13 transcripts. We are up to date, up to speed 

14 and -- as far as all the transcripts -- we are 

15 on time and on schedule. The one exception, I 

16 did-- I never said there would be a deadline 

17 for when we would get the application of the 

18 new redaction policy to those Board meetings 

19 that oc-- and -- and conference call-- 

20 conference -- Board conference calls that 

21 occurred from May through the end of last year. 

22 It -- we have applied the new redaction policy 

23 to those transcripts, but we have not yet 

24 posted them. There's one more small step that 

25 has to happen before they're posted, and we 
174

1 hope to have that happen soon -- hopefully 

2 before our early August Board conference call. 

3 FUTURE PLANS AND MEETINGS

4 DR. ZIEMER: Thank you, Christine. Are there 

5 any changes in meeting plans in -- in future 

6 meeting plans -- 

7 DR. BRANCHE: No -- 

8 DR. ZIEMER: -- that we -- 

9 DR. BRANCHE: -- there are no changes in the 

10 dates. However, this is the time when we need 

11 to determine when our December meeting would 

12 occur -- excuse me, where our December meeting 

13 would occur. At this time our December meeting 

14 is scheduled for December 16th through 18th, 

15 and I recall a discussion about the fact that a 

16 few -- at least one Board member -- and it was 

17 Dr. Melius; he's not here -- asked that the 

18 location be east of the Mississippi River. 

19 MR. CLAWSON: I take it'll not be in the 

20 Rockies. 

21 DR. BRANCHE: Well, that's not east of the 

22 Mississippi, is it, Brad? 

23 MR. CLAWSON: That's right. I know. 

24 DR. BRANCHE: Geography was not your strong 

25 suit, but we still love you. And -- 
175

1 DR. POSTON: We've got to wait to see where the 

2 flood goes. 

3 DR. BRANCHE: Yeah, we do -- no, we don't need 

4 to see where the flood goes, but I would say -- 

5 DR. ZIEMER: It may be in the Mississippi 

6 River. 

7 DR. BRANCHE: -- but I would say that, in 

8 discussing some of this with NIOSH staff, it 

9 appears as if Savannah -- the Savannah River 

10 Site would be coming up for discussion at that 

11 meeting, and it might be a nice idea to have it 

12 -- to have the meeting located in or around 

13 that area, so Georgia or South Carolina. 

14 DR. ZIEMER: The last time we met in the, 

15 quote, Savannah River area, we were down in 

16 Charleston. And that's really quite a ways 

17 from the site. It's alm-- 

18 DR. BRANCHE: No, I think we would go in-- 

19 DR. ZIEMER: -- it's almost too far. I don't 

20 know if Aiken is big enough to -- 

21 MR. PRESLEY: See? I don't know if 

22 (unintelligible). 

23 DR. BRANCHE: Aiken -- Aiken -- 

24 DR. POSTON: (Off microphone) (Unintelligible) 

25 DR. BRANCHE: Well, I mean if -- if you all ag-
176

1 - again, if you all agree to the general 

2 location, we will try to be sensitive to where 

3 the workers are located. I've al-- I've 

4 already heard about the fact that Charleston 

5 was too far. 

6 DR. POSTON: Well, Augusta's nice. 

7 DR. BRANCHE: So there's Augusta -- 

8 DR. ZIEMER: Augusta would be -- 

9 DR. BRANCHE: -- there's Aiken. 

10 DR. ZIEMER: Augusta would be all right. 

11 DR. POSTON: Augusta anyway. 

12 DR. ZIEMER: It's got to be Augusta or Aiken as 

13 our choice for -- 

14 DR. BRANCHE: Well, if you'll give us -- again, 

15 if -- if we can agree on the location, we will 

16 work -- given the parameters of our -- of our 

17 meeting needs, with the -- with the specific 

18 location. 

19 MS. MUNN: Let's try for Augusta. 

20 DR. BRANCHE: Okay. 

21 MS. MUNN: Sounds good. 

22 DR. BRANCHE: Augusta, Aiken, someplace in that 

23 general area. 

