Copyright 1999 Federal News Service, Inc.
Federal News Service
MARCH 3, 1999, WEDNESDAY
SECTION: IN THE NEWS
LENGTH:
5257 words
HEADLINE: PREPARED TESTIMONY OF
STATEMENT
DAVID MICHAELS, PH.D., MPH
ASST. SECRETARY, ENVIRONMENT,
SAFETY AND HEALTH
BEFORE THE HOUSE SCIENCE COMMITTEE
ENERGY AND ENVIRONMENT SUBCOMMITTEE
BODY:
I
appreciate the opportunity to present the Fiscal Year 2000 budget request for
the Department of Energy's (DOE) Office of Environment, Safety and Health (Eld).
The total budget request for EH is $163 million, a small fraction of the
Department's $18 billion budget. I can assure you, however, that the Secretary
views our mission of protecting workers and the public as critical to the
success of the Department's science, security and energy programs.
There is
no question that in this year and the next the Department and its workers will
continue to face complex environment, safety and health challenges. In the face
of these challenges, however, we have held the budget request for the Office of
Environment, Safety and Health to levels consistent with or less than those of
the past two years. We have achieved this by continuing to realize efficiencies
from the 1994 reorganization and reducing the use of support service
contractors. One program that shows an increased budget request is the health
studies program. That increase, however, reflects new responsibilities that have
been transferred from the Office of Environmental Management in order to improve
management of the Department's health studies program.
Integrated Safety
Management
Mr. Chairman, the budget request for the Office of Environment,
Safety and Health represents only a small measure of the Department's commitment
to protecting its workers and residents of neighboring communities. The key to a
safe and healthy Department of Energy is not only what we do in our office, but
what the Department's line managers do every day to integrate safety, health and
environmental protection into the budgets, planning and activities of every
worker and manager in the Department.
That is the philosophy behind
Integrated Safety Management or ISM, the department's environment, safety and
health policy developed with the support of the Defense Nuclear Facilities
Safety Board. The objective of ISM is full integration of environment, safety
and health into work so that safety is not the responsibility of the health
professionals - but of every manager and every worker. The premise of ISM is
that safety is achieved through close attention to work design and hazard
control, through teamwork and worker involvement, and through the tailoring of
health and safety standards to the work being performed. Because problems are
addressed before they become costly accidents or injuries, the principles of ISM
bring not only a healthier workplace and a cleaner environment, but notable
cost-savings.
Last October, in one of his first actions, Secretary
Richardson endorsed Integrated Safety Management, and became the third
consecutive Secretary of Energy to designate ISM as the Department's safety
policy. That endorsement came at a crucial time. It meant that rather than
stopping and switching direction toward yet another 'new and improved' safety
policy, the Department would continue to build on the progress it has already
made in implementing ISM throughout the complex. Secretary Richardson also plans
to take a series of steps in the next few months designed to move the Department
forward in implementing ISM to a point where we achieve demonstrable and
measurable results. These actions include the following:
* ISM systems will
be fully established and verified at all DOE sites by September 2000. The Eli
Office of Oversight will independently review and report to the Secretary on
each site's progress in meeting that goal and will be strengthened to oversee
the effectiveness of ISM implementation in the future.
* A newly-established
Secretarial Safety Council chaired by the Deputy Secretary will be charged with
developing management tools -- such as performance standards, contract clauses,
and stronger enforcement of nuclear safety rules -- to hold both federal and
contract employees accountable for making progress in ISM implementation. We
expect recommendations to be made within 90 days. * The Department will develop
a management system that will track and close on corrective actions across the
complex. As the Defense Board pointed out in its recommendation 98-1, DOE has
lacked an effective way to demonstrate that identified safety deficiencies have
been corrected. The new system will be operating within the next 60 days and
will identify the senior managers responsible for correcting and closing pending
safety deficiencies. Progress will be monitored and reported by the EH Office of
Oversight.
* The Department will strengthen its Price-Anderson Nuclear
Safety Enforcement program. While this program has demonstrated its
effectiveness in increasing safety at DOE sites, success has not been uniform
across the complex. The Secretary has directed each DOE Field Office manager to
redouble his or her efforts to assure that its Price Anderson staff is
effectively addressing contractor compliance with nuclear safety rules and
working directly with the EH Enforcement Staff to follow through on actions.
