Radioactive Metals Could Enter the Marketplace in the United States

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PHOTO: FOTOLIA/KLETR
Faced with dismantling these Cold War relics, DOE in 1997 awarded a $238 million contract to British Nuclear Fuels Limited (BNFL), charging the foreign company with decontaminating and recycling materials housed inside the buildings.

The Department of Energy’s plan to recycle radioactive metals, these radioactive metals could enter the marketplace in the United States. Is recycling in this case a greener option?

Will your home be the nation’s next nuclear test site? It well could be, say critics of a Department of Energy (DOE) plan to recycle radioactive metals into the commercial marketplace, meaning these radioactive metals could enter the marketplace in the United States.

At the center of a controversy that has enraged environmental, labor and consumer groups nationwide are three mammoth buildings – part of DOE’s Oak Ridge, Tennessee, nuclear complex where from the 1950s to 1985 uranium was enriched for weapons and power plants. Faced with dismantling these Cold War relics, DOE in 1997 awarded a $238 million contract to British Nuclear Fuels Limited (BNFL), charging the foreign company with decontaminating and recycling materials housed inside the buildings.

BNFL is expected to retrieve from Oak Ridge an estimated 100,000 tons of metal. And since its post-decontamination use will be neither tracked nor restricted, bits of it could show up just about anywhere. “It’s possible this metal could wind up in your baby’s carriage, the jewelry that you wear, the zipper in your pants, your grandmother’s hip replacement, all of your cookware and utensils,” says Wenonah Hauter of the consumer watchdog group Public Citizen. “You may receive multiple doses . . . without your knowledge or consent”

Richard Meehan, team leader in DOE’s Facility and Materials Reuse Division, calls the above scenarios “very unlikely,” insisting that the age and condition of the metal will almost certainly relegate it to such “bulk application” as concrete rebar or structural steel. But he admits he can’t rule out more specialized uses.

  • Published on Dec 1, 1999
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