24 And then we have -- the next face-to-face 

25 meeting following that would be in February -- 
177

1 February 17th through 19th is the -- is the 

2 face-to-face meeting for which we've yet to 

3 select a location. If you have some general 

4 ideas, it would be helpful for Zaida and me to 

5 hear that now so we can at least begin to look 

6 at -- if you give us several locations, we can 

7 begin to look at -- 

8 MR. PRESLEY: Somewhere where it's warm. 

9 DR. ZIEMER: Hawaii? 

10 MR. PRESLEY: Don't put us in Boston. 

11 DR. BRANCHE: Okay, somewhere where it's warm 

12 is not enough. I need a little bit more focus 

13 than that, Bob. I love you, too, but I need a 

14 little bit more focus than someplace where it's 

15 warm. 

16 DR. POSTON: San Juan, Puerto Rico. 

17 DR. BRANCHE: Yeah, uh-huh. 

18 DR. POSTON: There is a site there, by the way. 

19 DR. BRANCHE: I understand. 

20 MS. MUNN: Are we in a position to second-guess 

21 where we are going to be with LANL and -- and 

22 the folks in New Mexico by that period of time? 

23 DR. BRANCHE: Larry or a member of his staff 

24 might be able to respond to that question. I 

25 don't think he heard the question. Can we say 
178

1 anything yet -- yet about Los Alamos or -- what 

2 was the other one, Wanda, New Mexico? 

3 MS. MUNN: Sandia -- any of the -- 

4 DR. BRANCHE: If -- where NIOSH would be -- 

5 MS. MUNN: -- New Mexico sites by next February 

6 -- 

7 DR. BRANCHE: Is it too early to tell? 

8 MS. MUNN: Is that a reasonable site? 

9 MR. ELLIOTT: Sandia, I can't -- I can't answer 

10 that. We will be ready to present on Savannah 

11 River. That's our -- a goal, and I think it 

12 would be appropriate that we -- we have -- if 

13 you recall, the Board has met in Augusta and 

14 the Board has met in Charleston -- 

15 DR. BRANCHE: We're talking about February now. 

16 MR. ELLIOTT: Oh, in February. 

17 DR. BRANCHE: We've already agreed about 

18 Augusta -- 

19 MR. ELLIOTT: Oh, okay. 

20 DR. BRANCHE: -- or Aiken for December. 

21 MR. ELLIOTT: I'm sorry, I was in and out -- 

22 DR. BRANCHE: We're talking about the February 

23 meeting, I'm sorry. 

24 MR. ELLIOTT: I can't speak to Sandia or Los 

25 Alamos -- 
179

1 DR. ZIEMER: It may be too early, but -- 

2 MR. ELLIOTT: -- at this point. 

3 DR. ZIEMER: -- we might consider that as a 

4 possi-- possibility. 

5 DR. BRANCHE: Okay, that -- that helps. 

6 DR. ZIEMER: Would probably be Albuquerque or 

7 Santa Fe then, I suppose. 

8 MR. CLAWSON: So for the September -- 

9 DR. BRANCHE: Santa Fe -- 

10 MR. SCHOFIELD: I would say that at that time 

11 of year there's a good chance there could be 

12 quite a bit of snow. 

13 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah, that's a problem. 

14 DR. BRANCHE: But you could have a barbecue for 

15 us if we come. Right? 

16 MR. SCHOFIELD: (Off microphone) 

17 (Unintelligible) would be the wiser choice. 

18 DR. BRANCHE: Okay, so that would be for the 

19 February meeting. 

20 DR. ZIEMER: That's probably -- 

21 DR. POSTON: Everybody's got to rent a car. 

22 MR. SCHOFIELD: Yeah. 

23 DR. ROESSLER: There are shuttles. 

24 MR. CLAWSON: So Christine, for September we 

25 still are on for California -- 
180

1 DR. BRANCHE: Absolutely, the location has been 

2 selected. 

