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 the 


WORKING GROUP MEETING 


ADVISORY BOARD ON 


RADIATION AND WORKER HEALTH 


HANFORD
 

The verbatim transcript of the Working 


Group Meeting of the Advisory Board on Radiation and 


Worker Health held in Cincinnati, Ohio on March 26, 


2007. 

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C O N T E N T S
 

March 26, 2007 


WELCOME AND OPENING COMMENTS 


DR. LEWIS WADE, DFO 


PURPOSE OF MEETING 11 


DR. JIM MELIUS, CHAIR 


OVERVIEW 14 

DR. HANS BEHLING, SC&A 


TBD 21 

EIGHT SINGLE-PASS PRODUCTION REACTORS 23 


N REACTOR 79 


HANFORD 200 AND 300 AREAS 106 


SODIUM 24 130 


WRAP-UP 139 

COURT REPORTER’S CERTIFICATE 144 

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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. 

 

 

 

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


(By Group, in Alphabetical Order) 


BOARD MEMBERS
 

CHAIR
 

ZIEMER, Paul L., Ph.D. 


Professor Emeritus 


School of Health Sciences 


Purdue University 


Lafayette, Indiana 


EXECUTIVE SECRETARY
 

WADE, Lewis, Ph.D. 


Senior Science Advisor 


National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health 


Centers for Disease Control and Prevention 


Washington, DC 


MEMBERSHIP
 

CLAWSON, Bradley 


Senior Operator, Nuclear Fuel Handling 


Idaho National Engineering & Environmental Laboratory 


MELIUS, James Malcom, M.D., Ph.D. 


Director 


New York State Laborers' Health and Safety Trust Fund 


Albany, New York 


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


Professor, Texas A&M University 


College Station, Texas 


SCHOFIELD, Phillip 


Los Alamos Project on Worker Safety 


Los Alamos, New Mexico 

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IDENTIFIED PARTICIPANTS
 

ALVAREZ, BOB, SC&A 


ANIGSTEIN, BOB, SC&A 


BEACH, JOSIE, USW 


BEHLING, HANS, SC&A 


BEHLING, KATHY, SC&A 


BRIGGS, NICHOLE, SC&A 


CHANG, CHIA-CHIA, NIOSH 


ELLIOTT, LARRY, NIOSH 


FIX, JACK, ORAU 


GLOVER, SAM, NIOSH 


HOMOKI-TITUS, LIZ, HHS 


HOWELL, EMILY, HHS 


KOTSCH, JEFF, DOL 


LABONE, TOM, ORAU 


MACIEVIC, GREG, OCAS 


MAURO, JOHN, SC&A 


NELSON, CHARLES, OCAS 


NETON, JIM, NIOSH 


SCALSKY, EDWARD D., DMA CHP 


SCHMIDT, KELLY, USW 


SHIELDS, LASHAWN, NIOSH 


THOMAS, ELYSE, ORAU 

 

 

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P R O C E E D I N G S


 (10:00 a.m.) 

WELCOME AND OPENING COMMENTS
 

DR. LEWIS WADE, DFO
 

DR. WADE: Welcome, this is Lew Wade. This 


is the meeting of the Hanford work group, the 


work group on the Hanford site profile, of the 


Advisory Board. What I’d like to do is first 


begin to identify Board members on the line. 


Then we’ll go through some introductions. 


When we do the introductions, I’ll have the 


NIOSH/ORAU team introduce themselves. When 


you do, please identify any conflicts you have 


relative to Hanford. 


We’ll then have the SC&A team identify 


themselves. We’ll ask for other federal 


employees who are on the line by virtue of 


their employment. We’ll ask about members of 


Congress, their representatives, their staff 


or workers’ representatives who are, or 


workers who are with us, and then we’ll begin 


the deliberations. 


First, to deal with Board quorum 

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issues, are there any Board members on the 


call? Any Board members on the call connected 


by telephone? 


 (no response) 


 DR. WADE: This work group is chaired by Dr. 


Melius. Members Clawson, Ziemer, Poston and 


Schofield, Phillip is a new addition, Josie is 


also with us, Josie Beach. Josie is 


conflicted at Hanford, but you know the 


Board’s rules allow conflicted Board members 


to have comment if those comments would help 


the deliberations. So at the Chair’s request 


or with his permission, Josie can contribute 


as she sees fit. Obviously, she wouldn’t be 


voting or make any motions as it related to 


Hanford. 


Let’s go around the table and identify 


here. Again, for those NIOSH or ORAU members 


or SC&A members please identify your 


conflicts. 


This is Lew Wade. I work for NIOSH 


and serve the Advisory Board. 


DR. NETON: This is Jim Neton. I work for 


NIOSH, and I’m non-conflicted at Hanford. 


MS. HOWELL: This is Emily Howell with HHS, 

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no conflicts. 

MS. BEACH: Josie Beach, and I am conflicted 

at Hanford. 

DR. MAURO: John Mauro, I’m with SC&A. I am 

not conflicted. 


DR. BEHLING: Hans Behling, SC&A, no 


conflicts. 


DR. MELIUS: Jim Melius from the Board, no 


conflicts. 


MR. SCHOFIELD: Phillip Schofield from the 


Board, no conflicts. 


MR. SCALSKY: Ed Scalsky, ORAU, no 


conflicts. 


MR. MACIEVIC: Greg Macievic, OCAS, no 


conflicts. 


MR. NELSON: Chuck Nelson, OCAS, no 


conflicts. 


 MR. CLAWSON: Brad Clawson, Board, no 


conflicts. 


DR. ZIEMER: Paul Ziemer, Board, no 


conflicts. 


 DR. WADE: Let’s go out to on the telephone, 


and we’ll start with members of the NIOSH/ORAU 


team. 


MS. THOMAS (by Telephone): This is Elyse 

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Thomas, and I’m with the O-R-A-U team, and I 


have no conflicts with Hanford. 


 DR. WADE: NIOSH/ORAU team on the telephone? 


MR. FIX (by Telephone): This is Jack Fix. 


I’m considered to have a conflict of interest 


with Hanford. 


 DR. WADE: Other members of the NIOSH/ORAU 


team? 


MR. LaBONE (by Telephone): This is Tom 


LaBone. I have no conflicts with Hanford. 


 DR. WADE: Other NIOSH/ORAU team members? 


MR. ELLIOTT: This is Larry Elliott. I have 


no conflicts with Hanford. 


 DR. WADE: We’re going to move on to SC&A. 


MR. ALVAREZ (by Telephone): This is Bob 


Alvarez. I have no conflicts with Hanford. 


MS. BEHLING (by Telephone): This is Kathy 


Behling. I have no conflict with Hanford. 


MR. ANIGSTEIN (by Telephone): This is Bob 


Anigstein. I have no conflicts at Hanford. 


 DR. WADE: Other SC&A members? 


MS. BRIGGS (by Telephone): This is Nichole 


Briggs. I have no conflicts. 


 DR. WADE: We’re having trouble hearing you, 


Nichole, if you could make an adjustment. 

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MS. BRIGGS (by Telephone): This is Nichole 


Briggs. I have no conflicts. 


 DR. WADE: Thank you. Other SC&A team 


members? 


(no response) 


 DR. WADE: Other federal employees who are 


on the call by virtue of their employment? 


MS. HOMOKI-TITUS (by Telephone): This is 


Liz Homoki-Titus of Health and Human Services, 


and I have no conflicts. 


MS. CHANG (by Telephone): This is Chia-Chia 


Chang with NIOSH. I have no conflicts. 


MR. KOTSCH (by Telephone): Jeff Kotsch, 


Department of Labor. 


 DR. WADE: Welcome, Jeff. 


MS. SHIELDS (by Telephone): LaShawn 


Shields, NIOSH. 


 DR. WADE: Good morning, LaShawn. 


Other federal employees? 


 (no response) 


 DR. WADE: Members of Congress, their staff, 


workers, worker representatives, any of those 


friends with us? 


MR. SCHMIDT (by Telephone): This is Kelly 


Schmidt with the United Steel Workers. 

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 DR. WADE: Good morning. 


Anyone else who wants to be identified 


on the record as being on the call? 


DR. POSTON (by Telephone): Lew, this is 


John Poston. I’m a little bit late. 


 DR. WADE: Welcome, John. 


John is a member of the working group. 


The working group is now complete. Anyone 


else who wants to be identified? 


 (no response) 


 DR. WADE: Again, relative to telephone 


etiquette, please if you’re not speaking, mute 


your phone. If you are speaking, speak into 


the handset as opposed to a speaker phone. Be 


mindful of any background noises, flushing 


toilets or things like that that might take 


place and don’t go to sleep. We had one 


snorer. We can’t have any of that. 


I think, Dr. Melius, it’s all yours. 


DR. MELIUS: Thank you. 


PURPOSE OF MEETING
 

The main focus of this meeting is to 


talk about the neutron issue at Hanford, and 


we have a -- Hans, after -- if I can get this 


right -- Hans, after our last work group 

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meeting, prepared sort of a summary of, a 


slight update of the original SC&A comments 


pertaining to the neutron issue. And we now 


more recently received a response from 


NIOSH/ORAU. So that will be the main focus. 


If we have time at the end we may sort 


of do sort of a quick factual or update, 


logistical update of where we stand with some 


of the other issues because some were pending 


further work in updates. But most of the time 


should be spent on the neutron issue. 


We will decide as we go along how 


we’re doing in terms of time and decide 


whether it’s worth it to take a lunch break or 


not in terms of timing and so forth. However, 


we will let our transcriber, Ray, make sure 


that his fellow staff person showed up at the 


other meeting at one o’clock. 


Hans and I were talking a little bit 


just beforehand and what we thought we’d do is 


let him sort of just briefly give an overview 


on the issues that were raised in the SC&A 


review. And then we thought for the more 


detailed discussion it would be better to go 


into that sort of split into three different 

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areas and spend time on that and so do it that 


way. They are separate, and I think that 


might be the most efficient way of dealing 


with these technical issues. 


So with that I’ll turn it over to Hans 


unless somebody else has, somebody has 


questions. Yes. 


MR. NELSON: Yes, John Nelson. I have 


copies of the NIOSH responses if anybody needs 


a copy. 


 MR. ELLIOTT: Are they on the web, too, 


Chuck? 


MR. NELSON: I don’t believe they went up. 


They went on e-mails to all the working group 


members, so I don’t know if they’re on the 


web. 


DR. MELIUS: They also went out on the web 


in the Hanford area I have on an e-mail list. 


DR. BEHLING: In conjunction with that 


offer, I did bring with me four copies of the 


report that I issued a few weeks ago and which 


will be the focus of this discussion. If 


anyone would like to have a hard copy, I have 


four copies available for anyone who would 


like to have a copy. 

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MR. NELSON: It’s also in that packet I just 


gave --


DR. BEHLING: To some extent, it’s not in 


its entirety, and it doesn’t track the way I 


would like to perhaps approach this. 


OVERVIEW
 

As Dr. Melius has mentioned what I’d 


like to do is just give a very brief overview, 


a few minutes, and then because of the fact 


that the neutron/photon dose ratio was 


fragmenting into three areas, that is the 


eight single-pass production reactor, the 


closed tube N reactor and, of course, the 2, 


300 Areas have all three different independent 


neutron/photon ratios that were derived by 


NIOSH/ORAU. And so we will probably want to 


discuss each of them separately. 


What I’d like to do is address the 


issues that I raised on behalf of those three 


neutron/photon ratios, and then offer the 


people here from ORAU to present their point 


of view before we go on to the next one 


because all of these things are quite 


technical issues. And if we were to go 


through the whole thing first on my part and 

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then follow that by your response, we might 


forget what the major issues were. So for the 


sake of simplicity and practicality we’ll do 


it in three independent stages. 


Now also I did want to mention the 


fact that Bob Alvarez had also submitted some 


comments, and there were some issues 


responding to his comments. And I don’t know 


how we’re going to integrate that into the 


discussion, but let’s try to do my work up 


front and then hopefully there’ll be time for 


Bob Alvarez on this. 


Bob, are you on the phone? 


MR. ALVAREZ (by Telephone): Yes, I am. 


DR. BEHLING: Are you available for 


discussing this some time later on in the 


morning or early afternoon? 


MR. ALVAREZ (by Telephone): Yes, I am. 


DR. BEHLING: Okay, so we’ll try to do it 


that way. 


MR. ALVAREZ (by Telephone): Okay. 


DR. BEHLING: Let me start out by saying 


that the Hanford site is a very, very complex 


site. And since 1950 and up into the end of 


1971 a neutron dosimeter was used. That is 

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the NTA film dosimeter. And it was concluded 


in 1972 based on AC studies that the NTA film 


dosimeter for neutron detection was 


questionable because it had certain 


deficiency. 


And I’ll just briefly identify what 


those deficiencies are. The NTA film actually 


measures neutrons by allowing a neutron to 


collide with the component of the film that 


contains hydrogenous material, namely 


hydrogen. And in order for a neutron to 


essentially manifest its impact on that 


dosimeter it has to impart a certain amount of 


kinetic energy that will in turn be handed 


over to a proton. 


In other words a hydrogen atom and, of 


course, it is the hydrogen atom because of its 


charge, it has a single positive charge, will 


then produce a certain impact on the film that 


is measured optically under a microscope. And 


these tracks are then counted, and there’s a 


correlation between the number of tracks and 


the exposure. 


One of the problems that were, there 


were several problems identified, but the key 

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problem is that for this dosimeter to really 


function properly one has to really understand 


the neutron spectrum that is being monitored. 


And we know the neutron spectrum is quite 


complex. 


Even for a single reactor we know that 


the neutron spectrum changes as a function of 


power level as well as a function of location. 


And so you can go into a given, a single 


reactor, and measure a different location 


under different power levels and even over 


time, and realize that the neutron spectrum 


will change due to moderation effects. 


One of the things that is recognized 


is that for a single track to be essentially 


observed on this photographic film, it has to 


at least have 300 kilo-electron volts of 


kinetic energy on the part of the energized 


proton in order for that track to be 


visualized under microscope. And we often 


talk about the issue of a threshold value. 


And I want to caution you what the 


threshold value is. It’s not a single moment 


in space where once you exceed 300 keV of 


proton energy, the neutron will always be 

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registered. It’s a probabilistic event, and 


the way to describe it is to simply give you 


an analogy. 


If you think of a neutron as a cue 


ball on a billiard table, and it has a certain 


amount of energy, depending on which angle it 


strikes the other ball will determine how much 


kinetic energy you’ll impart. And so if you 


have a neutron that’s exactly 300 keV, and it 


hits the other ball dead on where it is able 


to transfer 100 percent of its kinetic energy 


to the hydrogen atom, then you will have the 


threshold effect of producing a track. 


On the other hand you could have a one 


meV neutron, and if it only glances off the 


proton, it will only give up part of its 


kinetic energy. So the threshold is really 


not a key energy value that above which 100 


percent it is obviously a probabilistic event. 


And so when we talk about a threshold, you’ll 


see throughout the TBDs that have been issued 


by ORAU and NIOSH, you will see values that 


identified a threshold value, 500, 700. 


And it’s really a question of what you 


consider a threshold value because it is not 

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an issue of an all or nothing issue. 


Obviously, when you get to a one MeV according 


to Hine and Brownell who says that 


approximately 75 to 80 percent of the 


interactions will deliver enough of an energy 


(telephonic interference) so as to give you a 


track that can be countable. But even at one 


MeV, it is not 100 percent certain that you 


will actually get an interaction that results 


in a visible charge. 


(Whereupon, the telephonic connection failed 


and was then reconnected.) 


 DR. WADE: Hello, this is the working group. 


We had a brief technical difficulty. Dr. 


Poston, are you still with us? 


MR. POSTON (by Telephone): Yes, I am. 


 DR. WADE: Hans, please continue. 


DR. BEHLING: So in addition to the 


limitation that reflects the energy, needed 


energy to impart a track, there are other 


issues such as angular dependence. If we look 


at certain studies, we realize that if the 


neutron that is being detected by the film 


comes on an angle that is other than normal, 


there is reduced response on the part of the 

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NTA film, and there are other issues that 


cause everyone to recognize the fact that NTA 


film was perhaps not the way to go in 


reconstructing doses. 


