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U.S. Ill-Prepared for “Dirty Bomb” Testing, EPA Says By Jon Fox WASHINGTON — With current capabilities, it could take the United States up two years to test the hundreds of thousands of environmental samples needed to assess long-term radiation contamination following a “dirty bomb” attack, officials said yesterday (see GSN, June 13). A recent analysis by the Environmental Protection Agency found that the nation faces a significant capacity shortage when it comes to the laboratories equipped to carry out the type of radiological environmental testing necessary. “The gap will result in a lack of timely, reliable and interpretable data which will delay national and local response and consequence management activities,” Dana Tulis, the EPA deputy director of emergency management, told the House Science and Technology oversight subcommittee. The gap Tulis described is based on the government’s response to a single device with a radioactive source composed of a single radionuclide that would be dispersed by conventional explosives. A more complex source, or a response to multiple dirty bomb attacks in multiple cities as described in a White House planning scenario, would result in an even larger gulf between needed laboratory capacity and what is available, Tulis said. In the wake of a dirty bomb attack, testing of environmental samples would be necessary to determine the inhabitability of areas believed to be contaminated and to test the efficacy of decontamination efforts. An estimated 350,000 samples would need to be tested if just one bomb went off in an urban business area, Tulis said. She did not offer specific figures on current laboratory capacity or what exactly would be needed following a radiological incident. While the Environmental Protection Agency has not conducted a detailed assessment, she suggested in her testimony that responding to an improvised nuclear device would dwarf the laboratory needs related to a dirty bomb. The area of contamination could cover 3,000 square miles and necessitate millions of laboratory tests, according to Tulis. In addition to a capacity gulf, the EPA analysis also revealed what officials described as capability and competency gaps. In terms of capability, there is a lack of rapid radiochemical analysis methods and laboratory protocols designed specifically for response to a radiological or nuclear event. The competency gap is a result of a declining radiological laboratory infrastructure and a declining number of radiochemical experts who could analyze material used in a weapon (see GSN, Oct. 11). Tulis told Representative Brad Miller (D-N.C.), committee chairman and the only member present during the majority of the hearing, that the Environmental Protection Agency is working with Homeland Security Department and other agencies to improve capacities through a pilot initiative involving two laboratories. “How long is this pilot going to go on before you take it to the scale necessary?” Miller asked. Tulis responded that it could take as long as five years before the federal laboratory infrastructure is in a position to adequately respond to a single dirty bomb event, such as the type simulated in the recently completed TOPOFF 4, exercise (see GSN, Oct. 22). The pilot program, Tulis said, is “a way to get out there and start to develop capacity at this point.” Miller expressed concern that the “The material is out there. It is not secure. It could happen tomorrow. It could happen this afternoon,” he said. “We are woefully short of the level of preparation I assumed we would have given how clearly this threat was communicated.” Ultimately, a lack of data would result in “heightened public concern and panic and really a demand for answers,” John Griggs, head of the EPA monitoring branch, told Miller. In addition to environmental samples which would determine whether residents could safely return to an affected area, the nation’s capability to test human exposure to radiological contaminants is severely limited, Robert Jones, head of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s radiation toxicology branch, told the committee. Current methods are slow, taking between five and 30 days to process a radionuclide analysis in a urine sample; only a few labs can conduct such work and only at a rate of about 20 samples per day; and each sample requires about half a gallon of urine. Unfortunately, testing today is only available for a few radionuclides that could be used in a weapon. The Centers for Disease Control has “some limited capacity” to test for only five sources of radiation in urine, Jones said. The agency is working to develop a system that would provide results within 24 hours of receiving a sample and would require smaller amounts of urine. The new system in development would also screen for 13 different “priority radionuclides,” Jones said in his testimony.
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