letters How m u c h protection?
DEARSIR: Ernest Tsivoglou in his article, “Nuclear power: the social conflict,” ES&T, May 1971, states on page 409 “the AEC and the industry insist that nuclear plants must have the right to release radioactive wastes to the full extent allowed, according to the current radiation protection standard . . . . On the other hand, there is an increasingly strong movement among conservation groups and pollution control agencies to heed the admonitions of the ICRP and FRC.” This strong implication that the AEC and the nuclear industry are at variance with the ICRP and FRC has no basis. In fact, Tsivoglou himself states that GE and Westinghouse have announced near zero gaseous emission systems. Here at the National Reactor Testing Station, at the cost of extensive waste processing, liquid effluents are far below guide values, and average per-
sonnel exposures are less than 10% of guide values. Mr. Tsivoglou also states that “there is no conclusive proof that (the) currently applied radiation standard is either adequate or inadequate for long-term protection of the public.” Because of the many existing environmental conditions which we know do adversely affect the public, and because of the large variance of response by biological systems to adverse conditions, there can never be conclusive proof that any single agent does not contribute in some small way to adverse biological responses.
G . J. Briscoe Idaho Nuclear Corp. Idaho Falls, Idaho 83401 Dr. Tsivoglou specifically stated in the May ES&T article: “. . .neither the A E C nor the nuclear industry wishes actually to practice a policy of maximum radiation exposure.”-Ed.
Fossil fuels t h e felons! DEARSIR: Dr. Tsivoglou’s exposition of nuclear power (ES&T, May 1971, page 404) is an eminently sensible discussion of a topic that has been much maltreated in print. He takes the sound engineering approach in urging that radiation hazards be limited by “bottling up” the offgases. The more one looks at the energy problem, the more apparent it is that fossil fuels represent the villainous characters on the environmental scene. Nuclear energy, subject to proper controls, can greatly ease the impact of energy production on the air-water environment near power sites. However, the nuclear technology involved in power production is so complex that it intimidates the adversary process of a democracy. This means that the engineering community needs to exercise itself to bring into play a system of (continued on page 656)
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