Code of Massachusetts Regulations › 310 CMR - DEPARTMENT OF ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION › Title 310 CMR 43.00 - Site Selection Criteria For Low-level Radioactive Waste Management Facilities › Section 43.02 - Definitions

Current through Register 1525, July 5, 2024
The following words and phrases when used herein shall have the
				following meaning:
Adverse Effect
means an injurious
				impact which is reasonably significant in relation to the public health,
				safety, or environmental interest being protected.
Aquifer
means a geologic formation,
				group of formations, or part of a formation that is capable of yielding
				significant quantities of ground water to wells or springs.
Board
means the Low-Level Radioactive
				Waste Management Board established in M.G.L. c. 111H,§ 2.
Buffer Zone
means a parcel of land
				which is an integral part of a facility that is controlled by the facility
				licensee and acts as a surrounding boundary to the facility.
C hie f Municipal Official
means the
				city manager in any city having a city manager , the may or in any other city,
				the town manager in any town having a town manager or the chairperson of the
				Board of Selectmen in any other town.
Coastal High Hazard Zone
means coastal
				zones identified by the Office of Coastal Zone Management which are subject to
				any inundation caused by coastal storms up to and including that caused by the
				100 year storm, surge of record or storm of record which ever is greater
				including coastal beaches, coastal dunes, barrier beaches, coastal banks and
				rocky intertidal shores as those terms are defined in
				310 CMR 10.27
				through
				10.31.
Community
means a city or town of the
				Commonwealth.
Community Water System
means a public
				water system which serves at least 15 service connections used by year round
				residents or regularly serves at least 25 year round residents.
Department
means the Department of
				Environmental Protection.
Detailed Site Characterization
means
				the on-site investigatory and analytical step of site selection established in
				M.G.L. c. 111H,§ 23 and conducted prior to the selection of any superior
				site.
DPH Performance Objectives
means the
				performance objectives contained in regulations promulgated by the Department
				of Public Health at
				105
				CMR 120.811 through
				120.814.
Dissolution
means a space or cavity in
				or between rocks, formed by the solution of part of the rock material.
Disposal
means the isolation of
				low-level radioactive waste from the biosphere inhabited by human beings and
				their food chain.
Downgradient
means in a direction
				exactly opposite to upgradient (q.v.).
DPH
means the Department of Public
				Health.
Economically Recoverable Resources
means oil, gas, fossil fuels, sulphur, metals, ores, minerals, rock, soil, sand
				and gravel which because of their high quality, economic superiority or
				quantity are being exploited or are likely to be exploited in the reasonably
				foreseeable future.
Engineered Barrier
means a man-made
				structure or device that is intended to improve a facility's ability to meet
				DPH performance objectives.
Environmental Monitoring Program
means
				a monitoring programe stablished by DPH, after consultation with the Department
				and the board of health of each site community, pursuant to M.G.L. c.
				111H,§ 36 for the purpose of collecting and analyzing environmental data
				prior to construction and throughout the construction, operation, closure,
				post-closure observation and maintenance and institutional control o f a
				facility.
Facility
means a parcel of land,
				together with the structures, equipment and improvements thereon or appurtenant
				thereto, which pursuant to M.G.L. c. 111H, is being developed, is used, or has
				been used for the treatment, storage or disposal of low-level radioactive
				waste; but does not include any property used for temporary storage of
				low-level radioactive waste in sealed containers by a broker.
Fault
means a fracture or a zone of
				fractures in any material along which strata on one side have been displaced
				with respect to that on the other side.
500 Year Floodplain
means the
				estimated maximum lateral extent of flood water rising from creeks, rivers,
				streams, ponds, or lakes as result of a flood discharge of a magnitude likely
				to occur on the average of once every 500 years or, more properly, has a 0.2%
				chance of being exceeded in any year.
Flammable Liquid
means a liquid whose
				flash point is less than 100°F.
Geographic Information System [GIS]
means a computer based information handling program maintained by the
				Commonwealth that can store and manipulate both map-based information and
				associated tabular data such as zip codes or population density.