On the other hand we will say that the 


TLD, the Hanford multipurpose TLD that was 


introduced in January of 1972 is probably as 


best as you’re going to get. But I would also 


caution you that neutron dosimetry is 


something that is very, very complex, very 


difficult and from my own personal experience 


it’s probably every dosimetrist’s nightmare to 


have to monitor for neutrons. 


It is not an easy task to do. Even 


the state of the art TLD badge has certain 


limitations, but it is, in fact, the best we 


can do; and therefore, we will accept the fact 


that the Hanford TLD was probably the neutron 


dosimeter that we will put some faith into. 


Anyway, let’s go back and just briefly 


review some of the issues here that we’re 


going to discuss this morning. In the process 


of trying to reconstruct doses, neutron doses, 


prior to 1972, NIOSH in their TBD elected to 


segregate the areas where neutron exposures 

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were possible into three discrete areas. The 


eight single-pass reactors, the N Reactor, 


which is a closed loop, also production but 


also generate electricity, and the two and 300 


Area that involved plutonium production and in 


finishing. 


And potential exposures there resulted 


from, principally from the Alpha N reaction or 


the N Alpha reaction that you get when you 


have an Alpha interacting with a low Z 


material such as fluorine or any other 


materials, and that produces obviously a 


neutron. And for all three different areas 


you do have different neutron spectra, energy 


spectra that has to be looked at in terms of 


how does the NTA film respond to that and what 


are the potential deficiencies associated with 


these different spectra. 


TBD
 

So with that I would like to perhaps 


then start by briefly going over the technical 


basis document that was issued, and I don’t 


have the dates in front of me. But I’m 


working on the, or this report that I’ve 


written reflects the technical basis document 

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that was issued in 2004. And I fully 


understand that ORAU has issued a revised 


version of the TBD back in November, I 


believe, of this year. 


But the report that I had written 


really reflects the original report. So if 


there are changes, I will have to accept the 


fact that some of the changes may have 


accommodated some of the issues that were 


raised here. But this discussion reflects the 


TBD as it was written as rev. one back in 


2004. 


For those who have my handout, I would 


like to essentially start with page four 


because I think the first three pages are 


nothing more than an overview. 


MR. NELSON: May I make a suggestion? 


DR. BEHLING: Yes, please. 


MR. NELSON: You know we’re talking about 


three different areas, the two and 300 Area, 


the N Reactor and the eight single-pass 


reactors. The 200 Area and the N Reactor are 


current as you’ll see in the response. The 


basis for determining neutron/photon ratios 


are based on NTA, not NTA film, but 

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multipurpose TLD badges. So I think in the 


interest of resolving the issues and getting 


through the most items, I think if we go in 


reverse order there where we feel we’re 


stronger, then perhaps we can resolve those 


issues sooner in the meeting and get through 


more of the discussion if anybody’s amenable 


to that. 


DR. BEHLING: Well, as I said, my response 


to this was really based on the 2004 TBD, and 


I do have some concerns about the issues that 


you brought up in the response here which 


tends to ignore what was stated earlier. So I 


would like to at least follow the protocol as 


I identified it earlier. 


MR. NELSON: That’s fine. I was just 


interested in getting through more issues, and 


that’s fine. 


DR. BEHLING: I think we can easily get 


through here. 


EIGHT SINGLE-PASS PRODUCTION REACTORS
 

On page four you have the first group, 


and that is an assessment of the 


neutron/photon ratio for the eight single-pass 


production reactors. And one of the things 

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that was done here was to use NTA film and 


say, okay, we will use NTA film and compare 


the response of NTA film to the photon 


exposures associated with people who may have 


been exposed to both neutrons and photons at 


the production reactors. 


And one of the things that caught my 


attention was the fact that we’re really 


dealing here with seven workers who were 


monitored between 1950 and ’61. And these 


workers were described, and I have very little 


additional information, as workers who were, 


quote, primarily assigned to Hanford reactors. 


And there’s an issue here because if they were 


assigned to in addition to Hanford reactors, 


they may have been assigned to areas where 


there was essentially no neutron exposure 


which would potentially obviously add photon 


exposure but no neutron exposure. 


So the issue is one of having a set of 


data involving seven workers who had been 


primarily assigned to the Hanford reactors and 


using that data. And these seven workers were 


assessed, as you see in Table 1 here, by five 


different methods. They are defined as method 

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one through five. 


And just to again to abbreviate the 


discussion as it needs to be, method one was 


the response on the part of neutron/photon 


ratios where the photon exposure was compared 


to the neutrons as registered on the NTA film 


with no background subtraction. In other 


words these seven workers had exposures by the 


neutrons and photons, and there was no 


subtraction from a control badge that involves 


the neutron exposure. 


And what you have, as you see at the 


bottom, an average value, average neutron to 


photon ratio for method one as 0.43. Or in 


other words if the person on average had a 


photon dose of 100 millirem, his neutron dose 


would have been 43 based on that protocol. 


And there were several other methods that are 


very well described in your handout, in your 


recent handout, and I won’t go through it. 


But the method five is the method that 


is considered by ORAU to be the most accurate. 


And what that does is to subtract the tracks 


on the control neutron badge. So again, if a 


person had a photon dose of about 100 

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millirem, under method five those seven 


individuals that were assessed would have a 


neutron/photon ratio of 0.09. Or in other 


words there would be nine millirem assigned to 


the neutron dose. 


And as you see down here on the page I 


just simply summarized that, and ORAU 


concluded that since we don’t really know 


which method is perhaps most accurate, why 


don’t we just look at all of the five methods 


and then see what we can come off, what comes 


out of it. And they concluded that it fits in 


lognormal distribution. And based on all five 


methods they concluded that the geometric mean 


that should be used is 0.1. In other words 


100 millirem photon dose buys you 11 millirem 


NTA dose. And of course, they have a 


geometric standard deviation in the 95th
 

percentile. 


DR. POSTON (by Telephone): Hans? Hans? 


Hans? John Poston here. I guess I’m having 


trouble figuring out what’s wrong with what 


you just said. I would expect mostly thermal 


neutrons being present for around these 


reactors I would expect a whole lot more of 

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photons than neutrons. And I know that it 


takes about a factor of 100 more thermal 


neutrons to produce one rad of absorbed dose 


than it does fast neutrons. So everything 


that you said makes sense to me. I’m trying 


to see what’s wrong with what my intuition 


tells me. 


DR. BEHLING: Well, I haven’t said what’s 


wrong yet. I’m only verbalizing what NIOSH 


did. So I haven’t gotten to that part yet, 


Dr. Poston. 


DR. POSTON (by Telephone): Okay. 


MR. NELSON: This is Chuck Nelson. Not to 


be rude here, but cut to the chase. I mean, 


we’re gonna sit here and talk about all the 


technical limitations and problems with NTA 


film, and our response right away is that we 


realize there’s a lot of limitations and 


problems with NTA film so that’s one of the 


reasons I thought perhaps we could pass over 


some of that discussion so that we can get 


down to what the actual response was because 


our response didn’t really deal with, we 


basically acknowledge that that’s an issue, 


and we wanted to summarize why we felt that 

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the numbers that we have are claimant 


favorable, some of which were just now brought 


up. 


DR. BEHLING: Well, I think we can still get 


through it, but let me go through and explain 


to the people what was done here. 


So we’re, at this point, at this 


juncture, we recognize that the relationship 


between NTA film and photon dosimeters was one 


in which the geometric mean was 0.11 as a 


ratio. In recognition of the energy 


deficiencies that defined the NTA film, NIOSH 


did the following: They looked at a 


comparison between an NTA film and a tissue 


equivalent proportional counter for the 100 KE 


reactor and came to the conclusion that the 


ratio between the observed response on the 


part of an NTA film and the photon was 28 


percent. 


And that was based on a single 


measurement of a single reactor, and it was 


done on top of the reactor. That’s on page 


five. So what they then did, they said, okay, 


the neutron/photon ratio that was based on the 


seven individuals, that we just discussed, of 

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0.11 should be modified in order to reflect a 


deficiency on the part of the NTA film. 


And this deficiency is reflected by a 


single comparison between a tissue equivalent 


proportional counter and NTA film on top of 


the 100 KE reactor which yielded a ratio of 


0.28 or 28 percent efficiency. So in other 


words the 11 percent ratio was then divided by 


0.28 to come up with the 0.141 ratio. And 


that is the method by which this ratio was 


then delivered. 


So having said that, this is what they 


did, and let’s go quickly through the 


findings, one through five, and it won’t take 


long. The first finding that I have on page 


five states the paradoxical use of NTA film. 


We all came to the conclusion that NTA film 


was not very good. It can’t be used for 


reconstructing individual doses for any given 


claimant. But somehow or other the paradox 


here that I wanted to identify is the fact 


that we saw fit to use NTA film to develop a 


ratio method. So that’s finding number one. 


Finding number two is the questionable 


accuracy of recorded NTA data, and again, 

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we’re talking about the seven individual 


workers who were primarily assigned to 


reactors. We don’t have a full understanding 


of their assignments throughout this period of 


time for which these data were collected. And 


of course, the potential exists that they may 


have been assigned to areas where there were 


no neutrons which tends to inflate the photon 


component; and therefore, in the process 


reduces the end gamma ratio. 


We also -- and I won’t go through this 


as Chuck had already mentioned -- where there 


are issues involving interdependency and all 


these other things. And I have a discussion 


here about Hine and Brownell which we won’t go 


into. 


Finding number three, the assumption 


that method five was technically most correct, 


and this is an issue that I can’t quite 


understand. When you look at the first table 


there, and you see method one through five, 


and you go from a ratio -- this is 


unadulterated, that is raw neutron/photon 


ratio -- you go from method one where the 


ratio is 0.43 to method five which is 0.09, 

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and you realize that the difference is one of 


subtracting the response on the part of 


control badges. 


What that really suggests that, in 


essence, let’s go back and just use simple 


numbers. If I had a photon dose of 100 


millirem, under method five I would only get 


nine millirem assigned to me for a neutron 


dose. Under method one I would get 43 


millirem. So the difference between method 


one and five were just nothing more than 


subtracting the control badge value, would be 


essentially an 80 percent dose, or neutron 


dose, was measured by control badges. And 


that’s hard for me to accept. 


DR. POSTON (by Telephone): That’s totally 


within the realm of the anticipated error 


which is on the order of plus or minus 100 


percent, at that level. 


DR. BEHLING: Well, we have here a geometric 


standard deviation which I assume accounts for 


that. I believe these are all raw numbers 


that do not necessarily reflect the 


uncertainty associated with it. 


DR. POSTON (by Telephone): I don’t know. I 

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just know that when you’re measuring at very, 


very low doses, plus or minus 100 percent is 


the typical acceptable --


DR. BEHLING: I agree with that, but I don’t 


believe that error is the reason for using 


method five as the most likely or most 


accurate measurement. I think the uncertainty 


has been addressed in the standard, geometric 


standard deviation. 


DR. POSTON (by Telephone): Well, I’m not 


arguing that point. What I’m arguing is that 


those could be the same number as far as we’re 


concerned. That difference is not 


unanticipated. 


DR. BEHLING: Finding four, we’ve already 


discussed the issue of the seven workers that 


were, as I said, primarily worked at Hanford, 


but the more important thing was the issue of 


the 28 percent. But here we again, as I 


mentioned in my opening statement, if you go 


into a single, a given reactor and measure the 


neutron/photon ratio, you will see it change 


drastically as a function of location over 


time, over power levels that may be operating. 


Here we’re trying to address a 

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neutron/photon ratio for eight reactors over 


many years at many locations, and to adjust 


the relationship from neutron to photon ratio 


using NTA. We take the single value of 28 


percent, a single moment in time, a single 


location, and we give credence to that as the 


way in which we’re now going to address all 


neutron/photon ratios. And of course, finding 


one is the (unintelligible) neutron spectra 


and the issue of the photon energy 


deficiencies that define the NTA film. 


One of the things that I wanted to 


point out was, and I include it in my write 


up, was the 28 percent. If you look at Table 


2 in my handout, you see, and it’s written in 


bold, that that 28 percent was based on a 


single measurement. As I’ve said that 


compares the tissue equivalent proportional 


counter to the NTA film, but it was measured 


on top of the 105 KE reactor. And you see the 


28 percent corresponds to the relationship 


between 470 over 1700 millirem which then 


gives you the 28 percent. 


On the other hand if you look at the 


front face or if you look at the X-1, and I’m 

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not sure I even know what that location is, 


you find that the NTA film reads zero. So 


again, here is a situation where a data point 


was selected that is possibly correct, but 


what is the relationship between a 


neutron/photon dose response on top of the 


reactor where it’s not likely that the 


majority of work exposure may have taken 


place. And of course, if you take it in front 


of the reactor, you have essentially a 


relationship that can’t be even measured 


because the NTA film registers nothing. 


So that is basically the summary of my 


concerns. It’s the limited data involving the 


comparison of the seven workers, the method by 


which that data was accessed using five 


different methods and using the geometric mean 


among the five instead of perhaps using method 


one, which when in doubt might be more 


claimant favorable, and the issue of the 


relationship for adjusting NTA inefficiency 


that is the 28 percent which was based on a 


single comparison in a single moment in time 


for the 105 KE reactor that then applies to 


all reactors including, as we’ll see shortly, 

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the N Reactor. 


And with that I’ll turn the discussion 


over to --


DR. MAURO: This is John Mauro. Could I 


just make one point also? Because in 


following all this with Hans a thought came to 


my mind, and that is to step back and ask 


myself the question, given the data, given the 


assumptions and the concerns that were raised, 


there’s another layer. And that has to do 


with do you feel that this .28 and the 


conversion factors for adjusting for the NTA 


film captures all workers? You see? 


Remember, I think one of the things 


that we lose sight of very easily is that you 


may have 1,000 workers, and you may have come 


up with a technique that would be okay for 


some workers, maybe even 50 percent of the 


workers, but is it a bounding analysis for all 


workers who may have not been monitored 


properly or monitored for neutron? So 


confounding, superimposed on this, which 


really the points that Hans made really 


challenges whether or not the data are 


adequate and appropriate to come up with this 

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neutron/photon ratio. 


I ask another question. Even if they 


are do they capture and place an upper bound 


on all workers? Maybe they’re okay with some 


workers. And remember, our mandate is we have 


to make sure that we give the benefit of the 


doubt to all the workers that are working, or 


as the theme’s been going, 95 percent. So I 


think that’s part of the story, too. And I 


guess with that I’d like to stop and leave it 


to you folks. 


MR. NELSON: This is Chuck Nelson. I just 


wanted to say that Hans actually did a very 


nice job in laying all that out in the 


document in the findings. And he definitely 


has some good points that he’s making about 


the limitations and problems with NTA film. 


They’re well recognized. They were recognized 


by Hanford as well. 


And what we did in the TBD or what was 


done in the TBD was to use the available data 


to come up with what was felt to be a claimant 


favorable neutron/photon ratio. Given that we 


realize there are limitations to it, and that 


the 28 percent that was applied was very 

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limited and was based on a single set of pair 


measurements, and there just wasn’t much data 


available. So that number was used, and it 


was felt that it was claimant favorable. 


So in our response we basically say we 


don’t have any conceptual difference of 


opinion in all these particular areas with 


angular response issues with limitations on 


the NTA film. So what we did is we started to 


dig into some records closer because there’s a 


lot of opinions that in data and reports 


around the reactors that neutron levels around 


the reactors were controlled such that there 


wasn’t high neutron levels, where there wasn’t 


significant gamma levels. 


So what I’d like to do is turn it over 


to Ed Scalsky. He’s got some good points he’d 


like to make about the single-pass reactor 


facilities and tell you what we’re doing right 


now to look at some of the data to help 


support that these numbers are in fact 


claimant favorable. 


MR. SCALSKY: This is Ed Scalsky. I think 


one of the things that we have to be aware of 


is that the people at that time were aware of 

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all these problems. They made extensive 


surveys around the reactor. They started with 


the 305 reactor, and they went into the 105-B 


reactor when it went critical. They did 


complete surveys along the front face of the 


reactor. They timed people when they went in 


there to do work, they made measurements. 