The Secretary also intends to hold a series of safety forums with his senior
managers. In these meetings, managers will discuss their progress on
implementing ISM, barriers they may be facing, and resources that may be
required. These forums will play an important role in maintaining management
attention on safety and in assuring the accountability of all of us to the
Secretary for our safety performance.
External Regulation of Department of
Energy Nuclear Facilities
As the Committee knows, over the past several
years the Department of Energy has actively investigated the application of
Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NKC) and Occupational Safety and Health
Administration (OSHA) regulation of facilities that are currently exempt from
such regulation by the Atomic Energy Act. This Committee has been very
supportive of these efforts, and I'd like to take this opportunity to bring the
Committee up to date on where we stand today.
In late 1997, the NRC and the
DOE agreed to initiate a pilot program that would simulate regulation at DOE
sites to determine actual costs and benefits from external regulation. The DOE
initiated three pilots: one at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, and
two others at facilities at the Oak Ridge site and at Savannah River. As then
Deputy Secretary Moler testified to this Committee last fall, it was the
Department's intention to submit legislation to Congress this year that would
externally regulate certain single purpose energy research laboratories, such as
Lawrence Berkeley, based on the outcome of these pilot projects.
Subsequent
to the Moler testimony, the Conference Report accompanying the FY 1999 Energy
and Water Development Appropriation directed that the Department "not initiate
any pilot projects to simulate external regulation of Departmental facilities
which do not include the NRC, OSHA, and the appropriate State and local
entities." The Conference Report also stated that "the pilot project (at the
Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory) was completely inadequate because it did
not include the participation of OSHA or State and local entities. Thus the
pilot project failed to address many of the issues involving the interactions
among all of these entities and the Department of Energy. Obvious questions were
left unanswered in the pilot project.
" The Committee further directed
the Department to submit a report to Congress by March 31, 1999 on the expanded
Lawrence Berkeley pilot and added that "the Department should not conduct
simulations of external regulation at sites with weapons activities
responsibilities." In accordance with that language, we worked with OSHA, the
State of California and local entities to revisit the Lawrence Berkeley pilot to
address safety and health issues. The final report on the Lawrence Berkeley
pilot is expected to be completed within a few weeks.
The pilots projects,
unlike the previous studies and analyses of the issue of external regulation,
were based on real-time simulation of external regulation activities. These
pilots have highlighted a number of significant, unresolved issues including:
ascertaining whether DOE or its contractor should most appropriately hold a
license; the need for state regulation of accelerators at our facilities in
addition to NRC and OSHA, because NRC lacks authority to regulate accelerators;
difficulties in assessing facility design under NRC standards in some older
facilities because we lack original construction plans; the extent to which
older facilities can be "retrofitted" or upgraded to meet NRC standards;
applicable requirements for safeguards and security, and deactivation and
decommissioning; and cost. Based on what we know today, many of the potential
benefits that we expected to see from external regulation have not been
demonstrated, and appear to be outweighed by associated costs and difficulties
raised in the pilot projects.
Consequently, we have determined that
submittal of legislation to exempt certain facilities from Departmental
regulations is premature. It also is clear that initiating more pilots at this
time will not help to clarify these issues or resolve problems. At this time, we
are not ruling out continuation of external regulation activities. We will
complete our work with NRC, OSHA, States, and local governments to analyze the
results of the pilots and will report back to you with findings. The final
report on the Lawrence Berkeley pilot will be submitted to Congress later this
month. Once the other pilots are complete, we will reexamine the extent of
unresolved issues, and evaluate whether the substantial funds required to
prepare DOE facilities for a shift to external regulation would be better spent
on achieving the Department's cleanup and mission goals.
We will continue to
work with the NRC in its licensing of certain DOE activities, and we will
continue to work with OSHA to clarify their jurisdiction over non-nuclear and
privatized facilities and to explore ways to include OSHA participation in
oversight and enforcement efforts.