Ground Water
means all the water below
				the land surface in soils or geologic formations, specifically that part of the
				subsurface water in the saturated zone except as otherwise defined by
				310 CMR
				22.00.
Hazardous Waste
means a waste or
				combination of wastes, which because of its quantity, concentration or
				physical, chemical or infectious characteristics may cause, or significantly
				contribute to an increase in serious irreversible or incapacitating reversible
				illness or pose a substantial present or potential hazard to human health,
				safety, public welfare or the environment when improperly treated, stored,
				transported, used or disposed of or otherwise managed, however not to include
				solid or dissolved materials in irrigation return flows or industrial
				discharges which are point sources subject to permits under section 402 of the
				Federal Water Pollution Control Act of 1967 as amended, or source, special
				nuclear or by-product material as defined by the Atomic Energy Act of 1954, as
				further described in 310 CMR 30.000.
Holocene
means the most recent epoch
				of the Quaternary period extending from the end of the Pleistocene Epoch to the
				present.
Horizontal Gradient
means the change
				in static head per unit of distance along a flow path.
Hydraulic Conductivity
means a
				characteristic property of a porous medium that measures the ability of water
				to move through it under a difference in hydraulic potential or head. If a
				porous medium is isotropic and the fluid is homogeneous, the hydraulic
				conductivity of the medium is the volume of water at the existing cinematic
				viscosity that will move in unit time under a unit hydraulic gradient through a
				unit area measured at right angles to the direction of flow.
Hydrogeologic unit
means any soil or
				rock unit or zone which, by virtue of its porosity and permeability, or lack
				thereof, has a distinct influence on the storage or movement of
				groundwater.
Important to the Safety
means those
				engineered structures, systems and components essential to the isolation of
				waste and prevention of a release of radioactivity which would result in an
				exposure in excess of DPH performance objectives.
Institutional Control
means the
				continued observation, monitoring and c a re of a facility following transfer
				of the facility license from the operator to the Board.
Interim Wellhead Protection Area
				(IWPA)
means:
(a) with
			 respect to public water supplies and well fields whose pumping rate is 100,000
			 gallons per day or greater and for which the Department has not approved a
			 hydrologically delineated Zone II, the ½ mile radius surrounding such
			 well or well field; and
(b) with
			 respect to public water supplies and well fields whose pumping rate is less
			 than 100,000 gallons per day and for which the Department has not approved an
			 hydrologically delineated Zone I I , the radius calculated by multiplying the
			 maximum pumping rate in gallons per minute for such well and well field by 32
			 and adding 400 feet thereto (
i.e.
IWPA = (32) X (y) + (400);
			 where y = pumping rate in gallons per minute .
Liquefaction
means the potential of
				certain soils to be transformed from a solid to liquid state as a result of
				increased pore pressure and reduced effective stress, such as might result from
				certain seismic loading conditions.
Lithified Earth Material
meansallrock,
				including all naturally occurring and naturally formed aggregates or masses of
				minerals or small particles of older rock formed by crystallization of magma or
				by induration of loose sediments. This term does not include man-made
				materials, such as fill, concrete, and asphalt, or unconsolidated earth
				materials, soil or regolith lying at or near the earth surface.
Low-Level Radioactive Waste
means
				radioactive material that:
(a) is
			 neither high-level waste nor spent nuclear fuel, nor by-product material as
			 defined in section 11(e)(2) of the Atomic Energy Act of 1954, as amended,
			 42
			 USC 2014(e); and
(b) is classified by the Federal Government
			 as low-level radioactive waste, but not including waste which remains a federal
			 responsibility, as designated in section 3(b) of the Low-Level Radioactive
			 Waste Policy Act, as amended,
			 42 USC
			 2021c(b), as in effect on
			 the effective date of the Act.
Management
means the storage,
				packaging, treatment, transportation or disposal, where applicable of low-level
				radioactive waste.
Mass Wasting
means the movement of
				rock or soil material under the influence of gravity either as the movement of
				the product of weathering down a slope or as mass movement of rock or soil
				along joint planes or bedding planes. Mass wasting includes but is not limited
				to creep, mud flows, earth flow, soil flow, rock avalanche, landslide, landslip
				and slumping.