And, in fact, from 1950 to ’57, I guess, one 


of the things they did is that they made the 


survey. When people went into work, they 


started a stop watch, and they based their 


time on the highest dose rates that they could 


find in there. 


DR. MAURO: And so they’re neutron 


measurements? 


MR. SCALSKY: Neutron measurements. 


DR. MAURO: With NTA film? 


MR. SCALSKY: No, with instruments. 


DR. MAURO: Okay, this was instrumentation. 


MR. SCALSKY: Instrumentation also. 


DR. MAURO: (Unintelligible). 


MR. SCALSKY: Well, I don’t know about 


(unintelligible). They had a (unintelligible) 


type instrument, BF-3 with cadmium covered and 


non-cadmium covered. 

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MR. ALVAREZ (by Telephone): And this is Bob 


Alvarez. Are these data recorded somewhere? 


MR. SCALSKY: Yes, they are recorded. 


There’s a couple of, we’re in the process of 


getting additional data, logbooks. We have a 


couple of logbooks right now. The HEW 199L 


goes from 11/21/44 to 12/29/44. And the HEW 


507L goes from 9/10/45 through 5/3/46. And 


these logbooks give the details of all the 


surveys that were made at that time. 


MR. ALVAREZ (by Telephone): Now subsequent 


to that, you know, when they started to 


significantly raise the power levels to these 


reactors and the shielding, bioshielding, 


began to degrade and the engineering studies 


subsequently pointed out an increased leakage 


of photon and neutrons. Are there data with 


respect to that time period? 

MR. SCALSKY: I believe there are data. The 

HW-33533, I’m not sure. Whose was that, 

Chuck? Do you recall? 

MR. NELSON: That was a report. It was 

called “Achievement and HAPO Monitoring”. It 

covered 1944 to 1954, and it was basically a 


summary of all the controls that were in place 

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from the beginning of the time they started 


the reactors. It actually included a lot of 


different work areas, but it had a specific 


section on monitoring at the reactors. 


MR. ALVAREZ (by Telephone): I guess perhaps 


I’m not being clear. I’ll restate my 


question. Subsequent to 1954, around 


beginning in the, let’s say ’56, ’57 timeframe 


when the power levels were increased 


dramatically in these reactors and they began 


to observe deterioration of the bioshields and 


things like warping and other phenomena 


affecting the physical state of the reactor, 


et cetera, there was concern expressed, at 


least by the engineering people, about the 


potential for an increased leakage of photons 


and neutrons. And my question is after 1955, 


’56 were there any sort of specific studies 


performed to look at doses that might have 


been received from the deterioration of the 


bioshield and other problems associated with 


increasing power levels? 


MR. SCALSKY: I would expect that based on 


the logbooks that they’ve had, that they’ve 


made surveys on a continuing basis and I see 

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no reason why it should have stopped, you 


know, at 1950 or ’55 or any other time. 


MR. ALVAREZ (by Telephone): I see. Because 


I just heard reference to one report it 


stopped in 1955. I was curious what went on 


beyond that especially during this period 


when, as I said, when they were experiencing 


these problems of deterioration of the 


bioshields. 


MR. SCALSKY: No, we’ve only had, we’re just 


now getting a lot of this data in. We have 


made requests to get this data, and we are 


getting it in. So it’s taking a little longer 


time than we had anticipated. 


MR. NELSON: It’s going to take a lot of 


time and resources to go through all these 


documents and pick all this information out. 


So it’s not going to be a little uptaking to 


go through and try to re-create every 


situation throughout all those years prior to 


the implementation of the TLDs. 


DR. MAURO: This is very important, and as 


what you’re saying is there’s a body of data 


out there that measured neutron, I guess 


fluxes, was it just energy distribution or was 

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it just dose? 


MR. NELSON: It’s dose ranges. 


DR. MAURO: Okay, the dose that does capture 


the full range of the energy distribution. 


MR. NELSON: That’s what we’re not sure 


about. I don’t think at this point we can say 


that we know the neutron energy spectrum at 


the reactors because it changed wildly. 


DR. MAURO: But this instrument that was 


used -- I’m not familiar with the instrument 


you’re referring to -- captures the full 


range. In other words it says dose --


MR. ALVAREZ (by Telephone): Was it a gold 


foil instrument? 


DR. ZIEMER: Let me insert here. Neutron 


instruments historically have had somewhat the 


same problems as the film badges. But people 


knew from the front end that there was 


spectral dependence in terms of dose, and you 


want to relate what you saw on the NTA film 


was dose, and so you needed to know the 


spectrum. So there are a lot of things you 


could do, and some of them were crude. You 


could do threshold foils, and those were done 


in the early days. The Chang and Eng was 

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maybe had boron and cadmium or --


MR. SCALSKY: Well, it had two chambers 


actually. 


DR. ZIEMER: But that was really rough 


spectral analysis in a sense, probably fast 


and maybe epithermal and thermal or something 


like that. So there were a lot of different 


detectors and all of them had limitations. It 


really wasn’t until you got to the Bonner 


spheres and you’re up toward the end of the 


‘50s and into the ‘60s before those started to 


get -- I don’t remember the dates, maybe 


Poston would -- but there was a lot of 


attention given. 


And let me get a little soap-boxy 


here, but I always remember [Name Redacted] 


who’s kind of the father of TLD. He used to 


say anything worth doing is worth doing 


poorly. And what he meant by that was even if 


you couldn’t measure whatever it was, say 


neutrons, very well, you ought to try to 


measure them as best you can and then -- and I 


think Mr. Nelson mentioned -- these issues 


were known very early on. 


The limitations were known very early 

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on, and great amount of effort to try to 


define those spectra under different power. 


This is throughout the system under different 


power levels, under different leakage levels 


and so on. I know it was going on at Oak 


Ridge. Based on what I know about Hanford it 


was going on there. 


And keep in mind what they were doing 


in terms of trying to limit worker exposure 


and getting these ratios. So if you knew 


something about the gamma, you at least knew 


roughly where you were overall, a very 


different purpose. Now, we’re trying to say 


how can I use that information and make a 


correct decision on compensation. 


And that’s the struggle here I think. 


And to do it with a few numbers doesn’t give 


us a lot of confidence. But if we can find 


these early spectral depictions, even though 


those early ones are going to be crude, but at 


least you’ll have some idea. Actually, the 


higher energies are kind of easier to do, and 


those are the ones that delivered the most 


dose anyway. 


So I think if you can get a hold of 

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those, those will be very helpful. I don’t 


think -- and Bob Alvarez asked the question --


I don’t think we know completely what’s 


available, do we? 


MR. SCALSKY: Not yet. We are constantly 


seeking new information. 


DR. ZIEMER: But our confidence on bounding 


these for purposes of compensation will be 


very much enhanced if we can get some of that 


information with the early measurements. They 


certainly were trying to do what you’re 


talking about. 


MR. SCALSKY: Yeah, and some of these early 


measurements they used the long* counter which 


you know is useful for (unintelligible) case 


estimate. So there is some data on that we’ll 


continue to get. 


DR. MAURO: Am I correct in understanding 


then this number .28 is really what we’re 


talking about, is that .28 a good number? And 


will this new information help us to support 


that number as being a good bounding value or 


is some other value more appropriate? Is that 


really what we’re zeroing in on? 


MR. SCALSKY: I can’t say that the .28 is a 

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good number. 


DR. MAURO: No, no, I’m not saying it is or 


isn’t. I’m saying that, in other words the 


research --


MR. ELLIOTT: That’s the issue. 


DR. MAURO: -- or is there more to it than 


that? 


DR. BEHLING: Well, I think there is more 


because you can look at the Table 2 that I 


have, and obviously the difference between Top 


23 when you have the 1700 versus the 470 that 


gave rise to the 28 percent was not obviously 


matched by the front phase or the X-1 location 


meaning that the ratio will shift as a 


function of neutron spectrum. 


As you degrade the spectrum, you 


approach raising zero response for the NTA 


film with obviously, I mean, if you get much 


below the neutron energies of 300 keV, your 


NTA film has no chance of registering, and yet 


your photon badge will register whatever down 


to a few tens of keV. 


So we realize that no single number 


will ever do justice. What you hope for is to 


perhaps take a claimant favorable number and 

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say that on average if a person spends time in 


the containment, and he wanders from one 


location to the other over time or different 


reactors, that a single number will perhaps 


provide a bounding relationship. But not, 


there will be no single number that will 


capture the truth. 


DR. NETON: I think this is the crux of the 


issue. You kind of avoided it in your 


discussion. We didn’t assign a single number. 


We assigned a distribution, and in fact, the 


upper 95th percentile of that distribution was 


.62. And that was assigned to workers, not a 


single value. And then the question becomes ­

- and we’ve been down this path many times in 


many working groups -- is it appropriate for 


NIOSH to assign a distribution with their best 


estimate, which this was. 


We looked at all the data and said 


this was our best estimate of what it could be 


but given the uncertainties it could go as 


high as .6 something at the 95th percentile. 


Or is it SC&A’s opinion as it has been in the 


past that we need to assign a 95th percentile 


to everyone? And that’s what it comes down 

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to. 


DR. MAURO: I think there’s some very 


productive discussions on this when this came 


up on other sites, and there’s almost like a 


procedure that’s inherent. And that is if you 


have a site of highly variable, let’s say 


neutron to photon ratio was extremely variable 


which it sounds like it is, then the question 


becomes do we have people that may have worked 


-– is there a location that may represent a 


neutron to photon ratio of five, because I 


think I’ve run across some of those. 


And is it possible, is it plausible, 


here’s where the judgments come in, that that 


five was predominant at that location because 


of the nature of the activities that took 


place there and that there were workers that 


may have worked there for extended periods of 


time where they experienced the neutron to 


photon ratio of five? 


See, the way I look at it is, and if 


we don’t really know -- we ran into this 


problem at Bethlehem Steel -- it’s almost like 


a policy issue. If we have a situation where 


you have this variability, you have workers, 

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you’re not quite sure where the workers 


worked, but there are some locations where 


consistently the ratios were above one. I 


won’t even use five because that’s pretty 


high. But let’s say consistently above one. 


And we have workers, and we’re not 


quite sure where they worked. What do you do? 


Do you assign the full distribution? And I 


think where we came out on this -- and Jim, 


you correct me if I’m wrong -- is that when 


you’re in the difficult situation, you have no 


choice but to give the guy the upper end. I 


think that you go with the full distribution 


when there was good reason to believe that, 


no, it’s unlikely this guy, the nature of his 


job was such that perhaps there’s no reason to 


monitor him or that we had good reason to 


believe that he spent time in lots of 


different places. 


But I guess we’ve developed a 


practice, and I think we agree --


DR. NETON: I think what you’re saying here 


is the evolution of our process. 


DR. MAURO: Yeah. 


DR. NETON: This Hanford document was 

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written, one of the first ones that you 


reviewed, and a lot of water’s gone under the 


bridge since then. And we’ve evolved our 


position particularly in the area of photons. 


I mean, I think there is a TIB out there now 


that you’ll read about later that’s in our 


response, TIB-20 I think, that essentially 


takes that position. If you don’t know any 


better and the person should have been 


monitored, in our judgment they were more 


exposed and should have been monitored, then 


the 95th percentile is probably the appropriate 


measurement. 


Now, we don’t have a position on that 


for neutrons yet, but I think we need to go 


back and look at this. I think what Ed 


suggested with these logbooks and everything 


is fine and good, but we’ve got to look at it 


and see is a single value with a distribution 


appropriate or not. And I would suggest that 


in some cases it may be. For instance, if 


we’ve not been successful with you guys at 


least in making the case that some, the 


workers that were more highly exposed were 


monitored, and if we can demonstrate that, I 

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think you would agree that unmonitored workers 


then may --

DR. MAURO: Full distribution would be 

better. 

DR. NETON: -- the full distribution would 

be more appropriate. 


MR. ALVAREZ (by Telephone): There also 


appeared, at least in sort of a general 


process history perspective, an increased 


number of people who were brought to bear to 


do maintenance and repair on these reactors 


especially beginning in the mid- to late-‘50s 


through the period in fact when they were 


ultimately closed. And there’s some data that 


indicates how many people were doing what 


when. 


But it just appears to me that there 


were people working on all different aspects 


of these machines especially in the, what 


would be a concern, of course, was during that 


period of peak production when there was a lot 


of pressure to keep these reactors operating 


to their fullest capacities. And the 


pressures to do that while at the same time, 


you know, because maintenance repair required 

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mostly reactors that were closed for that 


purpose. 


DR. GLOVER: Hey Chuck, this is Sam Glover. 


The numbers escape me a little bit, but based 


on obviously Hanford’s and SC&A’s evaluation, 


we’re looking at that. When you look at the 


cases, only 62 cases have used a best 


estimate. I think 62, something like that, 


and over 2,000 have used the 95th percentile. 


So it was at about 2.62 --


DR. MAURO: Was it neutron? 


DR. GLOVER: Yes, the NP ratio, I think it 


was 2.62. Very few have used the actual 


geometric mean and distribution. And I think 


Chuck, we’ve captured this in our discussions. 


MR. MACIEVIC: This is Greg Macievic. One 


of the things you offered, that NP ratio of 


five. You also have to look at the film 


itself and when you’re developing this ratio. 


That number came about due to going to the 


detection limit of the film at 20 millirem. 


So now your variability goes way up. Your NP 


was five, but you were not how solid is that 


five. 


DR. NETON: That’s another issue. When you 

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start getting into the neutron/photon ratio 


business, when you’ve got non-detectable 


badges at the detection limit, you can’t take 


the 95th percentile, the badge and the 95th
 

percentile in my mind of the neutron/photon 


ratio and come up with what I would consider a 


reasonable estimate. 


DR. BEHLING: On the other hand I did fail 


to mention something that did catch my eye, 


and it’s on page two, and I’ll quote because 


it’s taken directly from the TBD. 


DR. ZIEMER: That’s from your report? 


DR. BEHLING: Yes, and I’ll read it for 


those that don’t have the report in front of 


them. And in the TBD it states the following: 


“Hanford NTA film was processed 


independently from the beta/photon film even 


though the NTA film was typically exchanged 


along with the beta/photon film. Prior to 


1957, NTA film was housed in the two-element 


beta/photon dosimeter holder along with the 


beta/photon film.” 


And I’m going to come back to this 


issue when we talk about the 200 and 300 Areas 


because that’s a very critical statement here. 

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But the thing that I wanted to point out here 


is the following statement a little further 


down. “The Hanford policy to process NTA film 


varied historically but basically involved the 


practice to read all NTA film for the 200 West 


plutonium facilities and, for other Hanford 


facilities, to process the NTA only if the 


photon dose was at least 100 millirem.” 


Now, there’s a certain bias associated 


with it especially for those individuals for 


whom perhaps the neutron/photon ratio was 


greater than one. Which meant that if his 


photon dose was less than 100 millirem, his 


neutron badge wasn’t even read according to 


that policy. 


MR. MACIEVIC: But in what we used, we used 


all the values that we had for 


(unintelligible) on the 200, 300 level, but 


all the values that were used were actual 


readings from the badge and not, if there was 


a number there, we used it. I may be 


misinterpreting what you’re saying, but we did 


not have a cutoff of a certain value except to 


say we used the minimum detectable on the 


badge. 

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If there was a reading on the 


beta/gamma, we used that reading and then we 


used whatever the neutron reading was to come 


up with that lognormal distribution. We 


didn’t, we cut off at 20 and also at 50 to 


take a look at how distributions were and how 


you can cut out some of the variability by 


going up to 50 millirem with a badge. 


DR. BEHLING: I think you’re referring now 


to the 200, 300 Area which is an issue in the 


third component. 


MR. MACIEVIC: That’s right. 


DR. BEHLING: I’m going back to the 


production reactors. And according to the 


policy statement here is that we always 


associate a neutron component along with a 


photon component. The two are not 


divorceable. Therefore, if we see a photon 


response that’s less than 100 millirem, we may 


not even bother with the NTA processing, the 


processing of the NTA film. 