Office of Environment, Safety and Health
Programs
The Office of Environment, Safety and Health is governed by the
imperative to prevent accidents, illnesses, and environmental damage associated
with DOE operations. EH is responsible for the only independent environment,
safety and health oversight program in the Department and the enforcement of
nuclear safety rules as required by the Price Anderson Amendments Act. Technical
experts in the various environment, safety and health disciplines help line
managers target the most urgent risks, use limited resources most efficiently,
and do work most effectively. We have seen that comprehensive environment,
safety and health planning and analysis of future activities through tools such
as the National Environmental Policy Act process can help avoid problems that
have plagued past DOE operations.
As the Chairman and members of this
committee know, the Office of Environment, Safety and Health operates
independently of the Department's mission-oriented program offices and reports
to the Secretary. We model our work upon that of a safety office in a major,
first class corporation. As the best performers in the private sector have
recognized, such an internal safety organization is the key to safety and
credibility with the public.
The Office of Environment, Safety and Health
conducts its functions in four business lines -- Technical Assistance,
Independent Oversight and Enforcement, Health Studies, and the National
Environmental Policy Act implementation. These business lines are supported by
an Office of Planning and Administration. As the attached chart shows, the
Health Studies, Oversight and Enforcement programs are funded in defense
accounts under the jurisdiction of the Armed Services Committees.
Technical
Assistance
In the EH Technical Assistance program, experts in the various
health, safety and environmental fields work with the line program on efforts to
improve safety performance in the face of serious and unique hazards. Our
efforts can be grouped into several categories:
DOE Corporate Safety
Services. These are functions managed by the Office of Environment, Safety and
Health because the activity either requires unique expertise housed in EH,
independence from line program involvement, or is crosscutting in nature.
Programs are diverse and include management of DOE's aircraft fleet, the
radiation exposure accreditation program, criticality operations at nuclear
facilities, support for the DOE complex in meeting environmental requirements,
and transportation of nuclear material.Technology-Based Operational Analyses.
These analyses involve complex assessments and analyses of environmental, safety
and health problems and risks. Efforts include technical reviews that support
specific management decisions, site- wide vulnerability studies of DOE's
hazardous material inventories, development of engineering solutions to safety
problems in the field, and analyzing safety and risk trends through performance
indicators.
DOE-Wide Safety Management Systems. Enhanced Work Planning -- an
advanced approach to planning that uses multi disciplinary teams, including
workers and safety specialists, to plan work and analyze hazards - was
successfully piloted over the past three years and is now achieving consistent,
substantial results. WorkSmart Standards is a graded approach to standards
tailored to the work and the condition of the facility where it will be
performed. Secretary Richardson has directed that these efforts be integrated
into each site's ISM program.
Initiatives with Industry. With the chemical
manufacturing industry, EH has imported the Responsible Care and Chemical
Process Safety programs developed by the Chemical Manufacturers Association.
Another example is the Voluntary Protection Program that recognizes safety and
health excellence in terms of "world-class" private sector performers in safety
and health similar to the Malcolm Baldridge Awards. To date, two DOE contractor
sites have achieved Star status, the highest level of recognition under the
program; approximately 20 other sites are actively pursuing formal recognition.
Independent Oversight
The EH Office of Oversight is the DOE's only
independent oversight function for environment, safety, health, safeguards, and
security functions. Its mission is to provide an accurate and comprehensive view
of the effectiveness, vulnerabilities, and trends of the Department's programs
in environment, safety, health and safeguards and security.
Oversight staff
provides DOE management with a professional, systems- approach to oversight
designed to add value to management decisions. This is accomplished through the
use of analytical tools including comprehensive, site-specific assessments of
environment, safety and health management called Safety Management Evaluations.
These evaluations play critical roles in management decisions. The Office is
also responsible for oversight of the adequacy of the Department's safeguards
and security systems.