Maximum Horizontal Acceleration in Lithified Earth
				Material
means the maximum expected horizontal acceleration
				depicted on a seismic hazard map, with a 90% or greater probability that the
				acceleration will not be exceeded in 250 years, or the maximum expected
				horizontal acceleration based on a site-specific seismic risk
				assessment.
Mixed Waste
means low-level
				radioactive waste containing material that either:
(a) is listed in
			 310 CMR
			 30.131 through
			 30.136;
			 or
(b) causes the waste to exhibit
			 any of the characteristics identified in
			 310 CMR
			 30.120.
Model
means a conceptual description
				and the associated mathematical, graphical and/or analogous representation of a
				system, subsystem, component or condition that is used to predict changes from
				a baseline state as a function of internal and/or external stimuli and as a
				function of time and space.
Monitoring
means observing and making
				measurements to provide data on a facility, its site, its surrounding
				environment, and its health, safety and environmental impacts.
Outstanding Resource Waters
means
				waters in the Commonwealth given a protected status due to their ecological,
				socioeconomic, recreational and/or aesthetic value pursuant to
				314 CMR
				4.04(3).
Non-Community Water System
means a
				public water system that is not a community system.
100 Year Floodplain
means the
				estimated maximum lateral extent of flood water rising from creeks, rivers,
				streams, ponds, or lakes as the result of a flood discharge of a magnitude
				likely to occur on the average of once every 100 years or, more properly, has a
				1% chance of being exceeded in any year.
Overburden
means all material that
				lies between the ground surface and bedrock.
Performance Assessment
means a
				comprehensive analysis that:
(a)
			 identifies the processes and events that might affect the site, and, if
			 practicable, the waste management area or facility;
(b) examines the effects of these processes
			 and events on the performance of the site, and, if practicable the waste
			 management area and facility; and
(c) estimates the cumulative releases of
			 radionuclides, considering the associated uncertainties caused by all the
			 significant processes and events. These estimates shall be incorporated into an
			 overall probability distribution of the projected cumulative distributions to
			 the greatest extent practicable.
Population Density
means the number of
				people residing in one square mile, as averaged over an area designated by the
				U.S. Bureau of Census.
Possible Location
means a location,
				identified in accordance with the procedures established in M. G.L. c.
				111H,§ 20, which will be the subject of a preliminary
				characterization.
Potential Non-Community Water System
means a Class I aquifer, as defined in 314 CMR 6.03(1), capable of yielding
				water of sufficient quality and quantity for a non-community water system and
				which is located under a parcel of land that at the time of the issuance of the
				statewide mapping and screening report pursuant to M.G.L. c. 111H,§ 20(a)
				is:
(a) capable of being developed as
			 a non-community water system under applicable community land use controls ;
			 and
(b) within the boundaries
			 established by state regulations and guidelines for the location of a
			 non-community water system.
Potential Private Ground Water Source
means a Class I aquifer, as defined in 314 CMR 6.03(1), capable of yielding
				water of sufficient quality and quantity for a drinking water supply and which
				is located under a parcel of land that at the time of the issuance of the
				statewide mapping and screening report pursuant to M.G.L. c. 111H,§ 20(a)
				is:
(a) capable of being developed for
			 residential use under applicable community land use controls; and
(b) within the boundaries established by
			 state regulations and guidelines for the location of private wells;
			 and
(c) not within an area being
			 served by a public water system.
Potential Productive Aquifer
means all
				aquifers delineated by the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) as a high or medium
				yield aquifer, and all aquifers located east of the Cape Cod Canal (Cape Cod),
				on Martha's Vineyard, on Nantucket and on the Elizabeth Islands.
Preliminary Characterization
means the
				investigatory and analytical step established in M.G.L. c. 111H,§ 20, and
				conducted prior to the identification of candidate sites.
Protected Area
means land or resources
				which have been restricted from siting a facility pursuant to state or federal
				laws or regulations in order to promote, protect or preserve its ecological,
				wilderness, historic, recreational, archeological, cultural or scenic value
				including, without limitation, the state and federal are as listed at Appendix
				A, provided that the designation of land as a protected area herein is not
				intended to expand, diminish or otherwise modify the scope of protection
				provided by said statutes or regulations in relation to the exercise of
				authority to acquire land or interests therein pursuant to M.G.L. c.
