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August 18, 2000

The Commission has approved the staff's recommendation to 1) defer a final decision on whether to proceed with rulemaking, 2) proceed with the National Academy of Sciences (NAS ) study on possible alternatives for release of slightly contaminated materials, 3) continue the development of a technical information base necessary to support a Commission policy decision in this area, and 4) stay informed of international initiatives in this area, related EPA and DOS activities, and potential import and trade issues.

While the NAS study is underway, the staff should provide quarterly reports to the Commission on progress made on all pertinent issues. Approximately three months after completion of the NAS study, the staff should provide its recommendations on how best to proceed, as well as the status of the technical bases.

The NAS should consider the issue of recycling of slightly contaminated solid materials as a separate issue from release of slightly contaminated solid materials.

The issue of measurability as it pertains to public health and safety should be given priority during development of the information base and should not be deferred to NAS.

The staff should continue to work with EPA, IAEA and the European Commission to identify and "fine-tune" realistic potential exposure scenarios and narrow the remaining differences in dose methodologies used to calculate potential doses to individuals and demonstrate compliance with a regulatory limit.

The staff should make their analyses and methodologies as transparent as possible to all stakeholders. The staff should describe how carefully and conservatively the NRC studies analyze the potential exposure pathways of released materials, as well as the consistency in results between the NRC studies and those of other agencies here and abroad including the EPA and IAEA. The staff should also put the potential doses from the various scenarios into context for stakeholders.

The Commission has carefully considered the industry's suggestion, made during the May 9 public Commission briefing, that NRC establish a committee under the Federal Advisory Committee Act to provide a consensus recommendation to the Commission on the release of solid materials. The Commission has decided to defer a decision on this matter at this time but intends to revisit the issue in the spring of 2001 once the related NAS study is underway and there has been additional opportunity for dialogue on this initiative.

The staff should work more closely with DOE to better understand and collect information and data on various aspects of DOE's current and future metals recycling program and thereby assess how various DOE scenarios might be considered by the NRC staff when estimating potential doses.