Special studies and reviews of particular issues are
also conducted, and have included radiation protection for nuclear
transportation workers, tritium plume recovery at Brookhaven National
Laboratory, and facility disposition at the East Tennessee Technology Park at
the Oak Ridge site. The Office also completed a wide-ranging review of emergency
management programs across the Department. Analytical studies on crosscutting
topics such as subcontractor safety, electrical safety, and fire protection help
identify vulnerabilities across the complex. The Office of Oversight is also
responsible for independent investigations of major accidents or injuries, and
independent site residents on the Oversight staff provide day-to-day information
on ES&H performance. In the next year the Office of Oversight will take on
added responsibilities in several areas. The first is to report on the
Department's progress in addressing safety and emergency response non-
compliances and completing related corrective actions. The Office will also take
on a new role in the oversight of the Department's occupational health clinics,
with the support of the Accreditation Association for Ambulatory Health Care
that has developed nationally recognized standards for occupational health care
services. Finally, our oversight efforts will now include environmental audits,
including the conduct of facility level environmental regulatory audits, audits
of compliance with toxic release inventory reporting, and emergency planning.
The Office of Enforcement and Investigation, which reports to the
Assistant Secretary, is responsible for enforcing nuclear safety rules
(promulgated pursuant to the Price-Anderson Amendments Act of 1988) on the
Department's contractors. This office employs a graded approach that focuses
enforcement actions on the most 'safety significant' issues and encourages
contractors to avoid penalties by taking action to identify, self-report and
correct violations. A core headquarters staff matrixes with enforcement staff in
the Department's field offices. As mentioned previously, Secretary Richardson
has committed to strengthen this program with stronger resources in the field
and in headquarters.
In its first three years of operation the Enforcement
program issued 34 enforcement actions including $1,830,000 in civil penalties.
Of this amount, $605,625 was waived due to the statutory exemption for specific
not-for-profit contractors at the national laboratories.
Health Studies
The Office of Health Studies funds epidemiologic studies and public health
activities relating to the environmental and occupational health impacts of DOE
operations. The key to designing effective health protection strategies for
workers and communities is understanding the relationships between exposures to
radiation and chemicals and potential health effects. Our goals are prevention
of illness and injury, better worker protection standards, and effective
response to the health concerns of workers and communities. Highlights of the
major efforts follow.
Monitoring Programs and Emergent Worker Health Issues.
Surveillance of the DOE workforce is the cornerstone of our ability to detect
any occupationally-induced pattern of illness. Such surveillance helps target
areas where intervention could prevent worker disease or exposure and identify
areas where studies are needed to develop better, scientifically accurate health
standards for the DOE workplace. EH manage several important programs in this
regard.
* Beryllium Health Screening Program. Beryllium and its compounds
were used widely in the production of nuclear weapons and can cause a serious
and debilitating lung disease. The standards and work practices designed to
limit exposures, originally established in the early 1950s, were felt to have
eliminated the problem of "chronic beryllium disease."
However, recent
advances in our understanding of the immune system, and the development of new
laboratory tests, have shown that some workers become sensitized to beryllium
and develop the disease despite adherence to the standards. Consequently, the
Department has tightened its restrictions on worker exposure to beryllium and
drafted a new rule to protect workers from beryllium disease.
Since 1991, a
screening program at Rocky Flats and Oak Ridge has examined over 8800 workers
for signs of sensitivity and identified more than 100 workers with chronic
beryllium disease. The program will continue to be expanded to additional sites
in FY 2000. A national Worker Beryllium Exposure Registry now under development
will track workers at risk for chronic beryllium disease throughout the complex.
* Medical Surveillance Program for Former Workers. In response to
Congressional direction, the Department has designed and implemented a program
to identify and evaluate the health of former DOE employees who may have been
subject to significant health risks resulting from exposure to hazardous
substances during their DOE employment. Because of the many uncertainties
involved in addressing these concerns, DOE has taken an incremental approach to
crafting this program. Ten cooperative agreements have been awarded to consortia
of unions and universities to conduct one-year 'needs assessments' at nine major
DOE sites to determine whether medical monitoring follow-up efforts are feasible
or required. All projects have completed "needs assessments" and six have begun
medical monitoring of workers. Our goal is to complete this program by the end
of Fiscal Year 2002.