				111H,§ 23(g). Protected areas do not include lands or resources restricted
				from development pursuant to municipal by-laws, ordinances or
				regulations.
Public Water Supply
means a source of
				ground water or surface water supplying a public water system.
Public Water System
means a system for
				the provision to the public of piped water for human consumption if such system
				has at least 15 service connections or regularly serves an average of a least
				25 individuals daily for at least 60 days of the year.
Qualified for Development
means a
				potential productive aquifer which the Department determines is capable of
				being developed into a public water system based upon the following
				demonstrations:
(a) Geologic and
			 hydrogeologic maps and, if available, local subsurface or hydrogeologic reports
			 demonstrate that the aquifer meets the definition of a potential productive
			 aquifer; provided ,however, approved pump tests may be conducted to demonstrate
			 that the source is incapable of yielding sufficient volumes of water to
			 economically supply a public water system and is capable of yielding a quality
			 which meets drinking water quality standards or can be cost efficiently
			 treated;
(b) The source is
			 necessary to supply one or more communities with sufficient water based on a
			 minimum 20 year planning criteria used by the Department in the event that,
			 after appropriate water quality testing, the largest current ground water
			 sources in each community in the affected water basin is shut down.
(c) A site specific land use survey within
			 the Interim Wellhead Protection Area demonstrates that existing or historical
			 land uses will not preclude the use of the aquifer as a source.
Radioactive Material
means any solid,
				liquid or gas which emits radiation spontaneously.
Radioactivity
means the transformation
				of unstable atomic nuclei by the emission of radiation.
Radionuclide
means an isotope that
				eventually undergoes spontaneous disintegration, with the emission of
				radiation.
Saturated Zone
means any portion of
				the earth below the land surface where every available opening (pore, fissure,
				joint, or solution cavity) is filled with water under pressure equal to or
				greater than atmosphere, except as otherwise defined by
				310 CMR
				22.00.
Seismic Impact Zone
means an area with
				a 10% or greater probability that the maximum horizontal acceleration in
				lithified earth material, expressed as a percentage of the earth's
				gravitational pull, will exceed 0.10g within 250 years or such extended time
				period in which projections can be made within reasonably conservative
				confidence limits.
Sensitive Populations
means persons
				who because of their age, health status or physical characteristics have a
				significantly higher probability of suffering an adverse effect to health than
				a member of the general public if exposed to a release of radioactivity or
				associated toxic materials managed at the facility. Examples of such sensitive
				populations may include, but are not limited to, children, infirm persons,
				pregnant women and persons who have experienced acute or chronic exposures to
				higher than normal doses of radioactivity due to occupational or geographic
				circumstances.
Sensitive Population Locations
means
				structures or areas which are principally designated or designed to serve
				sensitive populations or which are predominantly used by sensitive populations
				for extended periods of time. Examples of such places may include: day care
				facilities, grammar and secondary schools, playgrounds, bedded hospitals or
				radiation or prenatal clinics.
Shallow Land Burial
means a land
				disposal method that relies on the site's natural characteristics as the
				primary barrier for isolation of the waste.
Significantly Higher Than Normal Risk
means a significantly greater degree of risk of an adverse effect to health
				than the degree of risk which the general population would be exposed to in the
				event of a release of radioactive or hazardous waste managed at the
				facility.
Site
means a parcel of land which,
				pursuant to M.G.L. c. 111H, is being considered, developed or used or has been
				used as a location for a facility.
Slumping
means landsliding
				characterized by movement of a generally independent mass of rock or earth
				along a slip surface and about an axis parallel to the slope rim which it
				descends and by backward tilting of the mass with respect to that slope so that
				the slump surface often exhibits a reversed slope facing up hill.
Sole Source Aquifer
means an aquifer
				so designated by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, or by the Department
				under the authority of a state program as may be established, that supplies 50%
				or more of the drinking water for the aquifer service area, and the volume of
				water which could be supplied by alternative sources is insufficient to replace
				said aquifer should it become contaminated.