3 MR. CLAWSON: Right, LA area. Correct? 

4 DR. BRANCHE: Redondo Beach, I believe is the -

5 - is that the right -- Zaida, Redondo Beach, 

6 the hotel's been selected, the contract's been 

7 signed. And I believe Zaida sent a message out 

8 to you with those -- with that information. 

9 UNIDENTIFIED: Not yet. 

10 DR. BRANCHE: Not yet? Okay, forgive me. 

11 DR. POSTON: It would help to send out 

12 (unintelligible). 

13 DR. BRANCHE: She -- she only last week signed 

14 the contract. 

15 DR. ZIEMER: Okay, if you have other 

16 suggestions -- I don't think we need to decide 

17 today on -- 

18 DR. BRANCHE: We do not. 

19 DR. ZIEMER: -- the other one. 

20 DR. BRANCHE: Thank you. 

21 DR. ZIEMER: Are there any other items that 

22 need to come before us today? 

23 RESPONSIBILITIES OF BOARD’S REPRESENTATIVE TO DOE

24 DR. BRANCHE: There was one, Dr. Ziemer, and 

25 that was the responsibilities of the person who 
181

1 would represent the Board to DOE. That was 

2 something that came up yesterday. In talking 

3 to our colleague-- my colleagues at DOE, you 

4 all wanted to know the roles for this 

5 particular contact person. They can provide 

6 information on the Board's approaches, the 

7 Board's handling of information and data, and 

8 how the Board assigns work to its contractors. 

9 The person can also serve as a conduit for 

10 Board -- for questions that would be from the 

11 Board back to DOE on DOE's procedures. 

12 DR. ZIEMER: I -- I have a feeling that we -- 

13 we left this a little bit fuzzy. It wasn't 

14 clear I think to all of us that we needed an 

15 official representative at this point. I'm 

16 wondering if we can operate under the following 

17 parameters, where at least for now -- 

18 DR. BRANCHE: Uh-huh. 

19 DR. ZIEMER: -- where you would -- 

20 DR. BRANCHE: Right. 

21 DR. ZIEMER: -- serve as the contact point 

22 where an issue arose. 

23 DR. BRANCHE: Uh-huh. 

24 DR. ZIEMER: And you would have a knowledge of 

25 the cleared individuals on the Board -- 
182

1 DR. BRANCHE: I'm getting that, yes. Uh-huh. 

2 DR. ZIEMER: -- and would call on one or more 

3 of them to address whatever issues came up. 

4 DR. BRANCHE: Well, let's do that for now, and 

5 if there -- 

6 DR. ZIEMER: If at some point we need -- 

7 DR. BRANCHE: -- ends up being a sticking 

8 point, we can revisit this. 

9 DR. ZIEMER: Right, because we -- we talked, 

10 for example, about having a, quote, workgroup 

11 of those individual and -- and we don't want to 

12 sort of -- 

13 DR. BRANCHE: That's not going to work. 

14 DR. ZIEMER: -- set them out and put targets on 

15 their backs. We -- we aren't' going to have a 

16 public list of our cleared people. 

17 DR. BRANCHE: Right. 

18 DR. ZIEMER: So as a practical -- and even -- 

19 even identifying an individual as that point of 

20 contact may be a problem. Maybe not in a 

21 particular case, but in general 'cause it may 

22 not always be -- let's say it was -- we -- we 

23 had talked about Bob Presley, but what if it 

24 was somebody else? We -- we end up having to 

25 identify a cleared person, so I'm wondering if 
183

1 we can do it this way where -- 

2 DR. BRANCHE: Let's at least try it. 

3 DR. ZIEMER: -- where you would channel -- 

4 DR. BRANCHE: Uh-huh. 

5 DR. ZIEMER: Josie, you have ano-- 

6 MS. BEACH: And will we have a clear 

7 description sometime soon? 

8 DR. BRANCHE: A clear description of? 

9 MS. BEACH: Of the responsibilities of that 

10 individual or those individuals? 