* Epidemiologic Surveillance Program. This program
monitors illness and injury and assesses the overall health of the DOE work
force. Epidemiologic surveillance includes more than 60,000 current workers and
identified groups that may be at increased risk for occupational injury and
illness. The program facilitates interventions that reduce or eliminate risk and
provides a means by which the effectiveness of these corrections can be
measured. Special analyses of at-risk populations in the workforce augment the
program's core surveillance activities. Annual reports are provided to site
workers and management and are available via the Internet.
Public Health
Activities. DOE funds an independent, peer-reviewed program of epidemiologic
studies and public health activities related to potential health effects
&DOE operations. The program is managed by the Department of Health and
Human Services (HHS), including the National Institute of Occupational Safety
and Health, National Center for Environmental Health, and the Agency for Toxic
Substance and Disease Registry (ATSDR). Since 1990, 27 health studies and
environmental dose reconstruction projects have been completed under this
program, with nearly another 100 underway. The most recently completed study,
the Hanford Thyroid Disease Study, reported no evidence that thyroid or
parathyroid disease is increased in the Hanford area population. In Fiscal Year
2000, we anticipate a number of worker studies will be completed, including
studies focused on the Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Laboratory,
Rocky Flats, and a multi-site study of female workers in the nuclear weapons
complex.
Studies to date have not found widespread patterns of radiation-
related illnesses resulting from employment at DOE. However, the studies do
suggest a need for continued vigilance in efforts to keep worker exposures to
radiation as low as reasonably achievable. All data collected during the course
of such studies are submitted to DOE's Comprehensive Epidemiologic Data Resource
where they are offer unlimited opportunities for independent scientific inquiry.
Establishing a Public Health Agenda. Last year, the Department and Congress
agreed that a credible, coherent, coordinated agenda of health studies at DOE
sites was needed. Representatives of the three HHS agencies worked with DOE and
its stakeholders to develop an agenda that would ensure that the health needs of
communities and workers at DOE sites are effectively and efficiently addressed.
As a first step, responsibility for the program administered by ATSDR was
transferred from the Office of Environmental Management to EH. Studies supported
by this program will be integrated into the overall public health agenda and a
single Memorandum of Understanding between DOE and HI-IS. The agenda will
establish clear priorities based on site-specific public health needs, and will
be established with significant input from the affected worker and community
populations.
Completion of the agenda will involve several aspects at each
site: establishing what is already known about the environmental contamination
legacy, workers' exposures, and the health of communities and workers; reviewing
all ongoing public health activities conducted or supported by the HHS agencies
and DOE; identifying gaps in our knowledge and any unanswered public health
questions or needs that can be used to improve the health of communities and
workers. Each site-specific agenda will be evaluated with both overall,
complex-wide programmatic goals as well as site- specific needs.
A number of
important steps have been taken. The first was to catalogue all health studies
and public health activities underway by each of the HHS agencies and DOE.
Second, input has been received from communities, workers, and health and safety
professionals from throughout the DOE complex. Work is underway on site-specific
draft agendas that will be circulated for comment and input .from workers,
community members, and public interest groups. The first agenda will be complete
by September 30, 1999. Both the overall agenda and the site-specific agendas
will be reviewed annually, with stakeholder input, for their relevance and
responsiveness to identified and emerging health needs and concerns. We also
look forward to continued input and guidance from the Congress on this important
program.
Help for Sick Workers. In recent years the Department has heard
increasing concerns from current and former workers and some community residents
who believe that their health has been impaired by DOE operations. These
concerns range from workers at Oak Ridge who suffer from a wide range of
symptoms that are difficult to diagnose, to the workers at the Amchitka, Alaska
underground nuclear testing site, to residents living near Brookhaven National
Laboratory who fear that cancer in the community could be related to the
laboratory's operations. For the most part, these workers have not been eligible
to receive workers' compensation benefits.
Another group of workers with
serious health concerns is those workers who worked with beryllium metal.
With these workers, there is no question of the link between work at DOE
and the debilitating lung disease that often results from beryllium exposure.
The problem lies in the various state workers compensation systems, many of
which don't recognize that diseases like berylliosis are progressive and often
don't manifest themselves until years after exposure.