Meaning that for those individuals who 


where the potential ratio was one or higher, 


you may have not even processed the NTA film 


based on the failure of the photon dose to 

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have been less than 100 millirem, which means 


there’s the potential of a lot of data missing 


that on the basis of this policy was simply 


not bothered to be read. 


DR. ZIEMER: Were there actual cases in your 


charts where you show that ratio being greater 


than one? I don’t recall it. 


DR. BEHLING: There are, there are evidence, 


and in fact, the TBD has for certain areas the 


ratio was as high as five-to-one in select, 


rare instances, yes. 


MR. NELSON: Yeah, I think it’s plutonium 


facilities. 


MR. ANIGSTEIN (by Telephone): This is Bob 


Anigstein. I’d like to interject a comment on 


this. Hans said that there was data missing. 


I’d like to put it more strongly and say that 


that indicates there’s a potential bias in the 


data because if low photon readings meant that 


the NTA film wasn’t read, you could 


conceivably have situations where you have 


photon readings below 100 millirem, and yet 


you have high neutron readings, and those 


would be automatically discarded. And these 


would give you a very high neutron/photon 

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ratio. 


MR. SCALSKY: That was a study by Watson 


that came up with that particular value. They 


did a study of 66,000 NTA film, and what they 


were trying to do was economize. And they 


found that you would not, if you had a high 


gamma, you would have, or if you had a high 


neutron, you would have a high gamma. And 


they concluded that it’d be one in 10,000 


where you would get a high neutron without a 


high gamma. And that’s why they came up with 


that. 


DR. MAURO: There was a certain amount of 


wisdom in that decision at that time whereby 


you would not miss a significant neutron 


component. That’s important if the data are 


out there that demonstrate that, great. But 


right now I guess on face value the argument 


that Bob just made, you know, sort of is self-


evident. That is, if it turns out the actual 


data on which that judgment was made was 


sound, I think that’s very important. 


MR. NELSON: That threshold value was 


established for reactor facilities not for 


plutonium facilities because they felt that 

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neutrons weren’t as significant in the reactor 


facilities. So instead of counting all these 


badges, they set a threshold at which now 


those are the ones we’re going to target, and 


we’ll look at those and see if we can 


specifically see neutrons on those. 


DR. MAURO: So let me see if I understand. 


The wisdom behind the decision was, okay, if a 


person has a gamma of less than 100, there 


really is no need to read the neutron 


component because it’s likely for reactors 


that the neutron to photon ratios is 


relatively low. That’s under point one or on 


that order. And on that basis they really 


weren’t that concerned about that ten millirem 


and really changed things too much as opposed 


to the fact that possibly it was five to one 


in that case. 


Well, you’re saying in that particular 


circumstance as for the reactors having a five 


to one ratio associated with the 100 millirem 


photon dose is probably very unlikely. That’s 


what I’m hearing. I think that’s an important 


point, and I think that if that’s true --


DR. BEHLING: I think if you have faith in 

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it, John --


DR. MAURO: No, no, I’m just posing the 


question. I understand the argument you’re 


making, and if the data support it, that’s 


right. But of course, we haven’t seen that 


data. 


MR. SCHOFIELD: How good is the 


documentation that these people spent their 


time at the reactor and didn’t go over to the 


200, 300 Area to work with the plutonium? I 


mean, shielded gamma is pretty easy so I mean, 


you know, you have guys who almost any –-


they’re gonna be floaters. They’re going to 


spend a lot of time here, but they’re going to 


spend a heck of a lot of time here 


particularly times when they’re short they 


need to generate a lot of this overtime. They 


will pull people from here to fill in over 


here. Unless that’s well documented, there 


are people who have potential for a large 


neutron dose being missed in their records. 


DR. NETON: I assume there’ll be logbooks 


not only recording the neutron but the photons 


simultaneously so you’re going to have an 


instantaneous ratio here that documents the 

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neutron/photon ratio independent of the badges 


themselves, I would think. 


MR. SCALSKY: Well, you have to watch where 


these measurements were made. 


DR. NETON: Right. But what I’m saying is 


it would be unusual to me if someone would go 


and measure neutrons without measuring photons 


at the same time. And if you have that type 


of data, then you don’t have to rely on these 


badges anymore. 


MR. MACIEVIC: That last argument though if 


you were now saying that you don’t know where 


the person is, then this discussion about the 


individual areas doesn’t really help you 


because now you’re going to have to say is 


there a site NP ratio. And are you going to 


now make some upper percentile for everybody 


at the site and assign neutron doses to 


secretaries and everything else? Because that 


gets into some very fuzzy areas which I think 


with these records and that we’ll be able to 


identify more what the worker did. 


MR. NELSON: Well, Jim, if you look at the 


records associated with the claims, they’re 


actually very good in that they’ll have the 

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dosimeter records, and they’ll show the area 


where the guy works. I’m not saying they’re 


100 percent complete regarding showing every 


movement, but it does, for many of the years 


it shows, okay, the guy left 100 Area and 


moved over to the 200 Area. 


And there’s an actual entry into their 


dosimetry file that says that. And there’s 


also x-ray records. On x-ray records it has 


work area. So when the dose reconstructor is 


looking at this, he’s picking through all this 


data and noting the fine details on the work 


location, and that’s the information that we 


have. And for the Hanford site it’s pretty 


good. It’s very impressive. 


DR. MAURO: Bob Alvarez did make a point 


though that struck me, and I don’t know the 


history of the Hanford facility. It sounds 


like in 1956 something special happened. That 


is, they kicked up the power level of the 


reactors, and apparently from reading the site 


profile there was a lot of problems with 


regard to, I guess, the tubes. There was 


warping and in other words what we’re dealing 


with is a very variable, time and space 

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variable. 


So I think that the, what I heard was, 


well, if you know you’re in the reactor area, 


you’re pretty confident that the neutron to 


photon ratios were below one. I mean, I guess 


that’s what this says. But then at the same 


time I hear, well, wait a minute. I don’t 


know if we can jump to that given the 


experience, that is, we have a highly variable 


nature in time and space amongst these seven 


or eight reactors. Was it the 


(unintelligible) reactors? 


So all I’m cautioning is that these 


occurrences where the reactors weren’t 


performing as well as you’d like may play on 


all this and have some influence on what 


you’re going to pick. Because remember, I’ll 


go back to what I said in the beginning, that 


is, remember, we have an obligation to make 


sure that all the workers that moved through 


the system we’re going to give the benefit of 


the doubt. So we’re not looking for a 


collective dose or the average dose, we’re 


looking for the right thing to do for just 


about everyone. 

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DR. BEHLING: And let me add something here 


because of comments made earlier by someone on 


the other end of the table. And that is to 


date we have used, obviously, the 95th
 

percentile for dose reconstruction. But I 


want to caution everyone. When you have most 


of the dose reconstructions probably involve 


claims where you tend to maximize doses, and 


sure, you can be generous then because you can 


give them the 99th percentile as long as you 


know the bottom line is we don’t pay up and 


the POC’s less than 50 percent. 


The concern that I have in applying 


neutron/photon ratios applies to best 


estimates, and that’s the bottom line. 


Anything else doesn’t really matter because we 


know when you start out with the assumption 


that we’ll maximize everything, oh, you can 


generously give them the 99th percentile value 


because it doesn’t matter. The bottom line is 


we don’t pay. So I wanted to look at only 


those cases where best estimates were used and 


then determine which is the appropriate 


neutron/photon ratio because that’s the only 


place where it matters. 

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DR. NETON: I think we agree with that. 


DR. MAURO: And could I ask a question then? 


I know we’ve done a lot of Hanford studies, 


cases. Have we run across many realistic 


cases? 


DR. BEHLING: I’d have to ask Kathy, but she 


would have to --


MR. ELLIOTT: I think that’s why Sam framed 


his comment earlier that there’s only been 65 


claims done under best estimate. 


DR. GLOVER: At 2,000 and something. 


MR. NELSON: I think the number was 72. 


This is a very cursory review, but it takes 


awhile to get that detail. I think the number 


was 72 in over 3,000 Hanford claims. 


MR. ELLIOTT: We don’t disagree with you, 


Hans. That’s where we need to focus our 


attention. It affects a small number of the 


population. 


DR. BEHLING: No doubt, and that’s the only 


population that I want to address here. 


DR. NETON: And we agree. We need to go 


back and look and see if we can, if full 


distribution is applicable or whether 


something like the 95th percentile is more 

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appropriate. I think we’re all in agreement. 


MR. MACIEVIC: We have to remember that when 


you’re doing dose reconstruction, the person 


has, if you know he was in a reactor area, has 


no neutron and now very low, and he’s got low 


photon or none, you’re going to get all the 


missed dose and all that added into the photon 


dose which is now then going to be multiplied 


by that NP ratio which is going to be a much 


higher dose than just using the values that 


are right there off of the original data. 


MR. NELSON: I think Ed was eventually going 


to get to that, but yet missed dose is very 


significant in the early years. If they’re on 


a weekly change out schedule and you have high 


detection limits when you multiply that all 


through, you’re assigning very significant 


doses, photon and neutron missed dose. 


DR. BEHLING: And, in fact, that’s a good 


point because among the things that I brought 


up in my write up on page three was the actual 


changed frequency from January 1950 through 


December 1950. So it’s for the full year of 


1950 the frequency for badge exchange was 


weekly. So if you apply that it didn’t match, 

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it didn’t meet 100 millirem for that year, you 


could be missing an awful lot of photons and 


neutrons. 


DR. GLOVER: This is Sam Glover again. 


There was a brief comment made about that they 


aren’t divorced. Actually, the NP ratio, 


there is a divorcing. Most of the time, 


there’s only neutrons when the reactor’s on. 


I think that needs to be made very clear that 


when the reactor’s off, and there’s still a 


lot of photons, you know, you’re activating 


stuff, still a lot of photon generating 


circumstances around. These guys are getting 


photon dose, and we’re still going to apply 


this NP ratio. 

DR. ZIEMER: As if it was in operation. 

DR. GLOVER: Exactly. 

DR. ZIEMER: Could I ask? Maybe, Greg, you 

could answer this. In the case where that 


policy was enacted for the reactors where if 


it was below 100 millirem, they were assigned 


a zero neutron. Is that correct? For the 


reactor areas? At least in a certain time 


period. Can you spot that readily in the 


record? 

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MR. NELSON: What it was is they, if it was 


below 100 millirem, they didn’t read the NTA 


badge. 


DR. ZIEMER: Yeah, but what did they enter? 


Did they enter a zero I think you said? Is 


that easy for you to -- well, let me just ask 


it this way. So a zero shows up in the 


neutron column. You’re still putting in a 


half of the minimum detectable or something, 


right, for that number currently? Is that 


what we’re doing? 


MR. NELSON: Yes. 


DR. ZIEMER: Okay. 


DR. MAURO: Let me see now. You measure 


photon. He has his NTA film, and he has his ­

-


DR. ZIEMER: No, if he’s only got a 50 


millirem photon, then they would, zero would 


have been entered. 


DR. MAURO: Now the problem becomes, what 


I’m hearing is now in theory zeros entered. 


You could in theory fill in that blank by 


going one-half of the MDAs for neutron if --


DR. BEHLING: No, they --


DR. MAURO: No, they’re not doing that. 

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They didn’t measure it. I just wanted to 


understand, okay. 


DR. ZIEMER: So you are doing it for 


neutrons though, right? 


MR. NELSON: Right. 


DR. ZIEMER: You’re putting in a neutron 


value which is half the detectable limit which 


will be what? 


MR. NELSON: About roughly 25 I believe. 


DR. ZIEMER: Yeah, so actually, actually, 


you’re almost giving a bigger ratio anyway 


because you’re below 100 on the gammas, and 


you’re going to be assigning 25. So you’re 


already up in that same ratio or above where 


you would --


DR. BEHLING: Well, not quite because for 


the eight single-pass reactors the N/gamma 


ratio is .41. So if you measured 100 


millirem, what you would get if you apply the 


ratio would be 41 millirem. 


DR. GLOVER: I think it made -- This is Sam 


Glover again. We use an NP ratio. The 


neutron measurement is recorded, and we look 


at that. It’s there on the sheet, but an NP 


ratio actually assigns the dose to a worker. 

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So we actually don’t use that recorded 


neutron, the NTA film. I think that needs to 


be made clear. 


MR. NELSON: Prior to 1972 when NTA badges 


were used and TLDs did not exist, we only look 


at the photon dose. If they worked in one of 


the neutron areas, we apply the neutron to 


photon ratio to that photon dose and to the 


photon missed dose. And you assign a neutron 


dose to that worker for all the years that he 


or she may have worked in those areas. 


DR. BEHLING: Are we through with the first 


eight single-pass reactors? 


MR. NELSON: I think so. I mean, we had 


some, we talked about a lot of these points, 


but I think there’s some bullets in here that 


identify why we felt that neutrons weren’t as 


significant as one might think in those areas. 


And they were brought out by various people in 


the room talking about when you work around 


these reactors and refueling the reactors, the 


reactors were shut down. You weren’t working 


in a neutron field. 


Do you want to cover the rest of the 


bullets? Give you a fair chance to hit each 

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of those? 


MR. SCALSKY: Okay, we mentioned the fact 


that all Hanford reactor exposures scenarios 


involving neutron exposures also involved 


significant photon exposures. The higher 


energy neutrons associated reports and beams 


where shielding may have been inadequate would 


be detected by the NTA. There was a judgment 


made by [Name Redacted] who worked there in 


early 1947. And in his report his judgment 


was that less than five percent neutron 


radiation component of the recorded whole body 


dose in the Hanford reactor facilities had, 


well, that the exposure to neutrons would only 


be less than five percent at the reactor 


facilities in all of the (unintelligible) 


dose. 


DR. MAURO: That’s an aggregate parameter. 


In other words in the aggregate when you’re 


looking at all workers and all exposures, the 


contribution to the collective dose --


MR. SCALSKY: Would be less than five 


percent. 


DR. MAURO: Yeah, I always like to caution. 


MR. NELSON: I don’t think he’s saying that 

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it would represent a neutron to photon ratio. 


He’s not saying that. 


DR. BEHLING: We have to be very careful 


here. And I’m going to bring this up when we 


get to the third portion because as I pointed 


out when I read that statement earlier, the 


NTA film was handed out to people separately 


from their film dosimeter. Meaning that if 


the reactor was down, and you knew it was 


going to be down for the next six months, you 


wouldn’t have any NTA film assigned because 


there would be no reason to. 


And so what you have to be very 


careful about is comparing the NTA film error 


where this dosimeter was issued totally 


independently of the film dosimeter that 


measures photons. As you pointed out, when 


the reactor shuts down, you’re going to have 


residual fission products that continue to 


obviously expose people. But my gut feeling 


is, without knowing for sure, that you would 


stop issuing NTA film so that the person would 


have no reason to have a zero under his 


neutron dosimetry because what would be the 


point? 

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Now that changed, and I’ll bring that 


up later when we talk about the post-’72 


timeframe when we have the Hanford 


multipurpose dosimeter. That dosimeter was an 


integrated dosimeter, and it didn’t matter 


whether you were exposed to neutrons or 


photons or both. You were given that 


dosimeter. 


And you have to be very careful 


because I’m going to bring that issue up when 


we talk about the data that involves the two 


and 300 Area. I just want to clarify this. 


So we’re not mixing things up here. For the 


early periods when NTA film was used, NTA was 


only issued when there was reason to issue it 


because they were two independent separate 


dosimeters. 


MR. SCALSKY: And as Chuck said, the dose 


reconstruction process involves several dose 


components, you know, the missed photon and 


neutron doses, and it took into consideration 


frequency of changes when they applied all of 


these. And they used the MDL over two times 


the number of zeros or the less than MDL over 


two. So we do feel that all the evaluations 

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are favorable to the claimants when we take 


all these things into consideration. 


They did make dose rate measurements. 


There was a study by Peterson and Smalley, you 


know, they did make dose rate measurements at 


the elevator of the B-Reactor. And there they 


found 30 millirem per hour neutrons, 25 


millirem per hour gamma. And they used this 


to determine additional shielding that was 


needed. 