Storage
means the holding of low-level
				radioactive waste for treatment or disposal.
Subsidence
means the process by which
				the earth's surface sinks, either rapidly or slowly, with little or no
				horizontal motion.
Subsurface Dissolution
means a process
				of chemical weathering by which minerals and rocks are dissolved in
				groundwater; evidenced by subsidence, widened fractures, sinkholes, caverns
				and/or underground streams.
Suitable Technology
means a management
				technology which is qualified by the Board pursuant to regulations promulgated
				pursuant to M.G.L. c. 111H,§ 12 as being suitable to manage low level
				radioactive waste within the Commonwealth.
Superior site
means any site selected
				by the Board, after detailed site characterization, pursuant to M.G.L. c.
				111H,§ 23.
Transient population
means people who
				do not reside within an area, but do pass through or spend a limited amount of
				time within an area, including, but not limited to, tourists, seasonal workers
				or sportsmen.
Tributary
means a body of running
				water, including a river, stream, brook and creek, which moves in a definite
				channel in the ground due to a hydraulic gradient and which flows ultimately
				into a free flowing surface water supply. A tributary shall include the land
				over which the water runs and the banks thereto.
Upgradient
means:
(a) in reference to surface water, the
			 direction perpendicular to lines of equal water surface elevation over a
			 distance in which elevation continuously increases, measured from the point or
			 area in question; or
(b) in
			 reference to ground water, the direction perpendicular to lines of equal total
			 hydraulic head over a distance in which total head continuously increases,
			 measured at the water table.
Upland Drainage Area
means areas
				ordrainage basins that could discharge surface runoff to or through portions of
				the site, either by overland flow or by means of streams, rivers, and well
				defined drainage courses.
Urban Area
means an area designated as
				such by the U.S. Census in accordance with its detailed published
				criteria.
Waste
means low-level radioactive
				waste unless otherwise specifically designated herein.
Waste Management Area
means that
				portion of a facility where low-levelradioactive wastes has been, is being, or
				will be treated, stored or disposed of.
Watershed
means a region or area
				measured in a horizontal topographic divide which directs surface runoff from
				precipitation, normally by gravity, into a stream or a body of impounded
				surface water, except as otherwise defined by
				310 CMR
				22.00.
Water Table
means that surface in an
				unconfined water body at which the pressure is atmospheric. It is defined by
				the levels at which water stands in wells that penetrate the water body just
				far enough to hold standing water. In wells which penetrate to greater depths,
				the water level will stand above or below the watertable if an upward or
				downward component of groundwater flow exists. For purposes of
				310 CMR 43.00, unless
				otherwise stated, the elevation of the water table shall be taken to refer to
				its seasonal high level, which generally occurs in late winter or early
				spring.
Zone I
means the protective radius
				required around a public supply well or well field.
Zone II
means that area of an aquifer
				which contributes water to a well under the most severe recharge and pumping
				conditions that can be realistically anticipated (
i.e.
,
				pumping at the approved safe yield of the well for 180 days without any natural
				recharge occurring); it is bounded by the groundwater divides which result from
				pumping the well and by contact of the edge of the aquifer with less permeable
				materials such as till and bedrock. In some locations, streams and lakes may
				form recharge boundaries. The Zone II shall extend up gradient to its point of
				intersection with prevailing hydrogeologic boundaries ( a ground water flow
				divide, a contact with till or bedrock or a recharge boundary.) For the
				purposes of
				310 CMR 43.00, a Zone II area
				is one which has been defined and delineated in accordance with the
				Department's Division of Water Supply
Guidelines and Policies for
				Public Water Systems
, November 1993 Addendum to the October 1991
				edition or the most recent version thereof.
Zone III
means that land area beyond
				the area of a Zone II from which surface water and groundwater drain into a
				Zone II. The surface drainage area as determined by the topography is commonly
				coincident with the groundwater drainage area and will be used to delineate the
				Zone III. In some locations, where surface and groundwater drainage are not
				coincident, the Zone III shall consist of both the surface drainage and the
				groundwater drainage area.
Zone of Contribution
means the land
				area which provides recharge to the well.