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Yesterday, POGO sent a letter to the Department of Energy's (DOE) Office of Health, Safety, and Security (HSS) urging it to provide oversight and enforcement of Oak Ridge National Laboratory's (ORNL) beryllium exposure prevention policies. These policies were designed to prevent Lab workers' exposure to beryllium, which can lead to the development of the incurable and potentially fatal lung disease, chronic beryllium disease. Recently, POGO received a tip that ORNL is not in compliance with its beryllium prevention plan. ORNL's plan was born out of Beryllium Controls at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory (IG-737), a damning 2006 DOE Inspector General (IG) report which found that ORNL "did not properly manage activities relating to beryllium contamination." In our letter, we expressed concern that HSS did not follow up on these issues when they were previously brought to the office's attention.

In the latest issue of the journal Public Health Reports, there is debate about the role that beryllium giant Brush Wellman played in stalling OSHA action on beryllium, and whether Brush waged a public relations campaign to minimize the hazards of the toxic metal. In an article in the January-February 2008 issue of Public Health Reports, David Michaels and Celeste Monforton of the Project on Scientific Knowledge and Public Policy (SKAPP) explored how the beryllium industry fought efforts to lower workplace beryllium exposure limits, first by the Department of Energy (DOE) and then by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA). In "Beryllium's Public Relations Problem: Protecting Workers When There is No Safe Exposure Level," Michaels and Monforton criticized Brush Wellman for its efforts to prevent these agencies from lowering exposure limits for beryllium.

"The Hanford Advisory Board is questioning whether the Department of Energy is doing enough to protect Hanford workers from an incurable lung disease caused by exposure to beryllium. DOE officials in Washington, D.C., are about to launch a review of the Hanford beryllium protection program because of the concerns of some workers. But by the time that review is finished, three more cases of chronic beryllium disease could be diagnosed if current trends continue, said board member Mike Korenko at a meeting Thursday of the advisory board in Kennewick. "How can you not look at that data and have adrenaline flowing?" he asked Doug Shoop, deputy manager of the DOE Hanford Richland Operations Office. Ten months have passed since the advisory board last recommended that DOE improve its beryllium protection program, and since then three more Hanford cases of chronic beryllium disease have been verified. That brings the total with the disease to 32 and the number of workers determined to be sensitized to beryllium to 95, up from 88."

"Some people sickened by beryllium say the toxic metal is finally getting adequate attention at the Hanford Nuclear Reservation. The Department of Energy has completed a long-awaited report on workers' exposure to beryllium. But the document has not yet been made public. Beryllium is a light-weight metal that was used to seal radioactive rods. In fine particles it can get into the lungs. Craig Hall worked at Hanford. He was diagnosed with Chronic Beryllium Disease more than 10 years ago. Since then he's been warning of the dangers of beryllium, but says he was ignored. Now a federal investigation has resulted in a 100-page draft report by the Department of Energy's Office of Health Safety and Security. Hall was one of the few people who were allowed to see it this week. Hall says he thinks the findings could have been more critical of Hanford managers. But he says the issue has reached a tipping point."

Beryllium is a remarkable metal. It is stiffer than steel, lighter than aluminum, and causes chronic beryllium disease at very low levels of exposure. It is also causes cancer in humans. There is no evidence of a safe exposure level. Beryllium has long been employed in nuclear and defense operations, and is now being used in bicycle frames and other consumer products. The current OSHA workplace exposure standard was developed in a 1948 discussion held in the back seat of a taxi by two Atomic Energy Commission scientists - for this reason it is known as the "taxicab standard". This standard is widely acknowledged to be insufficiently protective, and workers exposed to levels below the standard have developed beryllium-related disease.

"Washington Closure Hanford has stopped work at 27 buildings at Hanford as it makes sure they have no beryllium contamination. The 27 buildings are among a couple of hundred under the contractor's control and have not been sampled for beryllium, in some cases because they are new structures. An independent inspection released by the Department of Energy Office of Health, Safety and Security on June 2 found a new sitewide program to prevent chronic beryllium disease at Hanford had shortcomings. As it became clear during the inspection this spring that improvements were needed, DOE Hanford officials instructed the site's environmental cleanup contractors to take actions, such as completing sampling for beryllium at any facility where it is required."