But they’ve had an extensive radiation 


protection program, both up on top of the 


reactor, on the front face of the reactor, and 


it was a continuing process along with 


extensive training. So everybody understood 


what was going on, not only the workers, but 


the health instrument people in understanding 


the instruments that they were using, the 


reactors. And they were looking for voids. 


They were looking for ways to constantly 


improve the shielding on it. 


And I think that’s all. Are there any 


other... Chuck, do you --


MR. NELSON: You talked about that Peterson 


and Smalley report. That was in 1960, so they 

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had some dose reads that would support a one-


to-one NP ratio. Of course, that’s what the 


reactor operated. So as Ed mentioned, you 


know, there’s a lot of times when people are 


receiving photon dose and receiving no neutron 


dose. And we’re taking that photon dose and 


applying those NP ratios. So I feel like that 


in effect most of the photon doses were 


relative to when there wasn’t much of any 


neutron dose. So I think that by itself is 


claimant favorable. 


There was the B hole test reactor 


measurement, Whipple, 1949. Do you have any 


notes on that, Ed? But what I have here is 


that there was a test hole they put on the 


reactor, and they said, so we’re talking about 


a hole that was made in the reactor, and 


there’s a beam coming out of the reactor. And 


they said a significant amount of flux was 1.3 


MeV neutrons. 


So if we’re talking about a 


significant degradation of shielding, then you 


should be seeing these higher energy neutrons 


which would have been seen by NTA film. He 


made a general conclusion about that. He said 

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that NP ratios of about one with minimal 


shielding. So there’s a hole, a beam coming 


out of the reactor, and you’re seeing NP 


ratios of about one. 


DR. MAURO: This is concrete shielding? 


MR. NELSON: We’re talking about the B 


Reactor so it’s all the shielding that makes 


up the B Reactor. 


DR. MAURO: I just, I’m thinking in terms of 


as the shielding increases the standard 


depending, of course, on the material, but I 


would assume it’s concrete, you’re going to 


sharply reduce your gamma but not necessarily 


your neutron. So what you just said seemed to 


sound like the opposite. 


DR. ZIEMER: Well, this is a beam though, 


wasn’t it? 


DR. MAURO: Yeah, I mean, help me out so I 


don’t misunderstand you. 


DR. ZIEMER: This is an unshielded beam, 


from the report, it sounds like. 


DR. MAURO: I thought I heard something 


about shielding was increased incremental --


MR. NELSON: No, that was another reactor. 


I didn’t bring that one up. You’re probably 

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thinking of another report that they talk 


about, an ORNL 2195 which was --


DR. MAURO: Yeah, ‘cause I remember reading 


that one. Okay, that threw me a little bit. 


 MR. CLAWSON: Didn’t these reactors have an 


outer skin on the outside of the concrete to 


be able to, I don’t think you could actually 


drill right into the, and get a complete beam. 


You’re going to have some rebounding. You’ve 


got an outer shielding on it. 


MR. NELSON: That’s one of the things that 


in the response was that these reactors 


actually had very significant shielding. And 


there’s a discussion there, and it talks about 


all the shielding that made up the B Reactors. 


I don’t know if we need to cover that or not. 


 MR. CLAWSON: Here’s the question. All this 


different shielding, and they’ve got quite 


complex into it, what pushed them into that 


situation to be able to do, they must have had 


an issue there, and they must have had a 


problem. So they were trying to correct a 


problem by putting more shielding on and so 


forth. 


The degradation, my understanding is, 

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is of the heat of it. They weren’t able to 


cool it the way that they wanted to, and there 


started to become degradation. Also 


understand into it that they also had ports on 


this outer shielding that they could actually 


pull out to be able to get to some of the 


piping and so forth like that to be able to 


work it, which a lot of that was done while it 


was operating and under full power. 


You know, looking at it from a 


worker’s standpoint, and no disrespect to 


anybody, but the thing is, is you’ve got to 


look at this as an individual that has worked 


in this situation. He’s been hands on out 


there. He knows actually what went on. And 


for us to be able to give a limit here and 


take this, it’s very confusing for them to be 


able to say how are you able to do my dose 


like this. So the thing that I always want to 


look at is what put us into these situations 


with the shielding and so forth, and can we 


really accurately do this. 


We’ve got to give the best. And Sam 


brought up a very good point. There’s 


probably only 75 that we’re going to have to 

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do the best estimate and stuff like that. But 


when we walk away from this we want to be able 


to know that we’ve done it the best that we 


can. And there’s a consensus of the problem. 


Both sides we are and we’re not, but we need 


to really look at what we’re putting on for 


them. 


One thing I wanted to ask is this 100 


MR that they would take, and then they’d read 


the film badges and so forth, was that on a 


weekly basis they had to get 100 --


DR. BEHLING: At various times, yes. In 


1950, it was weekly. Thereafter it was 


bimonthly, and after that monthly. So it 


changed, the exchange frequency varied over 


time. 


MR. NELSON: I don’t think that decision was 


made to eliminate those ones at a threshold of 


100 millirem until, it’s in that report when 


they started doing it. So initially they were 


reading all of them. So the report will tell 


you when they decided that, and I don’t 


remember the date offhand. So initially they 


read them all. 


DR. GLOVER: This is Sam Glover again. One 

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thing that doesn’t come out is that they 


actually spoke to people who were monitoring. 


They actually, when they entered these areas, 


they had people with them. And we’re going to 


actually talk, our hope is to talk to [Name 


Redacted], 1947. He’s still around, and also 


to talk to additional folks. 


And so Ed’s going to go out with us 


next week. And I think they’re going to talk 


about some additional interviews. Again, 


these were based on interviews of the actual 


reactor people. They felt that for anybody 


this was a very claimant favorable number. 


And what Chuck and everybody are trying to do 


is, okay, let’s go back and get additional 


numbers, do some additional interviews to 


verify and validate for everybody here that 


that it truly is a claimant favorable number. 


N REACTOR
 

DR. BEHLING: Are we ready to go to the N 


Reactor? 


Okay, the N Reactor, obviously it was 


somewhat different. It was a closed loop. It 


was used not only to produce plutonium but 


also generate electricity for the on site and 

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also tritium production. The N Reactor began 


operation only in December 1963 so it was the 


last one to come online. 


And what NIOSH did was basically say, 


well, there’s enough similarity for the N 


Reactor, and we can compare it to the other 


eight single-pass reactors so why don’t we use 


that as a starting point. So let’s go back 


and say what did we decide for the eight 


single-pass reactors. And we can apply that 


and then modify certain changes because there 


are differences. 


So as a starting point toward the N 


Reactor they went back and said let’s go and 


use the 0.41 neutron/photon ratio as the 


geometric median value for an N-gamma ratio 


for the eight single-pass reactors, and that’s 


our starting point. And they say, well, you 


know, this reactor didn’t come online in 1963 


and post-dates studies done by Peterson and 


Smalley that we already talked briefly about 


in 1960. 


Apparently in 1960 Peterson and 


Smalley studied the other reactors and 


realized that there were problems associated 

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with neutron doses. And if you look on page 


9, Table 3, you will see the neutron/photon 


ratios for the reactors. As you see, and 


already mentioned, I think Chuck just 


mentioned it briefly, that for the B reactor 


the neutron dose rate of 25 millirem per hour 


was matched by photon dose rates of 25. So 


you have as a matter or empirical evidence a 


ratio of one. And I assume these reflect 


instruments rather than NTA film. Is that 


correct? 


MR. NELSON: I believe so. I’m not 100 


percent sure about that. 


DR. BEHLING: I don’t either, but given the 


doubt that these are absolute values, if, in 


fact, these were based on NTA film, then the 


real ratio would obviously be considerably 


higher yet. I would say, give you the benefit 


of the doubt and assume these were instrument 


measured. But you have clearly here evidence 


of a ratio that is not .41 as is the median 


value proposed by NIOSH, but here you have 


values for the B reactor of 1.0. And you go 


for the C reactor; it’s 1.2 and so forth. So 


we do have higher values. Now --

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MR. NELSON: Just for clarity of the range 


of that I believe is it .2 to 1.2 so there was 


a wide range from... 


DR. BEHLING: So it does point out another 


fact that, for instance, among the different 


reactors, you have different values, as we 


mentioned, over time and space. And in 


different facilities a single value may or may 


not be appropriate unless it’s a bounding 


value for all reactors. 


But then what they did, they said, 


okay, we have a problem here so let’s decide 


on how to fix it, and let’s put some shielding 


on there. And it was based on calculational 


methods that you see the right-hand side of 


Table 3 give you neutron to photon ratios that 


are much reduced. And on that basis, and it’s 


strictly based on a theoretical calculation 


because if you read my quotation, no one 


really ever followed up. Some of those 


shielding modifications were never made. 


But based on the fact that these 


calculations were made in 1960 and the N 


Reactor went operational in 1963, ORAU took a 


leap of faith and made an assumption that, 

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well, they would have clearly made those 


modifications in a production reactor that has 


yet to operate. So on that premise, and it’s 


a leap of faith, they decided to reduce the 


0.41 neutron/photon ratio by a factor of seven 


and ended up with the neutron/photon dose rate 


ratio of 0.06. So that is the basic premise 


for assigning a neutron to photon ratio that 


is seven-fold lower than those for the single-


pass other eight reactors. 


MR. ALVAREZ (by Telephone): I think it’s 


important, too, to note that there was no 


additional shielding added to these original 


five reactors. What they did to reduce the 


heat load on the bioshield was to put thorium 


in the fringes so it would absorb more heat to 


reduce the deterioration. 


But, you know, by the late ‘50s there 


was evidence, at least in one report, where 


the bioshield was actually smoldering. So 


they were not, and the K Reactors and N 


Reactor, of course, did not use bioshields 


made of a composite of cast iron and Masonite. 


Masonite was the big problem. They went to 


concrete, and thus, had improved shielding 

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characteristics than the first five reactors. 


DR. BEHLING: Well, anyway, that pretty much 


sums up all of the concerns that were raised 


on behalf of the eight single-pass reactors 


have been passed on the pipeline because that 


became the starting point for the N Reactor 


which was then subsequently modified by way of 


reducing the .41 ratio that NIOSH had arrived 


at by a factor of nearly sevenfold to go from 


.41 to 0.06. And that was strictly based on a 


calculational method that we may not even 


realize ever took place. 


And so that’s my criticism, and those 


are the issues. So I guess I’ll pass the 


baton on to Chuck. 


MR. NELSON: Okay, thanks, Hans. 


DR. ZIEMER: Could I ask for clarity on a 


point? I was trying to correlate what Bob 


Alvarez stated versus the table you were 


citing. 


Bob, this is Ziemer, were you saying 


there was no neutron shielding added on those 


MR. ALVAREZ (by Telephone): No, to the best 


of my knowledge what they were doing to 

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prevent further degradation of the bioshield 


was to add thorium on the fringes of the 


reactor to reduce the heat loads. It was the 


thermal, the thermal heat that was actually 


causing the degradation of the Masonite 


basically. And there was evidence that it was 


combusting. This is how hot they were 


running, you know, and how hard they were 


running these reactors. 


So their sort of work around, if you 


want to call it that, was to put thorium in 


the fringes which would absorb more of the 


heat load coming off the reactor. And to the 


N Reactor, I just scratched my head when you 


are using the shielding values of the N 


Reactor. It just doesn’t make any sense 


because the shielding of these reactors, these 


first five reactors, were totally different 


and had these unique and difficult-to-solve 


problems. 


DR. ZIEMER: But if you look at the table, 


it appears that the photon dose is influenced 


very little. Whereas, the neutron dose drops 


by an order of magnitude that suggests that 


they put low Z material in the beam. Or they 

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thermalized --


DR. BEHLING: Well, I want to caution you. 


These were theoretical calculations --


DR. ZIEMER: These aren’t measured values. 


DR. BEHLING: These are not measured 


empirical values. These were only theoretical 


calculated values by Peterson and Smalley. 


And if you go to the next page, Paul, on --


DR. ZIEMER: But even there, if it was 


thorium that you were using in the 


calculations, I don’t see how you would get 


this kind of a change in, I mean, thorium’s a 


pretty dense material. It’d have very little 


effect on fast neutrons, and it would have a 


lot of effect on photons. So even 


theoretically they’re talking about something 


different than I here Bob talking about. So 


I’m a little confused about how that relates 


here. 


DR. BEHLING: But the thing I want to 


caution you is that those numbers on the 


right-hand side are theoretical. They’re not 


real. And if you go to the next page, I took 


a quote again from the TBD, and I quote: 


Since the report was issued in 1960, and the 

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first of the Hanford reactors were shut down 


starting in ’64 with the last single-pass 


reactor being shut down in ’71 -- and I 


highlighted -- it is possible that the 


additional shielding was only installed in 


some reactors (later running reactors) and not 


installed in others. 


So NIOSH admits that there’s 


uncertainty about whether the recommendations 


by the Peterson Smalley were ever implemented. 


DR. ZIEMER: I got you. 


MR. NELSON: That’s correct. 


What we did is, I agree with a lot of 


what Hans has said there. NTA film is very 


uncertain. There’s issues with it. So what 


we did is we looked at some data that we do 


have. And we went to Nichols, 1972. The 


title of that document is “Hanford 


Multipurpose TLD Field Test and Evaluation”. 


And this was done on Douglas United Nuclear 


Workers. We call them DUN workers. They were 


the operators of the N Reactor. 


And what they did in this test, it was 


in November and December of 1970 and January 


of 1971. And they were testing these TLDs so 

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they assigned them to workers working in the N 


Reactor area. And the results you’ll see on 


page, of the report, the responses, I believe 


it’s on page three. There’s a table there at 


the bottom. It has different badge readings ­

- because I’m using some of my notes here. I 


don’t want to confuse everybody. 


But what you see is if you look at 


each of those individuals, those are the only 


readings that had any recordable neutron dose 


that was a slow neutron dose of three 


millirem. And if you look at, these were 


monthly reads on these individuals. There 


were a total of 38 monthly reads. And out of 


the 38 these are the only ones that showed any 


positive neutron dose. So we agreed, you 


know, it’s not a whole lot of data. It’s 38 


readings and we have little-to-no neutron 


dose. 


So if you do look at the neutron to 


photon ratio from that table, you’ll see 


they’re well below the recommended values 


assigned in the TBD. So we said, well, that’s 


not a whole lot of data. It’s pretty 


uncertain, three millirems, pretty slow, 

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although we know NTA film does like slow 


neutrons. 


So what we did recently over the last 


month or so, contacted DOE, and they provided 


us all the data that they had for the Douglas 


United Nuclear workers. So this data focuses 


from 1972, when TLDs were implemented, until 


1986 towards the end of the operation of the N 


Reactor. And you’ll see that table on page 


four. 


There are a couple typos on this table 


I would like to clarify. Where it says number 


of workers, so the first column where it says 


number of workers, it should say worker 


records. So there wasn’t, if you look at the 


bottom, there wasn’t 30,189 workers. That was 


worker records. So that was the results of 


TLDs, whether they be quarterly or monthly. 


The second column and the third column 


are, let’s make that the third and fourth 


column where it says Deep and Neutrons, that 


is dose. And as Han graciously pointed out, 


that is millirem, millirem. Thank you. 


And the last column would represent 


what the neutron to photon ratio would be. 

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Just grossly looking at this data from all 


these records and say would that be picked as 


a neutron to photon ratio? And if you follow 


that down -– we’re looking at .003. The TBD 


recommends .06 as the geometric mean. So that 


number certainly is quite lower than the TBD. 


So we wanted to look at it further. 


That’s all workers at the N Reactor. So our 


next column, columns depict, let’s look at 


these workers, and let’s establish a criterion 


by which we can determine how much neutron 


dose and determine a ratio from these people 


and let’s set a threshold. So we set the 


threshold at, it’s 50 millirem neutron and 50 


millirem photons. 


And there again -- we found this out 


last week -- when they ran this, they ran this 


two different ways. One of them was 50 


millirem photons and zero millirem neutrons. 


And that’s actually what this table depicts. 


It is this misleading, and I’m going to cover 


when we run it for 50 millirems photon and 50 


millirems neutron what the actual results are. 


