The OREPA Rebuttal

Alfred Brooks

OREJC Approval 9/6/05

Author's Note: This rebuttal takes a new form: The subject article is quoted in full using an electronic copy from the Oak Ridger archives; the text to be rebutted is highlighted, and the rebuttal text is placed nearby in a text box. This avoids questions of misquoting and gives the original author's full context of the statement rebutted. We thank The Oak Ridger for enthusiastically endorsing this approach and allowing us to use their archive copies.

Story last updated at 12:47 p.m. on May 12, 2005

ATSDR report 'flat-out false' OREPA states

By: Darrell Richardson | Oak Ridger Staff
darrell.richardson@oakridger.com

Earlier this week, the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry released an assessment stating "past, current and future exposures to radionuclides released from White Oak Creek to the Clinch River/Watts Bar Reservoir are not a public health hazard."

Now, the Oak Ridge Environmental Peace Alliance has released its own statement, which says that the finding of the ATSDR "that releases from the Oak Ridge National Laboratories over the past 60 years have posed no public health threat is unconscionable, unsupported by the scientific community, and flat-out false."

Ad hominem – Appealing to personal prejudices or emotion rather than to reason. Such attacks are usually interpreted that the attacker has no evidence to support their point of view. Since they do not contribute to a reasoned debate, they have no place in science. If one wishes to register a complaint about the integrity of an individual, there are many proper channels for doing so. A technical debate is not one of them.

Congress has designated ATSDR as the proper agency to determine public health assessments for the NPL sites of other agencies, such as DOE and ATSDR is simply following federal law. The OREPA current suggestion is tantamount to asking ATSDR to violate the federal law. If OREPA is sincere in their concern for the current arrangement that Congress legislated, then OREPA should address the problem to Congress seeking a legislative change. At the same time they should suggest who will pay for the effort since payment by the federal government is inherent in the concerns. Perhaps OREPA has surplus funds.

OREPA representative Ralph Hutchison said, "ATSDR, an agency of the federal government, has a clear conflict of interest when it prepares health assessments on sites where the federal government itself is the primarily responsible party. This conflict is never clearer than today, when the federal government gives itself a high five for being such a good, clean citizen in Oak Ridge.

"The declaration that Oak Ridge has never posed a health risk cannot be supported by science or by common sense," Hutchison's statement added. "ATSDR's finding is either the result of half-hearted work or simple duplicity."

This Health Assessment was limited to White Oak Creek Radio Nuclide Releases and any significant impact on public health. It was not claimed that Oak Ridge was never posed a health risk. Where is the lack of scientific support? The Assessment was done by approved and peer reviewed procedures and data. It is supported by peer reviewers, by the opinions of the many scientists who have made similar assessments and by the common sense of a dilution of a factor of about 1200 by the Clinch River flow and another factor by the Tennessee River. Half-hearted and duplicity are personal attacks that have no place in science.

ASTDR assessment was designed to evaluate the releases of radionuclides to the Clinch River and Watts Bar Reservoir from the Oak Ridge Reservation via White Oak Creek. In addition, the assessment reviews past, current and future exposure to radionuclide releases for people who use or live along the Clinch River and Watts Bar Reservoir.

ATSDR assessment, released on Monday, concludes:

* Radionuclides released from the Oak Ridge Reservation to the Clinch River and Watts Bar Reservoir do not pose a health hazard to people who live near or use these waterways.

* The amount of contaminants in the sediment, water and fish are below levels associated with adverse health effects.

· People who have used or might continue to use the Clinch River and Watts Bar Reservoir for recreation, food or drinking water may have been exposed. However, this radiation dose is well below levels associated with a health hazard; therefore, use of the waterways does not pose a public health hazard.

"Either ATSDR's methodology is suspect, or their knowledge base is suspect, or their honesty is suspect," Hutchison said. "In either case,

the public is ill served by false assurances."

The levels of contaminants Again, opinion without proof or specifics worded in a personally insulting manner