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James L. Liverman, AES Pursuant to conversations with Ken Cowser, Bill Burr, and ;oe Deal, I have proceeded to organize an immediate review of the En~wetak situation. Attached is a list of the attendees and a tentztive agenda. The meeting will be held at the Nevada Operations Office and is expected to last through the week of August 15-19. liehave kept DNA fully informed.;they are most concerned about this activity at this late time (see memo to you from Joe Deal this date t-ethis The objectives of the review are two: 1) Review of AEC recommendations for clean-up and rehabilitation of Enewetak Atoll, specifically the criteria for Pu-239 in soil; 2) Review of environmental and bea!th implications of, ancllongterm monitoring requirements for, di~posal of contaminated debris The review group will be requested to either endorse the p]’esent criteria and plans, ci-to present alternate recomnendationr with justification. Before the meeting disbands, I would look LO have a report available for your consideration. The potential exposure of the Enewetakese from soil contamination has been addressed in thepast. Therefore it should be possib”leto review this material, relate it to potential exposure of the nati’/elifestyles under varying degrees of constraint, derive potential heal :h consequences resulting therefrom, and arrive at some conclusio-nsas to :he acceptability of the clean-up ct-iteria. As of August 11, howeve”, the risk acceptability factor upon wi-lichthe EPA transuranic guidan!;e is based has been challenged within El)A. ORP unofficially advises :hat the guidance itself will not change; Rowe has not yet endorsed this, however. (See accompanying memo). I requested of EPA/ORP an
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that they signed off on the EIS with the caveat “until such time as EPA provides Federal guidance,” or words to that effect. ) Consistently EPA has told ONA and ERDA that Enewetak probably ‘-’ won’t be affected by their guidance; nothing is in writing, hcwever. At the rnommt it is not clear what, if anything, will happen to the TRU guidance, and, despite my request, I do not expect any enlightenment from EPA prior to the meeting next week. They do continue to state, however, chat the current Enewetak criteria are not unreasonable. The second objective may be more difficult, if indeed it is even possible. No one in ERDA knows the details of the military plans for disposal (hence the.briefing on Monday), and there has never been an assessment made of the potential health and environmental consequences of such disposal. In a letter from you to Gen. Johnson dated April 10, 1975, it was stated that we assumed that EPA had done this since they opposed ocean dumping and advocated crater disposal, but we are not aviareof any such assessment. It is unrealistic to expect this review group to make such an assessment in a few days time. However, I expect they will be able to offer an opinion as to the adequacy of the disposal plans, or, perhaps, a statement as to why it is not possible to assess their aaequacy. I feel that we have some”of the best people in the country to this review, and, despite the short notice, time constraints, large quantity of material to digest, I expect they will prov’ with appropriate guidance. Office of Environmental