So if you look at the results of this 


table, I want to clarify that it is 50 

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millirem photon and zero millirem neutron. If 


they had anything that exceeded those 


thresholds, that’s what this data depicts. 


And if you look at what the geometric mean out 


of 245 workers, then you’ll see that the 


geometric mean was .03, GSD of 4.14 and 95th
 

percentile of .34. All those numbers are less 


than what the TBD recommends. 


So when I’m asking more questions 


about the data, I did find out that the 


preferred analysis was greater than 50 


millirems photon and greater than 50 millirems 


neutron. And you won’t find this on this 


table, but I did want to put out the analysis 


was done and the results are .06 as a 


geometric mean which is exactly the same as 


the TBD. A GSD of 2.88, the TBD recommends 


3.0. And finally, the 95th percentile came out 


at .35 which is very close to the .37 as 


recommended in the TLD, I mean in the TBD. 


So the data that we do have is real 


data. It’s using TLD data, and I think the 


basis by which the TBD assigned or came up 


with the neutron to photon ratio is again like 


the single-pass reactors uncertain. And we 

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think this data would more represent what an 


appropriate neutron to photon ratio would be. 


And that’s using actual data. 


DR. BEHLING: May I ask a question about 


that? As I’d already mentioned earlier when 


we talked about NTA film, it was only, I 


assumed it was only issued when there was a 


justification for considering that there was a 


need for monitoring a person for neutrons. 


Now that we go into the post-’72 era where we 


have the Hanford multipurpose TLD, it’s a 


dosimeter that was assigned to everybody 


whether you have a chance to be exposed to 


neutrons or not. 


So now let’s take a look and assume 


that the Douglas United Nuclear workers were 


assigned to the N Reactor, but as you 


mentioned, the reactor needs to occasionally 


be shut down for maintenance, for refueling, 


for all the things that are required. Now the 


neutrons obviously cease to exist at that 


moment in time. The photons continue. 


Now, and you don’t have the ability to 


separate and say, well, let’s assume a person 


worked there for a period of during a 

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refueling outage or extensive maintenance 


outage. At what point do you segregate the 


neutron from the photon exposure when, in 


fact, there was no chance for a neutron 


exposure? 


In other words I would assume that 


many of these workers were assigned to work 


involving fixing valves and all these other 


things when the reactor was shut down, and you 


have essentially compromised the true neutron 


to photon ratio by introducing into the 


denominator a high photon dose that is not 


associated with any neutron exposure. And to 


what extent do these data reflect that? 


MR. NELSON: I actually don’t have a great 


answer for that one. I do want to clarify 


though. Prior to 1972 that’s when we would 


apply those neutron to photon ratios. After 


1972 we’re going to use the actual neutron 


records. So what you’re questioning then 


would be prior to 1972, just to clarify it. 


DR. BEHLING: Right, and I agree that for 


these workers where you have TLD data you 


wouldn’t go to neutron/photon ratio anyway. 


You’d use the original empirical data. But 

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you’re basically stating that the 0.6 as 


geometric mean is therefore representative of 


a pre-1972 timeframe when NTA film was used; 


and therefore, justifies your assumption of 


0.06 as the best and reasonable assessment for 


neutron/photon ratio. 


And as I said, when I looked at the 


data, and I realized what the differences 


between TLD neutron dosimetry and the NTA is 


the selective assignment of NTA film which is 


lost once you cross over into 1972. 


DR. NETON: Wouldn’t you agree though that 


this represents a collective neutron/photon 


ratio of --


DR. BEHLING: Sure, yes, I agree. I agree. 


DR. NETON: And if you take the 95th
 

percentile, you’re going to be selecting those 


workers who were --


DR. MAURO: Yeah, but how did get that, that 


95th, in other words, let’s say -- let me see 


if I get this right because I always have a 


problem when you use collective dose and 


parameters in retrospect. You merge from 


collective dose and then say, okay, now I’m 


going to use that value and apply it to a real 

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person. Because in other words what you’re 


saying, because whenever you work with a 


collective dose, you’re really having a 


measure of the average, and we’re not 


concerned about the average. We’re concerned 


about the guy who might be at the high end. 


Now to get now the ratio, in other 


words I see, how did you get, for example, the 


1.04, the 95th percentile of ratio of 1.04, did 


you take like individuals, let’s say we have 


like, did you take 246 real people? 


DR. BEHLING: Here these are. There’s this 


20 workers, ten workers and 14 workers, and 


they have dosimetry records that fall into 


these categories and you simply pair them. 


DR. MAURO: Okay, so this isn’t, this 


geometric standard, this 95th percentile 


represents of all of the workers, the hundreds 


of workers that comprise, 95 percent of them 


had a neutron to photon, of those workers, had 


a neutron to photon ratio less than 1.04. Am 


I reading that correctly? Or is this a 


parameter on the collective dose? 


DR. BEHLING: No, it’s the distribution for 


these workers right here. You have in this 

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timeframe, ten, 20 workers, ten workers, 34. 


DR. MAURO: Oh, these are the number of 


records then? Okay, I must have missed that. 


So the first column is records. And then the 


column that’s called number --


DR. BEHLING: Number of workers. 


DR. MAURO: So what I’m seeing --


MR. SCALSKY: Excuse me. It’s really 172 


workers there, and it’s 245 results. There 


are some duplicate, you know, one person from 


one year, and then you’ve got another one the 


next year. 


DR. MAURO: Okay, so over all these years 


you have 245 workers? 


MR. SCALSKY: A hundred and seventy-two. 


DR. MAURO: Okay, 172 workers, then so what 


you’re saying is you’ve got data for these 


workers, real workers. And you’re saying that 


you make a plot, and the upper 95th percentile 


of the -- so therefore, you’ve got 172 


measurements of neutron to photon ratio. 


And you’re saying the upper 95th
 

percentile was .34. Is that a correct way to 


read this? In other words, as close to the 


highest? Because I was afraid I was looking 

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at a parameter that was an expression of the 


uncertainty in the collective neutron to 


photon ratio as opposed to the real individual 


variability between or among workers. 


MR. NELSON: I don’t know if I followed all 


that, but does represent, Jim? 


DR. NETON: (Unintelligible). 


DR. MAURO: What I’m getting at is that if 


you really have -- I’m in complete support of 


what your argument for this data set, in other 


words, if you have 170 workers, and for every 


one of those workers you’ve got a real 


measurement of neutron and photon dose. And 


then you make a plot of the neutron to photon 


ratio for every worker, and you say the upper 


95th percentile, the highest dose or the 


highest value because the 95th percentile would 


be close to the highest value, of the neutron 


to photon ratio for all those workers is .34, 


then I think you’ve got a rock solid argument. 


DR. BEHLING: No, you don’t. You’re missing 


my point again. 


DR. MAURO: Okay, help me out. Help me out. 


DR. BEHLING: You may have a person who 


worked there for three months, and it’s only 

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in the last, the first week or the last week 


that he had reasons to be exposed to neutrons. 


So the balance of time was done when the 


reactor was shut down, and he’s part of that 


aggregate. 


So for a large part of his -- for 


instance, had he been give NTA film they would 


have said, well, the reactor’s shut down. 


We’re not going to incorporate this 


measurement as a time period during which 


neutron exposure could have happened. 


Therefore, in that column neutron exposure is 


blank as opposed to some value or zero if it 


was below detection level. Here, I’m not sure 


you can make that distinction. 


DR. NETON: Don’t you think the upper end of 


that distribution is driven by people who were 


neutron exposed? 


DR. BEHLING: Well, it’s a question of, you 


know, for instance, when you have a power 


reactor, the number of people going to 


containments during the time when the reactor 


is up and running is very few. It’s a handful 


of people. When the reactor shuts down, you 


bring in the contractors by the dozens, and 

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that’s when you get the big gamma exposures 


but no neutron. And I don’t know to what 


extent these numbers here are tainted by an 


exposure that was exclusively, or at least a 


part of it, exclusively photon where there was 


no need for monitoring for neutron because the 


reactor was shut down. And this is the 


difference between NTA data and this data. 


And that’s why --


DR. NETON: The higher end of the 


distribution with a high neutron/photon ratio 


has to be driven by people who were neutron 


exposed. 


DR. BEHLING: But still it could have --


DR. NETON: Let’s assume there, Hans --


DR. BEHLING: Let’s assume we’re talking 


about a quarterly dosimeter. I don’t know, 


maybe monthly. But a large part where 


everybody with data, an exposure that was 


received during the time the reactor was shut 


down which means that you’re tainting the 


whole spectrum for the entire population 


because these DUN workers were there really to 


support an outage or to do maintenance work as 


opposed to going into -- for NTA film you have 

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that. 


You know when there was reason to say, 


oh, for this period, this monitoring period, 


for this week, month or whatever timeframe, 


there is a zero or some positive value. And 


you know very well what that period was. You 


lose that sensitivity when you go to the 


multipurpose dosimeter. And that’s why --


MR. ALVAREZ (by Telephone): May I ask a 


question? Are we talking about default values 


that are going to be applied relative to 


neutron/photon ratios for workers who were 


working at the five original production 


reactors? 


MR. NELSON: We’re talking about the N-


Reactor right now. 


MR. ALVAREZ (by Telephone): Just the N 


Reactor, but these values are not going to be 


applicable for workers who worked at the other 


reactors. Is that correct? 


MR. NELSON: At this point we haven’t tried 


to apply that, no. 


MR. ALVAREZ (by Telephone): You haven’t. 


Okay, thank you. 


DR. MAURO: I wanted to just make sure I 

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understand the dispute that we have on the 


table because I want to make it clear in my 


head. It sounds to me that, Jim, you’re 


saying that okay, we have 170 workers that 


worked on the N Reactor. We have some real 


data for them. In the upper 95th percentile, 


the neutron to photon ratio for those workers 


was .34. Hans is concerned, well, this may 


not be a representative distribution. 


MR. NELSON: One clarification -- I don’t 


want to interrupt you, but the 172 are those 


workers that had recordable neutron dose, 


right, Ed? Remember that you --


MR. SCALSKY: Yeah, there’s a lot more 


workers than that. They’re not included in 


that part of the analysis. 


DR. MAURO: So these are the workers that 


had 50 millirem. So you had 50 millirem is 


your threshold. You get those workers, and 


now I guess the dispute I’m hearing is that 


perhaps these workers were really outage 


workers. 


DR. BEHLING: Well, this is a yearly 


aggregate. You know, you see 1973. If we 


broke it down by wear period where it’s a 

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monthly, then I would potentially say that’s, 


you’re starting to get closer and eliminating 


-- let’s assume for 1973 a worker was 


subjected to photon field during the outage of 


maybe several months. And you discard that 


and say, well, when did he receive his neutron 


dose. 


Well, it may have been only for one 


month out of 12. And that’s the critical 


thing that may be missing here when we 


aggregate data by the year as opposed to by 


work period. And so I don’t have much faith 


in the 0.03 because it is a yearly aggregate. 


MR. SCHOFIELD: I’ve got a question. How, 


on the claimant’s record system, does it 


really break down which reactor they were at 


and how much time like maybe they spent on one 


reactor or maybe one of the other ones? 


MR. NELSON: No, what you’ll see is, 


especially for the early years when the guy 


went into an Area, you’ll see, it’s a log 


book, and you’ll see where he went in with a 


pencil dosimeter and what his recording was in 


and out. And it’ll have a column for each. 


It’ll say K Reactor, keV, you know, depending 

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on what reactor he worked in. So it will 


assign him directly to that particular 


reactor. 


MR. SCHOFIELD: Oh, okay. 


DR. MELIUS: It seems to me that we can get 


this, we have this data, right? So it can be 


looked at and --


MR. NELSON: Yeah, we can --


DR. MELIUS: -- we can get more on the work 


histories and whatever and what these work --


MR. NELSON: I honestly didn’t do a very 


good job in representing that because there is 


an error in there and there’s a few things. 


So we can work that to make it more easily, we 


can analyze it further if necessary. 


DR. ZIEMER: Now on the best estimate people 


you’re still using their actual values for the 


years when we have both? 


DR. BEHLING: No, no, again, Paul, these 


data are here for ’72 on forward because of 


the use of the Hanford multipurpose dosimeter. 


But the intent for us to do here is to look 


for the N Reactor exposures prior to ’72. 


DR. ZIEMER: Well, that’s what I’m getting 


to. 

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DR. BEHLING: And so we’re using this data ­

-


DR. ZIEMER: For the best estimates you’re 


just using the actual values. And the 


question is arising can you use these ratios 


for the other groups at either lower or upper 


estimates. 


DR. BEHLING: Yeah, what this --


MR. ALVAREZ (by Telephone): Well, I mean, I 


would urge caution about that because, for 


example, the original five production reactors 


which, you know, during the 1960s, from let’s 


say from the mid-‘60s on, were primarily 


involved in producing thorium. And a great 


deal of thorium was produced from these 


reactors, which meant that they had to have a 


higher neutron flux, more driver rods, to be 


able to do that in a reactor like that. 


So the neutron activities of these 


reactors need to be matched up with what they 


were making based on their relative neutron 


activities. And I contend that I just don’t 


believe you can extrapolate the neutron to 


photon ratios from the N Reactor with those of 


these original ones because of their, mainly 

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because the shielding is so totally different, 


and you had constantly degraded shielding 


problems going on. 


DR. BEHLING: But, Bob, this is Hans. This 


table here that Chuck had supplied us with has 


a singular purpose, and that’s to apply some 


credibility to the neutron/photon ratio of 


0.06 that was originally derived by the Peter 


Smalley methodology. And this table right 


here provides data post-1972 using the TLD 


data that suggests 0.03, which is a factor of 


get too smaller. And therefore, the attempt 


here is to give credibility to the pre-1972 


neutron/photon ratio for the N Reactor only. 


MR. ALVAREZ (by Telephone): Okay, I’m sorry 


to have wasted your time. 


DR. BEHLING: And I’m raising the question 


that I’m not yet convinced that this value 


has, is a sound technical value that we can 


apply here because of the issue that I just 


mentioned. 


MR. ELLIOTT: Further exploration is 


necessary. 


DR. MELIUS: Yeah, it should be resolvable 


to the extent possible by looking at the data. 

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And I’m sensing we should take a break. Give 


Ray a chance to get caught up with all that 


he’s missed this morning. Why don’t we take a 


ten-minute break which means 15 minutes. 


 DR. WADE: We’re going to break for ten 


minutes. We’ll maintain contact but go on 


mute. 


(Whereupon a break was taken from 11:57 a.m. 


until 12:13 p.m.) 


 DR. WADE: We’re back. 


DR. MELIUS: I’m not sure whether this is a 


plan or a proposal, but I plan to work through 


lunch. I think we can finish up about 1:00 or 


1:30, something like that so I think that’s 


easier than breaking and then coming back so 


unless there’s strong objections. We will 


take a break around, right at one o’clock so 


Ray can run next door and make sure there’s 


somebody covering that meeting, at least the 


beginning of it. 


HANFORD 200 AND 300 AREAS
 

I think we’re on to the third one, 


yeah. 


DR. BEHLING: For those who have my handout, 


I’ll skip to page ten and simply make a few 

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opening statements that starting in 1945 


Hanford began production of plutonium nitrate 


at the Plutonium Finishing Plant, that’s in 


the 200 Area and also lots of work was done in 


the 300 Area that involved potential neutron 


exposures. 


And NIOSH provided us with some 


neutron/photon dose ratios that are defined in 


Figure 1 of my handout which comes directly 


from the TBD. And you will see, in fact, the 


majority of the neutron/photon dose ratios for 


the two and 300 Areas center around the value 


of between zero and one, but you will see 


outliers where neutron/photon ratios were, in 


fact, measured that had a value of five. 


To come up with their neutron/photon 


dose ratios for the two and 300 Areas, again, 


we’re talking about pre-1972. Post-1972 you 


had your TLD, and therefore, empirical data 


will be used to assign neutron doses for those 


workers who were part of the two and 300 


production areas. To do so what NIOSH has 


done is said let’s take a look at the 1972, 


post-1972 data, and determine what 


neutron/photon ratios might come from that 

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dataset and then extrapolate it backwards in 


time and assume that we can apply these 


neutron to photon ratios to all periods all 


the way back to the 1940s. 


