Several hundred cases of scrap-metal contamination have occurred in New York, California, Alabama, Indiana, Louisiana, Pennsylvania, Utah, Kentucky, Texas, Illinois, and Tennessee. But undocumented cases could number in the thousands. In hundreds of cases, steel mills have received unmarked, radioactive scrap that wasn't identified in time to prevent multimillion-dollar cleanups.
Radioactivity can contaminate bag-house dust generated during steelmaking.
Workers in the steel industry are at risk because they can inhale radioactive particles if the contaminated source is vaporized during processing. The steel unions consider potential radioactive contamination a major health priority. Steelmakers in both the U.S. and Japan recognize the problem of radioactive contamination. There are no federal environmental regulations that require steel mills to install radiation-detection equipment, but many firms already have done so. This is an excellent example of innovative and voluntary compliance.