ILLINOIS POLLUTION CONTROL BOARD
    June 20, 1991
    CITY OF DEKALB,
    )
    )
    Petitioner,
    V.
    )
    PCB 91—34
    )
    (Variance)
    ILLINOIS ENVIRONMENTAL
    )
    PROTECTION AGENCY,
    )
    )
    Respondent.
    DISSENTING OPINION (by J.D. Duinelle):
    The water supply of the City of DeKaib has a combined radium
    content of 9.8 pCi/i. That is almost exactly twice the 5 pCi/i
    USEPA standard currently in force.
    The risk to all of the people (including the students at
    Northern Illinois University) of contracting head or bone cancer
    is thus twice the risk if the water were at the standard. The risk
    at the standard is l-in—14,300 over a 70—year lifetime. DeKaib’s
    water, with twice the risk, is then about 1-in-7,000. (The risk
    levels are contained in Dr. wiiiram H. Hallenbeck’s paper
    “Risk
    Analysis of Exposure to Radirnn-226/228 in Groundwater” published
    in The Environmental Professional, Vol. 11, pp. 171—177).
    When the USEPA sets limits for pesticide residues and for
    other chemicals it commonly uses a lifetime risk of l-in—l,000,000.
    The DeKalb risk of l-in-7,000 is thus 143 times greater than the
    usual risk used for many other chemicals.
    But that 1-in-7,000 risk may be even greater for two groups
    of DeKaib’s population. Three separate research papers point to
    “young children”, “young people”, and children in “periods of rapid
    growth” (“0-1 yr. and 10-16 yr.”) i~sbeing at even greater risk.
    (~
    Background Document on Radium in Drinking Water, Illinois
    Department of Nuclear Safety, August 25, 1986, p. 5). How much
    greater that risk is to these children ~weare not told but it is
    greater than l—in-7.000.
    An additional concern besides head cancer and bone cancer is
    leukemia. A 1985 paper, “Association of Leukemia with Radium
    Groundwater Contamination” by Lyman, et al (Journal of the American
    Medical Association) shows a correlation between high radium
    content in water and leukemia. Unfortunately, no one seems to have
    replicated the study in Illinois.
    On June 10, 1991 an article in the. Aurora Beacon-News gave
    actual or projected costs for 8 communities to bring their radium
    levels down to the 5 pCi/i standard.
    2
    The table below lists them alphabetically and the per capita
    capita cost is computed. Census figures for 1980 are used except
    in Aurora’s case where the 1990 estimate is given.
    CITY
    COST
    POPULATION
    COST PER CAPITA
    Aurora
    $23,300,000
    99,500
    $
    245
    Batavia
    4,200,000
    13,758
    306
    Channahon
    500,000
    3,788
    132
    Elburn
    1,400,000
    1,224
    1,143
    Geneva
    ~,000,000
    9,881
    507
    Morris
    600,000
    8,833
    68
    Ottawa~
    983,000
    18,166
    54
    Wilmington
    2,500,000
    4,424
    565
    Note that with the exception of Elburn all of the communities
    have per capita costs of $565 of less. In addition to these 8
    communities which authorized their projects to reduce radium levels
    there are two major regional water supply projects that will be on-
    line about April, 1992 that also reduce existing radium levels.
    These two projects are the DuPage Water Commission’s
    $350,000,000 system to supply Lake Michigan water to 27 communities
    with 750,000 people (per capita cost of $467) and the Central Lake
    County Joint Action Water Agency’s $103,200,000 system serving 8
    communities with 250,000 people (per capita cost of $413) also
    supplying Lake Michigan water.
    DeKaib should intensively study the various options to reduce
    the radium levels in its water. A risk of l-in—7,000 is simply too
    great for the public to bear. And that risk is even higher for
    infants and children.
    On July 18, 1991 the Federal Register finally published the
    USEPA’s proposed relaxation of the radium standards for drinking
    water. The new risk estimate for 5 pCi/l of either radium isotope
    seems to be l-in—50,000 as compared to the l—in—14,300 mentioned
    earlier. The basis for loosening the risk estimate by a factor of
    3 is not given but is contained in the “Criteria Document” which
    is not readily available. 56FR33073. Even using the new risk
    estimates, DeKaib’s water would have a lifetime risk for cancer of
    l—in—25,000 or 40 times greater than the usual l—in—1,000,000.
    3
    A duty of a city or a state government is to protect its
    people. I urge DeKalb to deeply consider the excessive health
    risks to its citizens from the radium content of its water.
    /,/
    Jacob D. Dumelle, P.E.
    Board Member
    I,
    Dorothy
    N.
    Gunn, Clerk of the
    Illinois
    Pollution Control
    Board hereby certify ~hat the above
    Opinion was
    submitted on the
    ~
    -
    day of
    ,,
    1991.
    //~
    ~
    .lution Control Board

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