And so what they did was to take a 


look at 15 long-term workers -- and I’m on 


page 11 here, and I always like to highlight 


the key words here that define the issues. 


They used 15 long-term workers who were 


monitored by the HMPD post-1972 all the way to 


1991. And they were able to select 186 


matched dosimeter readings where both the 


recorded photon dose and the neutron dose at 


least registered a dose of 20 millirem. 


And on that basis they assessed that 


data and said let’s take a look at that 186 


paired measurements, neutron/photon 


measurements, in behalf of 15 long-term 


workers and then come up with a value. On 


that basis they came up with a neutron to 


photon ratio that you see at the bottom of 


page 11, which I boxed out, and the geometric 


mean for those 186 paired measurements is 0.73 


as the geometric mean, and of course, we have 


your geometric standard deviation of 2.1 and a 

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95th percentile value of 2.47. 


So those are the numbers that they 


propose to use for assigning neutron doses to 


the 200 and 300 Area production workers prior 


to 1972 when NTA film was used. And 


obviously, we have concluded that that’s not a 


functional or viable dosimeter. So the 


question then is this a reasonable approach. 


And I think I described that as probably the 


most credible of the neutron/photon ratios. 


But nevertheless I did find a couple things 


that I found questionable. 


And so finding number one is the data 


selection. And the data selection of using 


period photon/neutron dosimeter readings that 


were at least 20 millirem each has a certain 


level of credibility problems because the MDL 


value for neutron dosimeter is 50. 


So the question is to what extent are 


we biasing the selection of 186 paired neutron 


and photon dosimeter readings by selecting, I 


accept that the TLD very nicely can measure 20 


millirem photon dose. The question is how 


reasonably accurate is the dose as low as 20 


millirem for neutron since we, I think, 

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identified 50 millirem as the MDL value. So 


that’s one of the issues. And I think in 


their response they did look at the revised 


matched dosimeter readings that looks at 50 


millirem neutrons as a revised number. So 


I’ll let them talk about what they found. 


But the more important finding in 


behalf of the two and 300 Area neutron 


exposures are based on the fact that since 


1944, these facilities have been in operation, 


and of course, I would concur with their 


assessment under one condition, and one 


condition only, that the facilities as they 


exist post-1972 were, in fact, identical for 


all previous timeframes which we know they 


were not. 


And in my write up I provided a number 


of statements that come directly out of the 


TBD that talked about the revisions to these 


facilities. Many of these things early on, 


especially in the early ‘40s and ‘50s were 


very, very manually driven processes including 


the area where we had a lot of these -- what 


is it called? The 500 foot line involving 


glove boxes where people were basically 

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standing there and pushing this material from 


one glove box to the next and in essence there 


was very little mechanization or remote 


methods by which these processes were 


performed. 


And when I looked at the number of 


changes, it struck me that the post-1972 


neutron/photon dose rate ratios may not 


necessarily apply depending on what changes 


had occurred from a very manually driven 


operation to a remote controlled operation. 


That also obviously had to include significant 


changes to things such as shielding, 


engineering controls and other things that 


would have potentially mitigated perhaps both 


neutrons and photons. And the question is to 


what extent can we rely on the post-1972 data 


and apply it to the very early years, 


especially the 1940s and early ‘50s. 


And quite honestly when I look at some 


of the data including that which was provided 


by Corley in 1972, and I included his 


assessment. If you look at his tables which 


are included as, I believe, on the last page, 


17, you end up with neutron/photon ratios that 

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were in most instances significantly above 


one. 


So even though for the proposed 


neutron/photon ratio that NIOSH has derived of 


0.73, I believe perhaps a more central value 


would be a value greater than unity based on 


Corley data. And of course, that may or may 


not even include some of the earlier ratios 


that might have been defined for which we have 


no data that go back into the ‘40s and ‘50s 


based on the fact that so many changes had 


been made to these facilities that would have 


affected both neutrons and photons. 


And so I will turn this over and allow 


you to provide us with some insight as to how 


you think these changes might have modified 


the neutron to photon ratio. 


MR. NELSON: Greg Macievic of NIOSH is going 


to actually respond to this particular 


concern. 


MR. MACIEVIC: We looked, the 186 paired 


dosimeter readings that the numbers were 


based, obviously based on genuine numbers. 


There was another that came up with the 


original ratio of the .73. We also looked at 

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later, in 2000, at a little larger group of 


247 paired readings and came up with a 


standard deviation, a geometric mean, .7, and 


a 95th percentile of 2.1, which is very close 


to what’s the numbers that we came up with. 


But the key that what we did that I 


feel, we feel, that is a claimant favorable 


number is that if you look, we took the 


geometric mean and the 95th percentile and 


applied it to claimant values that where the 


numbers were, compared the measured dose with 


the dose that was based on what you come up 


with if you apply these statistical 


parameters. 


And what you get is on all the, at the 


95th percentile, all of the neutron calculated 


neutron doses are higher than the measured 


field measurements. So they’re all higher. 


And there’s only two claimants where, if you 


use the geometric mean, where the measured 


neutron dose is greater than the calculated 


neutron dose. 


DR. BEHLING: Can you explain, these 


measurements, were they pre-’72 measurements 


where we talked about --

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MR. MACIEVIC: These are going back on the, 


to show on the 186 paired readings to go back 


and say, okay, now that we’ve come up with 


this ratio, let’s go and use the actual values 


and apply these numbers to them. And you see 


that in all cases for the 95th percentile, the 


neutron dose is bigger than the dose that was 


actually measured. And in several cases 


you’ve got, we could get up to a factor of two 


on some. 


DR. MAURO: That’s post-1972? 


MR. MACIEVIC: Right, post-1972. 


Now in going to pre-, when the U.S. 


Atomic Energy Commission did their study and 


looked at ARCO doing their study, when they 


determined that they had a problem with the 


neutron doses in several of the Areas in 


there, they had a potential problem, they went 


back and did an analysis for several time 


periods and looked also at the neutron/gamma 


ratio that was involved in these during these 


periods with the variation of shielding and 


come up with a maximum neutron to gamma ratio 


of 2.3. 


So ours, the study they did was a 

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bounding value study. They knew the fact that 


they didn’t know the actual workers’ location 


all the time. They didn’t know all the 


shielding modifications and all the other 


things that we discussed were a problem with 


using NP ratio, they said, okay, let’s do a 


study and do a bounding value on this. And 


they came up with, from ’48 to ’56, an NP 


ratio of 1.4; ’56 to ’60, 1.56; and 1960 to 


the present, 2.3. And we have that number 


higher than the value that’s already there. 


DR. BEHLING: How were those values 


determined? 


MR. MACIEVIC: From the study there is a 


report --


DR. BEHLING: Especially in the ‘40s and 


‘50s that you just cited. 


MR. MACIEVIC: Yeah, the report is U.S. 


Atomic Energy Commission. It’s a letter, 


Attention: Mr. O.J. Elgert, October 20th , 


1972, and it is a discussion of what they did. 


And this one doesn’t, unfortunately, have a 


title to it. But what they used in the study 


was the neutron doses were looked at for 26 


long-time plutonium workers were reviewed and 

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the methodology that they used to determine 


what the neutron dose was during that period, 


so --


DR. BEHLING: You don’t know whether it was 


NTA film, instruments --


MR. MACIEVIC: They did look, no, 


unfortunately, it does not say that. They 


were looking to see whether or not under the 


conditions they had that, whether or not they 


would have exceeded their three Roentgen per 


year administrative level from, if these 


conditions by doing the variations for these 


conditions then those NP ratios that they 


would violate this. And they found that they 


didn’t in those cases. And I can get you the 


exact --


DR. BEHLING: But it would be most important 


to determine how those numbers were derived 


because that’s really the crux of the problem 


is that you don’t have much faith in the 


earlier measurements. 


MR. NELSON: What years? 


MR. MACIEVIC: This is 1972. 


DR. MAURO: That’s the date of the report. 


MR. MACIEVIC: The date of the report for, 

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what the report summarizes is that for the 


previous years they felt like --


DR. ZIEMER: Wouldn’t that have been a three 


Roentgens per quarter maybe. 


MR. MACIEVIC: I’m sorry? 


DR. ZIEMER: Were they even using Roentgens 


in ’72? 


MR. MACIEVIC: No, that was the value that 


they were using in the early years to, knowing 


that they didn’t have the NP ratio down, that 


they limited the Areas to three Roentgens to 


make sure that they weren’t exceeding any 


neutron dose for the photon by using that as 


the photon limit. And they did a study in ’72 


to make sure that that actually was the case, 


that nobody from those previous years went 


over that value based on the study they did, 


and I will get you the report. 


MR. NELSON: Basically what they did is they 


looked back, and they said based on the type 


of shielding that was used and the type of 


activities that were performed in the earlier 


years, they actually applied different 


reduction factors. And let me read what they 


are. It says, from 1960, approximately one­
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third reduction in the neutron to photon ratio 


is assumed for the period of ’50 to ’60 when 


only lighter shielding was used. Lighter 


shielding did not attenuate x-ray radiation, 


in particular, or gamma radiation as compared 


to the shielding in place after 1960. 


Then they assumed another ten percent 


reduction in the neutron to photon ratio from 


1948 through 1955 when there was essentially 


no other shielding like Hans mentioned in 


those glove boxes when they were passing 


material through when there was only plastic 


windows, for instance. So the results of the 


1972 study said these numbers are bounding, 


and they provided, as Greg mentioned, some 


upper boundary values of NP ratios based on 


those reductions based on information they had 


in that study. And all the numbers that they 


use are actually lower than the ratios that we 


present in the TBD. 


DR. BEHLING: Let me ask you a question 


regarding the issue of shielding. Obviously, 


I would assume that the dominant gamma 


component would be the 60 keV americium-241 


component. Is that correct? Which is not a 

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very penetrating photon either. So I would 


have to look at, for instance, the material in 


question and see what the impact is for 


reducing the neutron component but which 


significantly also impacts the 60 keV photon 


because that has a very, very limited 


penetrating power, too. 


DR. NETON: I think that some significant 


shielding though at 60 keV is not the dominant 


emission at that point. Some of the lesser 


plutonium energies come through. You know, 


plutonium does have higher energy than photons 


DR. BEHLING: They’re very, very small. 


DR. NETON: -- even though they’re small 


fractions, but if you look at the ratio of 


attenuation of the 60 versus the higher energy 


ones, they become the dominant ones. 


DR. ZIEMER: They may be the only ones 


getting through even though they’re a small 


percentage. 


DR. NETON: I know that for a fact with 


whole body counting, for example, you could 


start to see the plutonium photons while over 


the --

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DR. BEHLING: But the yields, I looked at 


the yields for some of the higher energy 


photons. They’re so, so small. 


DR. NETON: I know, but then you look at the 


differential ratio absorption between 60 keV 


and, say, 200, three, 400 keV. 


 MR. CLAWSON: The records that you were 


using, what was that, what were they designed 


for? Why did they, what did they bring this 


up for? Was this just to check what they’d 


already done? 


MR. MACIEVIC: Well, they had determined 


that there was a higher neutron exposure than 


anticipated, and they were going back to find 


out whether or not they needed to modify the 


previous doses that they had based on their 


current finding. And this was what triggered 


this study to be done, and it was 1972. 


DR. BEHLING: Is it reasonable to assume 


that that study prompted more neutron 


shielding which means that post-1972 data 


would actually then suppress the neutron 


component? I mean, to me it would make sense 


that the 1972 AC or DOE study was prompted by 


the need to look at the neutron component. 

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And, of course, if that was truly the 


motivation, you would then introduce more 


neutron shielding which means that post-1972 


you’ve suppressed the neutron component 


meaning that your neutron/photon ratio is 


probably lower than in all previous times 


prior to this study and its recommendations. 


Is that a reasonable conclusion? 


MR. MACIEVIC: Well, there had to be, if 


here in the conclusion that the study was 


deliberately designed to maximize dose 


estimates. In general, the study provides 


reasonable assurance that the Hanford 


administrative practice of controlling gamma 


exposures to three Roentgen per year was 


indeed effective in preventing personnel from 


receiving exposure in excess of established 


limits. The total penetrating dose as 


maximized by the study appears to be less than 


twice the penetrating dose as measured using 


the best available state-of-the-art 


procedures. 


So they did this and their conclusion 


is that they weren’t, they did not modify 


their conclusions and the report was not to 

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modify any of the years for the exposure, on 


the exposure record. And in 1972 only to 


modify those where they had the specific 


information about the jobs that would require 


them to change any doses. So, and that’s all 


in several of these, I’d have to give you the 


official title of the report, but it’s Atomic 


Energy Commission report that was issued, I’ll 


have to find that. 


DR. BEHLING: I would very much like to look 


at that because like I said, even in the early 


times when they were relying heavily on film 


dosimeters, their ability to assess exposures 


to photons was at least reasonable and 


respectable, but what they didn’t know was 


what was the neutron components. 


And so any kind of modification early 


on whether it’s in ’56 or in the ‘60s would 


have probably been geared towards the 


reduction of the neutron component. Meaning 


that the post-’72 data has been tainted by 


attempts to mitigate neutron exposures. 


MR. NELSON: The results of the AEC studies 


suggest, it actually applies neutron to photon 


ratios as looking back at them, and the 

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numbers actually, the neutron to photon ratios 


are lower in those earlier years based on the 


type of shielding. So they actually looked at 


the type of shielding and the controls in 


place and the type of work that was being 


done. 


And they came up with the conclusion, 


using NP ratios, and they were indeed less for 


each of those years, one-third reduction from 


’56 to ’60 and a ten percent reduction from 


’48 to ’55 based on the type of shielding that 


was in place at those facilities. 


DR. BEHLING: Were these theoretical 


calculations or empirically derived? 


MR. NELSON: Those are just, I’m just giving 


you the results of the study, and I’m not sure 


of that. 


DR. MAURO: What were the ratios? 


MR. NELSON: Greg had their letter. These 


are, the one in our response is a little bit 


outside of those, but they’re fairly close. 


MR. MACIEVIC: They’re fairly close. 


MR. NELSON: He’s reading that straight from 

the report. 

DR. ZIEMER: Are these going to be made 
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available to everybody? 


MR. ELLIOTT: That’s what I was just going 


to raise a comment here. 


DR. ZIEMER: Does SC&A have any of this? 


MR. ELLIOTT: There’s been a lot, Chuck, 


your team has introduced a lot of 


documentation here in this discussion, and I 


don’t know if we’re starting to create a 


folder or already have a folder on the O drive 


for Hanford. If you will, point out for the 


working group members where these things are 


on that O drive. We can send an e-mail around 


later, and everyone’s attention to those 


particular documents that have been introduced 


today. 


MR. NELSON: We haven’t compiled them on the 


O drive, but we will. 


 DR. WADE: And I’d point out to all that 


sometimes documents are shared within the 


working group, Board members, SC&A. We need 


to always be cautious of Privacy Act material 


in those documents. The documents should be 


clearly identified as to whether or not they 


could contain such material, but I caution 


everyone just be careful, particularly when 

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we’re working very quickly in real time, 


mistakes can be made. 


DR. ZIEMER: These are DOE or AEC? 


MR. MACIEVIC: AEC. The one I have right 


here that has the --


DR. ZIEMER: I assume none of this is 


classified. 


MR. ELLIOTT: Let me just add a caution to 


what Lew’s valid comment was a moment ago. 


Anything that’s in the Hanford folders on the 


O drive should be considered as being Privacy 


Act protected. If you pull anything out of 


that, whether it’s my folks, ORAU’s folks that 


are going to submit in front of the working 


group, we need to have it reviewed for Privacy 


Act. If it’s SC&A pulling out of that O 


drive, they need to work it through their 


channels. 


But everything in the O drive should 


be considered to be part of the system of 


records that has, may have Privacy Act 


information in it. And we’re not redacting 


any of that. We’re holding that in that O 


drive so that everybody can see it. So if you 


pull out of that well, you need to make sure 

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your Privacy Act controls have been applied. 


