November (contributed by Kevin Reynolds)... Mr. Frank Munger, a columnist for the Knoxville News Sentinel, was the invited speaker at a joint meeting of the Oak Ridge/Knoxville Section of the American Nuclear Society and the East Tennessee Health Physics Society. Mr. Munger has covered issues involving Oak Ridge, the Department of Energy, and its contractors since the early 1980's. Mr. Munger used a combination of past headlines and old photographs from his past articles to reminisce about his years covering the DOE complex in Oak Ridge. Mr. Munger also entertained questions after his presentation. The topics were both philosophical in nature and tied to current events. Mr. Munger spoke about the role the press plays in influencing public opinion. Mr. Munger also spoke about the recent controversy regarding the DOE's investigation of the news media to determine whether or not they were favorable, neutral, or non-favorable in their reporting.

December... Gordon Fee addressed the Local Section during the December Dinner Meeting at the Oak Ridge Country Club. Mr. Fee discussed the challenges Martin Marietta and the DOE will face in the coming years with respect to expected decreases in federal budgets and an increasing trend toward privatization of DOE resources.

The next SHADES (SHaring ADventures in Engineering and Science) Colloquium is planned for March 16 at Pellissippi State Technical Community College. Anyone wishing to assist with SHADES should contact Peggy Emmett at (423) 574-5276.

January... Dr. Mary Ellen Burger, the Associate Associate Director of the Radiation Emergency Assistance Center/Training Site (REAC/TS) at ORISE, discussed emergency medical aspects of radiation accidents during the January Meeting held at the Italian Market and Grill. Dr. Berger discussed the function of REAC/TS, it's history, and two accidents which occurred in El Salvador and in Brazil. The El Salvador accident involved over- exposure to three individuals who entered an area with an exposed sterilization source. Dr. Berger discussed the medical consequences attributed to their over-exposures. The Brazil accident involved the release of a medical source. The source was widely distributed and resulted in the subsequent contamination of multitudes of people in a large town in Brazil. Dr. Berger discussed various aspects of this accident which had profound medical, economic and societal impacts on the affected town.

............. Robert W. Galvin, who chaired the Task Force on Alternative Futures for the Department of Energy National Laboratories, recently authored an article which appeared in Issues in Science and Technology. In the article, Dr. Galvin discussed his recommendation that the DOE Labs be corporatized.. He noted that micro management, oppressive oversight, compounding regulations, and contradictory directives are suffocating the Labs. Incremental improvements being proposed and implemented by Secretary O'Leary were not seen as being adequate to counteract the waste already in the system. His point being, the system is built on a foundation of corrupted congressional and departmental policies; fine tuning will not repair the foundation.

Dr. Galvin's recommended solution is to corporatize the Labs. In a corporation, the government would retain ownership and continue to fund research. The corporation would be line item funded by Congress for multi-years in each of four to five core areas. The corporation would then fund the Labs to do the work. Micro management or earmarking of funds for specific Labs would not be allowed. Corporatizing is projected to result in a 75% reduction in DOE support personnel, and a 20% reduction in operating costs.

Dr. Galvin concluded that private enterprise is the road out of the abyss the Labs are currently languishing in. Corporatizing would create a structure in which an empowered and quality-based Lab could flourish.

...submitted by Mayme Crowell

The American Nuclear Society (ANS) is celebrating its 40th Anniversary. With little fanfare in the 1950s, Oak Ridge Associated Universities (ORAU), then known as the Oak Ridge Institute for Nuclear Studies (ORINS), along with Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) launched this professional society of the nuclear industry. As early as 1953 discussions began with employees associated with ORNL and ORAU and with others outside of Oak Ridge about the desirability of forming a professional society devoted to nuclear energy. Later that year, a committee was formed to explore the matter formally. The chairman was Jerome Luntz, editor of Nucleonics. Other members included James Lane, ORNL; Alvin Weinberg, ORNL; and William Pollard, ORAU. The work of this committee led to the decision to form the American Nuclear Society. They recognized the need to unify the professional activities within the diverse fields of nuclear science and technology. December 11, 1954 marked ANS's historic beginning at the National Academy of Science in Washington, DC. The first scheduled meeting of the society was in June 1955 at Pennsylvania State University where Pollard was selected to serve on the board of directors. ANS was incorporated with interim officers and provisional by-laws.

W. W. Grigorieff was appointed to serve as the part-time executive secretary of the society with the full-time assistance of his wife, Lilian. ANS headquarters became the ORAU University Relations Division, of which Grigorieff was chairman. By 1958 the society had over 2,000 members, national and foreign. Grigorieff took a leave of absence to go to Vienna, Austria, to work with the International Atomic Energy Agency ((IAEA). At this time a full-time executive director was employed by ANS and its offices were moved to Chicago, Illinois. In 1979, ANS had about 12,000 memebers and a staff of over 60 in La Grange Park Illinois, according to Pollard's ORAU: From the Beginning, published in 1980.

In 1995, ANS is the pre-eminent nuclear industry professional society. It is a not-for-profit, international, scientific and educational organization governed by three officers and a board of directors elected by the membership. It's offices remain in Illinois. Approximately 15,000 individuals representing more than 1,600 corporations, educational institutions, and government agencies belong to ANS. Approximately 1,000 members live overseas in 40 countries. ANS has 18 professional divisions, 52 U.S. and 9 overseas local sections, 23 plant branches, 51 student branches, and 115 organization members. With a staff of 50, ANS conducts biannual professional society meetings with embedded or adjunct topicals and workshops.

