Oversight: Low-Level Plutonium Spill at NIST-Boulder; Contamination of Lab and Personnel

Opening Statement By Chairman David Wu

I want to welcome everyone to this morning’s hearing.  It’s not unusual for the Subcommittee to hold oversight hearings of NIST.  However, events over the past six months have revealed serious flaws in the environmental, health, and safety programs at NIST.

This Subcommittee has been the strongest champion of NIST in Congress, and its Members have spent a lot of time educating our colleagues on the outstanding scientific and technical work of NIST employees.  On a bipartisan basis, this Subcommittee has championed increased funding for NIST’s scientific and technical activities.

However, along with scientific and technical excellence, NIST needs an equal dedication to safe laboratory practices.  This is especially true at the NIST labs where staff routinely work with hazardous materials and high powered equipment, such as radioactive material and lasers.  In the past six months, NIST has had two significant accidents.

The first involved the use of a laser in Gaithersburg, Maryland, and the second was the accidental release of plutonium in Boulder, Colorado.  Initial investigations revealed the same basic issue in both cases – a lack of training for the researchers performing the experiments and inadequate laboratory safety policies.

These might sound like minor incidents, but they have had medical ramifications for NIST employees, including one person who experienced eye damage from the laser and another who underwent prophylactic treatment for radiation exposure.

I am concerned that the laser event did not trigger an immediate review of all of NIST’s safety training which might have prevented the accident in June.  I am also concerned that NIST did not act on the Visiting Committee on Advanced Technology’s 2006 recommendation that management needed to be more involved in, and place more emphasis on, environmental, health, and safety issues.

The purpose of today’s hearing is not to place blame; it is to understand how this situation developed and what needs to be done to instill a culture of safety in the NIST labs, while maintaining scientific excellence.  I especially want to thank our outside experts for assisting the Subcommittee in its endeavors.  I now recognize my friend from Georgia, the Subcommittee Ranking Member, Dr. Gingrey, for his opening statement.

Witnesses

Panel

1 - Dr. James Turner
Acting Director National Institute of Standards and Technology National Institute of Standards and Technology
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2 - Dr. Charles Miller
Director of the Office of Federal and State Materials and Environmental Management Programs Nuclear Regulatory Commission Nuclear Regulatory Commission
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3 - Mr. Elmo Collins
Regional Administrator Region IV Office Nuclear Regulatory Commission Region IV Office Nuclear Regulatory Commission
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4 - Dr. Kenneth Rogers
Member of the Panel Investigating the Boulder Plutonium Incident Former Commissioner, Nuclear Regulatory Commission Former Commissioner, Nuclear Regulatory Comm
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