11 DR. BRANCHE: I -- I think what Paul is 

12 suggesting is that we sort of hold off on that 

13 until -- and -- and I would serve as -- as this 

14 conduit for now, and if -- 

15 DR. ZIEMER: As issues arose and came in -- 

16 DR. BRANCHE: Right. 

17 DR. ZIEMER: -- where we needed a cleared 

18 person to interact -- 

19 DR. BRANCHE: A specific Board person. 

20 MR. GRIFFON: Can someone describe to me what 

21 are the -- what kind of issues? The doc-- the 

22 -- 

23 DR. ZIEMER: I don't know. 

24 MR. GRIFFON: And -- but why -- why -- I don't 

25 understand the cleared individuals. 
184

1 DR. BRANCHE: I -- 

2 MR. GRIFFON: Discussing in a -- in -- on the 

3 phone or an e-mail or anywhere else. It has 

4 nothing to do with cl-- you know, you can't 

5 discuss classified issues anyway. 

6 DR. ZIEMER: No, if we need to have somebody go 

7 with Larry -- 

8 DR. BRANCHE: Or his staff. 

9 DR. ZIEMER: -- or Larry's staff -- 

10 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah. 

11 DR. ZIEMER: -- to observe something, I -- I 

12 mean I don't know the conditions under which we 

13 -- 

14 DR. BRANCHE: Right. 

15 DR. ZIEMER: All I'm saying is I don't -- I 

16 don't think we need at this point a workgroup 

17 or an identified individual. 

18 DR. BRANCHE: Right, we've don-- 

19 MR. ELLIOTT: Let me give you an example -- 

20 MR. GRIFFON: Things in the past where a few of 

21 us have gone -- 

22 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah, and -- and you found out 

23 about that because -- 

24 DR. BRANCHE: And we can -- on an as -- as 

25 need-to-know basis. 
185

1 DR. ZIEMER: I'm saying let's remain on an ad 

2 hoc basis whereas that need arises -- 

3 DR. POSTON: Thanks for the reminder about 

4 (unintelligible). 

5 DR. ZIEMER: -- Christine can call on the 

6 cleared individuals. 

7 DR. BRANCHE: Uh-huh, yes. 

8 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah. I think we're okay on -- 

9 DR. BRANCHE: Yeah, we're -- 

10 DR. ZIEMER: Okay. Larry. 

11 MR. ELLIOTT: I could give you several 

12 examples, one of which might be that -- that 

13 the Board develops a document and DOE wants to 

14 review it and has some concerns or issues about 

15 it, and they need somebody that they can talk 

16 to in a cleared status. That might serve as 

17 one of the roles that not -- maybe Dr. Branche 

18 can't serve; a cleared Board member would have 

19 to serve in. 

20 Dr. Ziemer's example of when we go out in the 

21 field or SC&A goes out in the field and we want 

22 a balanced perspective of cleared individuals 

23 involved is another perhaps possibility. 

24 DR. BRANCHE: But at this poi-- at this time, 

25 we consult a list of cleared individuals to do 
186

1 that. And since these questions have come up, 

2 the interactions between DOE and me 

3 specifically, as it concerns cleared 

4 individuals, has improved. Our list was not up 

5 to date, not theirs and not mine, and we've 

6 resolved that particular issue substantially 

7 over the last several weeks. So Paul's 

8 suggestion of asking Board members, based on 

9 their clearance, to serve in this capacity on 

10 an as-needed basis as a way to proceed in the 

11 interim I think is -- is a wise approach for 

12 now. Which means the need for a specifically13 named contact person is kind of put aside for 

14 the moment. 

15 MR. GRIFFON: I -- I guess what I'm -- what I'm 

16 wresting with is if -- if -- Larry's example is 

17 -- is certainly one that I've been in the 

18 middle of before, that -- that -- so if we 

19 generate a document on the Board level -- first 

20 of all, there -- there are certainly issues if 

21 we generate something that by -- and this is 

22 always the -- the case in this sort of -- I 

23 mean this isn't research necessarily, but by 

24 putting some things together you potentially 

25 got into classified issues. I mean -- boy, 
187

1 tha-- tha-- there's a trickle-down there. 