Secretary Richardson
has asked me to find ways to address these issues. We are currently studying
this issue and soliciting input from outside experts in workers' compensation
law, state workers compensation programs, labor unions, and occupational
medicine experts. We will report back to you when these analyses are completed.
Japanese Atomic Bomb Survivors. The Department and the Japanese government
cofund the Radiation Effects Research Foundation's continuing studies of the
A-bomb survivor studies in Hiroshima and Nagasaki. This program is the longest
and most important continuous study of radiation health effects in the world and
forms the basis of what we know today regarding the incidence of cancer and
non-cancer diseases associated with acute radiation exposure. These studies
continue to hold great promise for significant new scientific knowledge
concerning the health effects of radiation exposure.
Russian Studies. Of
particular note is the collaborative effort between Russian and American
scientists to study a unique set of population and worker exposure data from
nuclear weapons production activities in the Russian Federation. There are data
on more than 45,000 people, 18,000 of whom were employed between 1948 and 1972.
These data include complete dosimetry and detailed inpatient and outpatient
medical records. The exposures of the workers were many times greater than those
experienced by workers in Western facilities, and this research could lead to
improved definition of radiation protection standards. As a necessary and
notable first step in these studies, we will soon complete a records
preservation activity that will permanently preserve these records -- many of
which were kept in such poor condition that risked their destruction.
Marshall Islands. Assessing the public health impacts of releases from
nuclear weapons testing has been an important part of DOE's health studies
program. The DOE Marshall Islands Program provides medical surveillance and
care, environmental monitoring and characterization, and dose assessment for the
peoples of the Republic of the Marshall Islands exposed to radioactive fallout
from a 1954 U.S. thermonuclear weapon test. Of the 239 individuals exposed in
1954, 130 survive today. This population is at a greater risk for developing
certain endocrine problems, such as thyroid disease and therefore receives
annual thyroid function blood tests, ultrasound diagnostics, needle biopsy and
thyroid examinations.
The Department's radiological environmental monitoring
program conducts environmental radiological surveys and plant uptake studies at
four Marshallese atolls. Over the past 13 years, the Department, through
Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, has conducted extensive radiological
surveys to establish the levels of cesium-137, plutonium and other radioactive
materials in the environment and in particular in food plants, Research has
shown that application of potassium chloride fertilizer on the radioactively
contaminated soils dramatically reduces the uptake of cesium in plants.
The
Department maintains an Internet site that serves as an easy and effective way
to make historical documents relating to the 1946-58 nuclear weapons testing
program in the Northern Marshall Islands accessible to the Marshallese and the
public. The searchable database of more than 10,500 documents makes available
important information to government officials and others concerned with policy
and compensation, and is also of great interest to historical researchers.
National Environmental Policy Act
The NEPA office ensures that DOE
complies with the National Environmental Policy Act and, in doing so, provides a
process that enhances managers' decision making, builds public trust, and
minimizes the cost and time for document preparation. In the remainder of FY
1999 and during FY 2000, this office will guide and support the development of a
Draft Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) on the potential nuclear waste
repository at the Yucca Mountain Site, and the Final EISs and
Records of Decision (ROD) for the Spallation Neutron Source, Management of
Savannah River Site Spent Nuclear Fuel, and the Commercial Light Water Reactor
for Tritium Production. Other major actions will include Final Site-wide EIS and
ROD for Los Alamos National Laboratory, Draft Site-wide EIS for Sandia National
Laboratories, Final EIS and ROD for Surplus Plutonium Disposition, and Draft and
Final EIS for Conveyance and Transfer of Certain Land Tracts at Los Alamos
National Laboratory.
Planning and Administration
Support functions of
the Office of Environment, Safety and Health, including overall resource
management, budget planning and execution, training, personnel, travel, and the
working capital fund, make up the EH Office of Planning and Administration.
Major activities include:
* Technical and analytic support for the field
offices in budgeting for environment, safety and health to assure that the most
serious risks are being addressed, and support for the development of the
contract clauses for environment, safety and health discussed above.
*
Information management and data bases that support the Office of Environment,
Safety and Health including reporting, tracking and trending systems, and the EH
Technical
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LOAD-DATE: March 4, 1999