ANS's main objective is to promote the advancement of engineering and science relating to the atomic nucleus, and of allied sciences and arts. Other purposes are to integrate the many nuclear science and technology disciplines, encourage research, establish scholarships, disseminate information, hold meetings for the presentation and discussion of scientific and technical papers, and cooperate with government agencies, educational institutions, and other organizations having similar purposes.

...contributed by Dennis Tollefson

The 1998 ANS Annual Meeting is currently scheduled for the Opryland Hotel, June 7- 11, 1998. Unless other circumstances dictate, the following offices/positions are generally supplied by the local section: General Chair (including any assistants); Student Program; Special Events; Media; Technical Tours; Spouse/Guest Program; International Chair (if needed); and Honorary Chair.

Please contact Dennis Tollefson if anyone is interested in these positions.

...contributed by Dennis Tollefson

The Decontamination, Decommissioning, and Reutilization Division of the American Nuclear Society has chosen the Oak Ridge/Knoxville Section to host the DD&R Topical Meeting in 1997. The executive and program committees of DD&R are currently working on obtaining a General Chair and a Technical Program Chair for the meeting. Judy Fissel has shown interest in working on the arrangements and will, hopefully, be confirmed as Arrangements Chair soon. As such, Judy would assume responsibility for completing the hotel arrangements and contract details with the Hyatt-Hotel in Knoxville for the week of September 6-11, 1997. Other committee chairs needed soon are Finance, Publications, Publicity, and Exhibits.

Initial indications are that DD&R wants the Oak Ridge/Knoxville Section to host this meeting every two years in Knoxville. It is intended that this meeting become for decontamination and decommission activities what the Las Vegas meeting has become for High Level Waste.

...contributed by David Moses

Volume 95-2 of The Acorn listed the Local Section comments concerning the draft Programmatic Environmental Impact Statement for Tritium Supply and Recycling. The DOE has since issued the Final Programmatic Environmental Impact Statement for Tritium Supply and Recycling (FPEIS). The FPEIS, unfortunately, does not address many of the Local Section's comments.

Specifically, the DOE appears to have misrepresented the involvement of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) in the FPEIS process. This conclusion was reached after discussions with NRC staff and reviews of public meetings and records maintained by the NRC Public Document Room. Additionally, the DOE classified the lead multiplying blanket and tungsten target as routine low-level radioactive waste even though they will contain substantial quantities of radioactive bismuth, polonium (including polonium-210), mercury- 194, and tritium. The Local Section believes this type of waste stream to be in a category that NRC has called "orphan waste" because it is not covered under the Atomic Energy Act and related legislation. Such waste should have been classified as "special case wastes" and/ or "inherently hazardous special waste" in the DOE internal system and will potentially require disposal in a geologic repository since such wastes are acknowledged elsewhere by DOE to be analogous to NRC-regulated Greater-than-Class-C wastes.

There are approximately eight areas of the FPEIS that the Local Section has taken issue with. For additional information, please contact the Local Section's Technical Information Committee Chair, Dr. David Moses, who is preparing a letter for submission to DOE.

...contributed by Dennis Tollefson

The Radiation Protection and Shielding Division of the American Nuclear Society has chosen the Oak Ridge/Knoxville Section to host the RPSD Topical Meeting in 1998. The General Chair will be Robert Roussin, RSIC, ORNL. Dan Ingersoll of ORNL will be the Technical Program Chair for this meeting. Peggy Emmett will be the Arrangements Chair. Tentative plans are for the meeting to be held in April of 1998, depending somewhat on hotel availability. Also needed are: Finance, Publications, Publicity, Exhibits Chairs, and assistance with Registration. Anyone interested should contact Dan Ingersoll at (423) 574-6102.

The preliminary analysis of the data sent back from the nuclear powered Galileo spacecraft has exceeded all of NASA's optimistic predictions. The $1.5 billion Galileo, named after the 17th century discoverer of Jupiter's moons, is the most expensive and sophisticated spacecraft ever built. The spacecraft's probe successfully entered the atmosphere of Jupiter on December 7th and transmitted data to the Orbiter for 57.6 minutes while withstanding temperatures twice as hot as the sun and deceleration forces up to 280 g's. The probe's communication's system failed 373 miles into the atmosphere, where Jupiter's environment was 305 degrees Fahrenheit with an atmospheric pressure of 23 bars. All of the probes scientific instrumentation operated properly. The initial findings are demonstrating the need to rethink theories on Jupiter's formation and the nature of planetary evolution processes.

The nuclear battery which powers Galileo's navigational and communication instruments is fueled with 49.4 pounds of Plutonium-238, which provides approximately 580 watts of electricity. The cladding for the power supply was developed by Metals & Ceramics Division scientists at ORNL and consists of an iridium alloy containing small amounts of tungsten, aluminum, and thorium. The iridium alloy is extremely tough and will prevent release of plutonium in any worse case shuttle accident. Plutonium generators have been utilized on 23 NASA missions.

If anti-nuclear activists had their way, Galileo's discoveries would not have occurred. Three anti-nuclear organizations sued to prevent the launch in October of 1989. They claimed an accident "could" spread radioactive plutonium over Florida. NASA correctly argued the danger was almost non-existent. U.S. District Judge Oliver Gasch ruled NASA had complied with NEPA, costing the anti-nukes their case. Despite losing their case, the activist vowed to enter the launch area and sit on the launch pad. The shuttle launch occurred under the tightest security ever.