2 Larry knows about it. I certainly know about 

3 it. I mean if you generate that report and it 

4 is deemed that there's something classified in 

5 there, you've got hard drive issues, you've got 

6 all kinds of things that could -- 

7 DR. BRANCHE: Well -- and -- 

8 MR. GRIFFON: -- result, but anyway, my point 

9 here is that I -- I had this sort of situation 

10 in some of my research and it -- it's not -- 

11 it's not black and white. I mean I've got -- I 

12 -- I was in Oak Ridge where I had three 

13 security offers that -- three and it was like 

14 two to one split on how they came down on a 

15 certain issue in my report and -- and I was -- 

16 I was -- it was basically a -- not a 

17 negotiation, but we -- we were discussing it 

18 between me being the author and -- and DOE. 

19 And I'm wondering how -- you know, if we 

20 generate something there's always different 

21 view on -- there -- there's gra-- I think 

22 there's some gray area -- 

23 DR. BRANCHE: Was this in your capacity as a 

24 Board member? 

25 MR. GRIFFON: -- and -- and some -- some 
188

1 classifiers I've seen have erred on the si-- on 

2 -- erred real strictly and others are -- are 

3 slightly different from that -- 

4 DR. BRANCHE: Right. 

5 MR. GRIFFON: -- so I'm just wondering -- 

6 DR. ZIEMER: All -- all I'm proposing is that 

7 we not set up a workgroup or -- 

8 MR. GRIFFON: That's more -- 

9 DR. ZIEMER: -- an individual right now -- 

10 MR. GRIFFON: I agree with that part of -- 

11 DR. ZIEMER: -- we continue to operate as we 

12 have. If a need comes in, DOE would let 

13 Christine -- 

14 DR. BRANCHE: Me know. 

15 DR. ZIEMER: -- know that -- or maybe Larry 

16 would say we -- we're going to look at these 

17 documents and we'd like to have a Board member 

18 along. 

19 DR. BRANCHE: And we'll assign it as needed. 

20 DR. ZIEMER: Christine will know who the -- who 

21 the cleared people are -- 

22 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah. 

23 DR. ZIEMER: -- that can participate -- 

24 MR. GRIFFON: I guess we can just monitor the 

25 process and -- and if -- if you can just let us 
189

1 know how many of these things hap-- whatever 

2 these issues are that arise -- 

3 DR. BRANCHE: Right. 

4 DR. ZIEMER: Right. 

5 MR. GRIFFON: -- if we haven't had any in six 

6 years -- 

7 DR. ZIEMER: If we have to formalize something 

8 at some point we'll do it, but I -- I don't see 

9 any advantage to formalizing this at this 

10 point, other than having cleared individuals 

11 available -- 

12 DR. BRANCHE: Right. 

13 DR. ZIEMER: -- and we have some or -- we will 

14 have more, hopefully, as others become cleared. 

15 DR. BRANCHE: Just so -- 

16 MR. GRIFFON: I -- I would at least appreciate 

17 it if you could let other -- the other Board 

18 members know -- like this is your -- to the 

19 best you can describe it in a -- in a -- you 

20 know, an open e-mail, this issue arose and I've 

21 assigned selected Board members to -- you know 

22 -- 

23 DR. ZIEMER: Well, let me ask -- I'm not sure 

24 we can always let people know when -- 

25 DR. BRANCHE: That's -- 
190

1 DR. ZIEMER: -- these issues arise even. 

2 DR. BRANCHE: Right. I think I can tell you 

3 when it's been resolved, potentially, but I 

4 don't know if -- 

5 DR. ZIEMER: Well, you may not even be -- 

6 DR. BRANCHE: -- I can tell you when arise. 

7 DR. ZIEMER: -- (unintelligible). 

8 DR. BRANCHE: Yeah, we -- I'll have to work 

9 with DOE and see how this happens, but -- let 

10 me see how -- how we work on this. 