MR. NELSON: I think one of the things that 


Greg talked about that may have not been, I 


don’t know how well it was received, but what 


was done is that they looked at several other 


cases, and they said, okay, using the neutron 


to photon ratios that we have, we took those 


and applied them directly to the photon 


readings starting in 1972 on. Then we compare 


them -- so we’re taking that ratio. 


We don’t do that in dose 


reconstruction. If it’s post-1972, we look at 


the neutron results, and we look at the photon 


results, and we use those actual numbers. If 


we took those photon results that we do have, 


and we apply the geometric mean to the cases 


that we have, you know, actual data, we’re 


seeing that the results of the neutron that we 


would apply at a minimum, a factor of two with 


the exception of two cases. 


They’re very close to a factor of two. 


They’re well higher than a factor of two, 


higher than the geometric mean. So it’s 


showing that if we use that data right there, 


it’s an overestimate for those. If we were to 

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take that same data and apply it and try to 


determine what neutrons were, using that post­

’72 data with the old ratio we’re using, it’s 


way high. Does that make sense? 


DR. MELIUS: Yeah, I think it makes sense. 


I think it’s still begs the question of what 


was going on pre-’72 which is really the time 


era we’re interested in. I mean, I think it’s 


helpful information. 


DR. MAURO: What was interesting is that 


that distribution which was created from the 


data post-1972, and then when used to test or 


validate against real numbers, you’re finding 


that this distribution itself is very 


conservative. So imbedded in the process they 


used to pick those numbers obviously while it 


was hot, otherwise you would have gotten a 50 


percent split. 


MR. MACIEVIC: And, yes, their intention was 


is to put an upper bounding number on the 


ratios they used. 


DR. MAURO: So this would make for a, I 


guess just to sort of speculate, a pretty good 


coworker model for post-1972. That’s what I’m 


hearing, but not necessarily for pre-’72 until 

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we take a look at these other records to see 


how well it also bounds pre-’72. 


MR. NELSON: The one conclusion that the 


report makes though is that there was a 


reduction in the neutron to photon ratio, and 


they understood all the shielding that was in 


place and the controls that were in place for 


the years prior to ’72. It’s in that report, 


the 1972 AEC report. 


DR. ZIEMER: Well, I think we need to have 


that reviewed. 


DR. BEHLING: Did you look at the correlated 


letter and the associated data that, I think, 


on page 23? Because if you look at those, and 


again, it’s a question because I don’t really 


know when they talk about column number three 


that’s identified as Calculated Maximum 


Hanford Dose and has the footnote b associated 


with it, how that was done. 


But if you look, go through those 


numbers, you find for that dataset of 20 


employees -- in fact, it’s not quite 20 


because they’re skipping numbers there, number 


two through 20 and so there’s 17 of them --


but if you look at those, you’ll find 

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consistent neutron/photon ratios in excess of 


one. Again, the letter is incomplete because 


it doesn’t really give you a full 


understanding of how these numbers came to be 


and what was the technical basis. But 


clearly, there are numbers here that would 


suggest a neutron/photon ratio in excess of 


one for a good number of the people. 


MR. MACIEVIC: I don’t have that letter 


available right now. 


DR. BEHLING: In other words for those of 


you who have it, if you look at employee 


number two, if you subtract column two from 


column three, so you subtract 110 minus 51 and 


then the balance of that, which would be 59 


over 51, you end up with a ratio that’s 


greater than unity. That’s what I’m getting 


at. 


DR. ZIEMER: I was trying to understand. It 


looks like they’re saying that he got 


something like 58 --


DR. BEHLING: Neutrons. 


DR. ZIEMER: -- millirem of neutron, 51 --


DR. BEHLING: Fifty-one of gamma. 


DR. ZIEMER: -- of gamma. Isn’t that what 

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they’re saying? 


DR. BEHLING: Yes, I interpret that table to 


mean --


DR. ZIEMER: The footnotes are a little bit 


unclear as to what they --


DR. BEHLING: As I say, I want to caution 


everyone because I don’t know how these 


numbers came to be. But at least if you take 


them at face value, the neutron/photon ratio 


would be greater than unity for these 17 


people for many, for most of them. 


DR. MAURO: So we have to reconcile, I 


guess, this information with your information. 


MR. NELSON: Right. 


DR. BEHLING: I guess I have nothing more to 


say. If we want to squeeze in Bob Alvarez’s 


portion at this point, and –-


SODIUM 24
 

DR. MELIUS: Yeah, I think that would be 


appropriate. 


Bob, are you still on the line? 


MR. ALVAREZ (by Telephone): I am. 


DR. MELIUS: If you want to sort of just 


briefly summarize the concern that you raised, 


and then we’ll certainly --

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MR. ALVAREZ (by Telephone): As I mentioned 


previously, there was I guess information on 


the public record regarding the potential 


exposures to neutrons to reactor workers, 


particularly for the first five production 


reactors. And as I mentioned, these reactors 


underwent problems particularly of 


deterioration of their bioshields and 


structural stress on reflectors, graphite 


distortion, et cetera, because of the wear and 


tear and increased thermal output of these 


reactors that caused a series of, I guess, 


engineering evaluations to be done about the 


bioshield indicating that the leakage rates 


were going up, and they were taking various 


steps to mitigate this. 


And I suggested, based on some 


preliminary information relative to the first 


whole body counts that the Sodium-24 levels 


that were being measured there, at least as I 


understood the reports, suggested that these 


Sodium-24 levels may not have come from the 


ingestion of reactor water but may have been 


due to thermal neutrons. So that’s in summary 


what I, the issue I raised. 

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MR. NELSON: Yeah, when we read the reports, 


our take on the reports are that the Hanford 


technical staff did associate it with drinking 


water giving, for instance -- if I can read 


directly from the report, but let me go ahead 


and do that. It said, “Sodium-24 has been 


observed only in reactor employees during the 


last quarter of 1960. Fifty-nine Area workers 


were examined. Sodium-24 was detected in 18 


of these employees.” That’s 31 percent. 


“Fourteen of the 59 were assigned to 


the reactor areas furthest upstream. We take 


this to mean the B Reactor. Therefore, were 


not regularly exposed to drink the water 


supplies which have been used as reactor 


coolant.” The next sentence says, “excluding 


these subjects.” In other words they excluded 


them from the study, and our understanding is 


why they excluded them from the study is 


because they weren’t exposed to the drinking 


water. 


And it says Sodium-24 instances then 


jumped from 31 to 40 percent when you excluded 


those individuals from the study. We actually 


talked to some of the people that were 

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involved who were the authors of this 


document, and he said that the understanding 


was always that it was from the reactor water, 


and so that was our take on the report. We 


didn’t get the same thoughts when we read that 


document that you did. 


MR. ALVAREZ (by Telephone): Well, I guess 


the issue in my view still hinges on the 


availability of data relative to neutrons and 


neutron flux and exposure data that were 


occurring. And while it may be correct that 


the whole body data may not be indicative of 


exposures to neutrons, I don’t think that that 


necessarily rules out the possibility that 


neutron exposures were occurring and might 


have been significant. 


And what I noticed in the response, 


which I’m glad to see is that there’s further 


work being done to look at this issue, am I 


correct? I mean, are you still assuming that 


neutron exposures to reactor workers during 


the first, at the first five production 


reactors were not significant? Or not 


significant as measured? Or --


MR. NELSON: Well, I think you’re going back 

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to the previous issue where we looked at 


single-pass reactors. And to try to add more 


credibility to the neutron to photon ratios, 


we are digging into some of the historical 


documents such as radiation surveys and all 


that. This particular paper didn’t drive that 


to happen though. 


MR. ALVAREZ (by Telephone): I see. So are 


you doing anything to look into the problem of 


the deteriorated shielding of these reactors 


to ascertain whether or not workers might have 


been receiving more neutrons than supposed or 


expected? 


MR. NELSON: Like I said we are looking at 


other documents, and the deterioration of the 


shielding is also going to lead to more of a 


photon component as well. 


MR. ALVAREZ (by Telephone): I’m sorry. I 


didn’t hear what you said. 


MR. NELSON: The deterioration of the basic, 


of some of the shielding, is also going to 


lead to an increase in the photon component as 


well. 


MR. ALVAREZ (by Telephone): That’s true. 


MR. NELSON: So we are looking over all that 

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different chaining. We’re going to look 


further and, as cautioned earlier, there’s a, 


we didn’t throw the number out but --


Sam, how many documents are there? 


Records are there for Hanford that we can get 


our hands on? Was it 3.5 million documents? 

DR. GLOVER: Just over 35 million documents. 

MR. NELSON: Thirty-five million documents. 

So the effort’s going to be quite involved, 


and --


 MR. CLAWSON: So you’ll have that out by 


next week? 


DR. GLOVER: We have actually some very good 


assistance at looking at the technical 


documents. 


DR. NETON: I think the bottom line with 


this issue, Bob, is that we don’t see any 


credible evidence that Sodium-24 in reactor 


operators could be used to reconstruct neutron 


doses at Hanford right now. But we certainly 


are aware of the significant neutron exposures 


that may have occurred, and we’re looking into 


them. But the mechanism using activated 


Sodium-24 to reconstruct those doses is 


probably not a reasonable approach that we 

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would use. 


MR. ALVAREZ (by Telephone): That’s fine. 


My concern has more to do with the initial TBD 


which seems to dismiss the potential risks 


from neutrons out of hand for these reactor 


workers. And that you’re sort of looking at 


this is fine with me, satisfactory to me. 


DR. GLOVER: One other is that they do 


assign -- Sodium-24 activates very well. 


Anybody who’s done neutron activation analysis 


stuff, it’s always a problem. And for the 


people who didn’t, they were from above and 


beyond the levels, and they were assigning 


those as inhalation doses. So there are 


obviously, Sodium-24 can be derived from other 


occupational exposures so that assigning 


internal dose from Sodium-24 inhalations. And 


that’s discussed in the TBD. 


MR. ALVAREZ (by Telephone): As I asked 


before in the previous conference call, the 


dose reconstructions that were being done for 


claimants were based on the assumption of 


inhalation and ingestion. And the question I 


posed is what was the data that you had to 


support that assumption. And are you saying 

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now you have data? Because at the time I 


could not get an answer about what data did 


exist. And are you saying now you actually 


have data that positively affirms that Sodium24 levels, especially in let’s say upstream 


workers, B Reactor, whatever, were due to 


ingestion of river water? 


MR. NELSON: What you just said is that 


ingestion of water for upstream reactors was 


due to river water? 


MR. ALVAREZ (by Telephone): Well, I mean, 


they might have been drinking at home. You 


know, there were all these studies done that 


looked at both workers at the site and workers 


at home. So what I’m trying to find out is 


what data are you relying on to provide some 


affirmation that these mixed Sodium-24 levels 


were from drinking contaminated water. 


DR. NETON: I think, Bob, that’s the basis 


of this study. I mean, they looked at people 


upstream and downstream, and there was a 


direct correlation between Sodium-24 levels 


and their relationship along the river to the 


reactors. 


MR. NELSON: There was also a statement made 

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that the B Reactors --


MR. ALVAREZ (by Telephone): I guess what 


I’m trying to ask, and maybe I’m not being 


very clear, is were there any studies done 


about ingestion of potable water onsite would 


contain the activation products? I’m aware of 


the environmental studies that were done. In 


general terms, I’m --


DR. NETON: I think there was --


MR. ALVAREZ (by Telephone): What I’m trying 


to find out is were there studies onsite 


ascertaining exposures from drinking potable 


water onsite? 


DR. NETON: I don’t think it’s in this 


study, Bob, but I think they refer to it in 


here. That it was fairly well understood that 


there was Sodium-24 in the potable water, 


drinking water, at the reactor sites. 


MR. NELSON: And there was specific 


discussion that the levels at the B Reactor, 


which is upstream of the reactors, was the 


same as background levels. 


DR. NETON: They did measure the water, and 


there was definitely Sodium-24 in the drinking 


water at those reactor facilities. 

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MR. ALVAREZ (by Telephone): All right, 


well, I mean, I don’t have much more to say 


about this other than I’m generally gratified 


that you are looking more seriously into this. 


WRAP-UP
 

DR. MELIUS: Are there any other technical 


issues or updates that we have? 


MR. NELSON: When you’re asking for updates, 


relative to the other issues? 


DR. MELIUS: Yeah, the other issues. 


MR. NELSON: I think I can give you some 


update on that. I know that we, what we’re 


waiting on as far as SC&A analyzing for the 


internal comments. We’re waiting on the 


procedures to be completed. And this has 


taken some time. And we’re making headway, 


and the procedures have been updated. They’ve 


been back and forth between OCAS and ORAU to 


make those changes as represented in the 


responses. And the hold up at this point is 


providing annotations to all these documents 


as requested by the Board. So there is 


progress being made. We’ve gone back and 


forth, but the latest hold up in getting those 


procedures signed by OCAS is having those 

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annotations made. So they’re held up in ORAU 


at that point. 


DR. MELIUS: And there’s also as I recall, I 


don’t remember the specifics, there’s 


something about the environmental dose, too? 


Is that? 


MR. NELSON: I don’t have a specific update 


for that to be honest with you. I guess OCAS 


is overwhelmed actually with all the neutron 


to photon issues, and I’m not prepared for 


that. 


DR. MELIUS: One other thing I would ask 


sort of post-meeting if, Hans, if you have 


time and Chuck and everybody could sort of get 


together and at least let’s share what 


documents are sort of critical that have been 


identified here. So we make sure they get up 


on the O drive, and we can move forward from 


there. And then we’ll keep in touch in terms 


of timing issues and so forth in terms of 


another meeting. 


MR. ALVAREZ (by Telephone): May I suggest 


relative to the environmental dose issue is 


that the times that I’ve been involved in the 


discussions about that, the persons who were 

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knowledgeable about that weren’t present, and 


I feel like we’ve deferred discussion on the 


environmental dose issue. So I’d like to see 


if we can also spend some time to discuss that 


at some future date. 


DR. MELIUS: As I recall it was a 


combination of the person wasn’t available, 


but there’s also something going on in terms 


of an activity, an updating of a report or 


something, that we were waiting on also. But 


that’s one reason I wanted to identify some of 


these updates and figure out where we were so 


we get the right people at the next meeting. 


MR. NELSON: Also, I’d like to propose that 


we’re actually going to do an update to the 


issues and responses, and we’re going to go to 


each subject matter expert and try to give you 


any updates if they exist and give you a 


better --


DR. MELIUS: Okay, if you could circulate 


that, that, too. But if we could just get 


together on how many documents. Once we leave 


and all go our separate ways, not that you 


don’t stay in touch, but it comes up. 


Okay, any other comments, questions? 

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 (no response) 


DR. MELIUS: I’d like to thank everybody --


DR. ZIEMER: Do we know, you’re going to 


wait until you get the documents before you 


set another meeting time and --


DR. MELIUS: We’re going to see what the 


timing of the documents and so forth. 


DR. ZIEMER: -- okay. 


DR. MELIUS: So we’ll give an update at our, 


I’ll check in with Chuck and Hans and Arjun 


and everyone before the, our next conference 


call which I can’t remember the date on that. 


 DR. WADE: April 5th . 


DR. MELIUS: April 5th . 


DR. ZIEMER: Well, that’s coming up pretty 


soon, but I’m thinking about prior to our 


face-to-face in Denver --


DR. MELIUS: I suspect we’re not going to 


have another meeting before the Denver meeting 


of this work group. I think just given the 


timing and so forth on that. 


 DR. WADE: I’m also thinking, I’m thinking 


of the meeting after the May meeting, possibly 


July maybe to go to Hanford to talk about that 


as a Board. 

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MR. ELLIOTT: The SEC evaluation report 


should appear and be distributed sometime mid 


to late May? 


 DR. WADE: Well, we can end this call. 


Thank you very much. We’re going to break the 


contact now. 


(Whereupon, the working group meeting 


concluded at 1:00 p.m.) 

______________________________ 

144 

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 March 26, 


2007; 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 


1st day of July, 2007. 


STEVEN RAY GREEN, CCR 


CERTIFIED MERIT COURT REPORTER 


CERTIFICATE NUMBER: A-2102