Jeremy L. Dillon
RW Monitor
12/19/2014
North Dakota introduced proposed rule changes late last week that would allow for more disposal of Technologically Enhanced Naturally Occurring Radioactive Material (TENORM) in the state’s landfills. The proposed rule change would increase the radiation level allowed per year from 5 picocuries per gram of material to 50 picocuries, which would allow for more in-state disposal compared to producers transporting the waste out of-state at high costs. The changes also require TENORM producers to register with the state’s Department of Health while also requiring the waste be tracked from production to disposal. Landfills could accept up to 25,000 tons of waste per year from North Dakota as well as from out-of-state producers. “Currently, approved landfills can accept waste of up to 5 picocuries per gram, which is approximately equivalent to background radiation. Extremely low standards were established because of a lack of available scientific data at the time,” Dave Glatt, Environmental Health Section Chief for the NDDoH, said in a statement. “Our proposed rules are based on the best available science and will allow for the responsible and safe disposal of TENORM generated in North Dakota.”
The new rules would allow for out-of-state TENORM waste to reach North Dakota landfills, Glatt said, but with the 25,000 ton restriction, safeguards still exist to prevent North Dakota from becoming the nation’s TENORM dumping ground. The state currently has ten permitted industrial landfills that could accept the waste under the new rules, with an eleventh on its way, Glatt said. “We cannot limit TENORM from other states under the Commerce Clause, but it would have to follow our standard and definition of TENORM,” Glatt told RW Monitor this week. “It could come from as far as the Marcellus Shale, but I think there are landfills prior. I think the cost of transport would catch up after a while, and we are also limiting each individual landfill to accept only 25,000 tons per year. The waste is limited to our special waste or industrial waste landfills. Municipal landfills cannot accept the waste.” The industrial landfills would also have to amend their current licenses to reflect its new waste acceptance strategies as well.
The increased activity in oil and gas exploration, especially in the Marcellus Shale and Bakkan Shale formations, has increased volumes of TENORM in states where that type of waste did not regularly occur. Radioactive contaminants like uranium, thorium, and radium naturally occur within the earth, and the fracking process exposes that material to drill tailings and water, among other things, and brings it to the surface. States like Pennsylvania and North Dakota have undertaken studies to better address the waste stream by looking at how the states’ landfills could handle the increased radiation levels, especially to avoid illegal dumping. Last year, North Dakota suffered a series of high-profile illegal dumpings of TENORM waste in landfills not equipped to dispose of it, which resulted in public outcry concerning the material.
Best Case Scenario Has Rule Instituted by June 1
For the proposed rules to become official, the North Dakota Department of Health needs to conduct public hearings, along with receiving approval from several state agencies. “If everything works just smooth, we would be done in six months,” Glatt said. “We have to go through the public hearing. We have to go to a health council and get approval, as well as get approval from the attorney general’s office. We then have to get approval from an administrative rules committee. If we can get that all done in six months, then the rules would be effective July 1. If we can’t, then they would go into effect October 1.” NDDoH has already scheduled three public comment periods for the coming year: Jan. 20, 2015 in Williston; Jan. 21 in Bismarck; and Jan. 22 in Fargo.
Envio. Group Accuses State of Collusion with Oil Industry
Meanwhile, the Dakota Resource Council, an environmental activist organization, accused the governor of working with the oil industry for favorable regulations at the cost of public safety. Back in September, the group called for the early release of the draft study to make sure that any oil influence could be easily seen, but the state would not release the study until all of its edits were complete. “We are outraged that this push by the Dalrymple Administration to increase radioactive levels 10 times is yet one more example that current state officials operate in secret at the direction of the oil industry,” DRC spokesman Sean Arithson said in a statement. “The health and safety of the people who live and work in North Dakota are once again being left behind.”
Arithson added, “The Dalrymple Administration is ill-prepared to deal with this waste. The State Health Department has known for years about radioactive waste and did very little to deal with it. How can state officials — who have been unable, or unwilling, to track the thousands of tons of waste dumped the past several years –suggest we should let them take on waste 10 times more dangerous? They can’t handle their current responsibilities to protect people’s health and safety and now they ask to take on waste 10 times more dangerous.”
The state, however, has maintained that the decisions were based on sound science. “The science is pretty solid,” Glatt said. “It took a look at what other states were doing. Obviously, people can appeal the decision, but it has to be really science based. I haven’t seen a whole lot of science based objections to it, other than the emotional response that we have gone from 5 [picocuries] to 50 [picocuries], 5 being a background level that, quite frankly, in western North Dakota we have soils naturally occurring that are higher than that. We are really concentrating on what the science tells us.”
According to the findings from the Argonne National Laboratory study, the 50 picocurie number came from an analysis of exposure to a potential landfill worker. “To determine a disposal limit, active and closed landfills were studied,” the study said. “For a closed landfill, the study considered a self-sufficient farmer living on the closed landfill, an industrial operation on the closed landfill, recreational use on the closed landfill and the proximity of off-site water wells. The study found that the limiting exposure to TENORM came from a worker employed at an active landfill. At a concentration of 51.6 picocuries per gram, a worker could potentially reach the 100 mrem/year exposure limit. The NDDoH used this result to propose a disposal limit of 50 picocuries per gram.”
Pennsylvania Study Delayed
Elsewhere, Pennsylvania’s TENORM study will not be released until early 2015, according to a spokesperson from Pennsylvania’s Department of Environmental Protection this week. Pennsylvania, located in the Marcellus Shale, has been at the epicenter of fracking, and the state is currently studying how best to deal with the radioactive portion of the fracking waste. It had initially planned for a late 2014 release, but delays pushed it to 2014. Prior to the fracking boom, Pennsylvania landfills, under a blanket exemption, could take certain volumes and concentrations of NORM material on an annual basis. The regulations worked for pre-fracking disposal, but with the increased waste, the landfills are filled almost immediately.