11 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah. If something arises, you 

12 can de-- you may -- 

13 DR. BRANCHE: I'll give you as -- 

14 DR. ZIEMER: -- find out what -- 

15 DR. BRANCHE: -- much information as I can. 

16 DR. ZIEMER: -- what can the Board -- 

17 DR. BRANCHE: Right, no. 

18 DR. ZIEMER: -- what can be made known to the 

19 Board about this. I don't know, Larry do you -

20 - you've had some experience in that. 

21 DR. BRANCHE: Well, I -- I mean I've had some 

22 experience. 

23 DR. ZIEMER: In general, some of this -- even 

24 the fact that it occurs is probably not 

25 releasable. Right? 
191

1 DR. BRANCHE: Right. 

2 DR. ZIEMER: Okay. 

3 DR. BRANCHE: Well, let me just make certain 

4 that -- 

5 MR. ELLIOTT: You can't call attention to it. 

6 DR. BRANCHE: Right. Let me just make certain 

7 that everyone knows, for the record, because 

8 the word "workgroup" around this has been -- a 

9 workgroup for this could never be established. 

10 MR. PRESLEY: That's right. 

11 DR. BRANCHE: Our procedures for workgroups 

12 require that we have transcripts, that we have 

13 a court reporter. So the idea of a workgroup 

14 for this is not appropriate. 

15 MR. GRIFFON: Again, I -- I -- 

16 DR. BRANCHE: So -- 

17 MR. GRIFFON: Well, I'm still a little hazy on 

18 what this is, but I mean I'm willing to 

19 proceed. It just -- kind of monitor it for 

20 now, but you know, what this is -- 

21 DR. BRANCHE: I understand. 

22 MR. GRIFFON: -- again, this -- regarding 

23 policies, regarding classified documents, I see 

24 no problem with having a workgroup on that. 

25 The -- the other things, I can understand your 
192

1 point, but regarding a -- you know, if there's 

2 -- there's this discussion of the policy going 

3 back and forth -- 

4 DR. ZIEMER: There's -- there will be no policy 

5 discussion -- 

6 MR. GRIFFON: -- (unintelligible) -- 

7 DR. BRANCHE: No. 

8 DR. ZIEMER: -- as far as I know. 

9 DR. BRANCHE: Exactly. 

10 DR. ZIEMER: Yeah. We're not talking about 

11 having any policy discussions. 

12 MR. GRIFFON: Okay. 

13 DR. ZIEMER: All we're saying is we're going to 

14 continue to operate as we are. If a cleared 

15 person is needed for -- from the Board for 

16 something, we'll make them available. 

17 DR. BRANCHE: Right. That's all I have on that 

18 particular -- 

19 DR. ZIEMER: Board members, are there other 

20 issues that we need to address today? 

21 (No responses) 

22 If not, I thank you for your time and your 

23 patience. I declare that this meeting is 

24 adjourned. Thank you for all who participated, 

25 members of the public and staff. We appreciate 
193

1 it. 

2 (Whereupon, the meeting was adjourned at 12:10 

3 p.m.) 

4 
194

1 CERTIFICATE OF COURT REPORTER 

STATE OF GEORGIA 

COUNTY OF FULTON 

 I, Steven Ray Green, Certified Merit Court 

Reporter, do hereby certify that I reported the 

above and foregoing on the day of June 26, 

2008; and it is a true and accurate transcript 

of the testimony captioned herein. 

 I further certify that I am neither kin 

nor counsel to any of the parties herein, nor 

have any interest in the cause named herein. 

 WITNESS my hand and official seal this the 

26th day of July, 2008. 

___________________________________ 

STEVEN RAY GREEN, CCR, CVR-CM, PNSC 

CERTIFIED MERIT COURT REPORTER 

CERTIFICATE NUMBER: A-2102