Too few workers at the Hanford nuclear reservation are being tested for exposure to beryllium, a metal that can cause fatal lung diseases, according to an Energy Department advisory panel. Based on the number of affected workers, beryllium is a greater safety risk at the Eastern Washington complex than radiation, according to Hanford Advisory Board recommendations issued during meetings Thursday and Friday in Portland, Ore. To date, 4,538 Hanford employees have had blood tests for beryllium sensitivity or disease, and 27 have been diagnosed with chronic beryllium disease, an incurable lung ailment that afflicts workers who develop an allergy-like sensitivity to the light, gray-colored metal. Six of those cases have been diagnosed since 2007.

A team of outside experts audited beryllium work at Lawrence Livermore Laboratory last month and federal regulators are set to follow up with their own review in September. Some of the incidents involved workers being unknowingly exposed to beryllium dust, which if inhaled can lead to beryllium sensitivity and chronic beryllium disease, an incurable and potentially fatal lung condition. In one of the incidents, the lab failed for five months to notify 178 contract workers

1999: After five decades of denial, the U.S. government owns up to poisoning thousands of defense, aerospace and atomic energy workers by exposing them to beryllium. President Bill Clinton asks Congress to enact legislation to compensate the sickened workers and their survivors. The element beryllium (Be, atomic number 4) is a Group 2 alkaline earth metal, the lightest of the family that includes magnesium, calcium, strontium, barium and radium. Because of its low weight, high melting point, resistance to corrosion, great strength and good electrical conductivity, it's widely used in electronics, aerospace, atomic energy and defense. Other applications are in precision machining and die casting, molding plastics, and making dental plates and X-ray tubes.

"An investigative branch of the U.S. Department of Energy told a group of citizen advisors Tuesday that it's launching an inspection into beryllium exposure at the Hanford Nuclear Reservation. It's a metal that can be inhaled into people's lungs. One of the people in the audience in Richland was Tom Peterson. He got sick in 1993 from beryllium. Now, Peterson wears an oxygen tank where ever he goes. He says he's skeptical of the federal investigation but hopes it could lead to help for his friends. Tom Peterson: "I'm not going to see any benefits but, I have a lot of friends who are working on site. I even have a brother that is working on site that don't need to go through what I'm going through. It's too late for me, but if I can help others, I'll get some satisfaction from that." Dozens of workers have been exposed to beryllium on Hanford."

"An Energy Department review has concluded that a program for protecting workers from a toxic metal at the nation's most contaminated nuclear site has a number of weaknesses and could have been implemented more quickly. An Energy Department review has concluded that a program for protecting workers from a toxic metal at the nation's most contaminated nuclear site has a number of weaknesses and could have been implemented more quickly. However, the review released Wednesday also found the beryllium program is an improvement over past practices. Beryllium was used in the production of reactor fuel at south-central Washington's Hanford nuclear reservation, and dust remains in some buildings. Worker safety groups have raised concerns that workers have not been adequately protected from exposure to beryllium, which can cause a lung disease."

"Beryllium is making too many people sick at the Hanford Nuclear Reservation. That's according to a group of stakeholders that advises the Department of Energy (DOE) on how to manage the site. Last Friday, the group asked the federal government for an independent review to find out what's going on with the toxic metal at Hanford. The Department of Energy says it actually has stricter standards than OSHA on exposure to beryllium. But many representatives on the Hanford Advisory Board say they are distressed that workers are still getting sick. Beryllium was used to seal nuclear fuel rods during WWII and the Cold War in many buildings throughout the Hanford site. People get sick when they get tiny particles of the metal in their lungs or absorb it through wounds. More than 30 workers have become sick so far. "

The safety and health community shouldn't hold out hope for the long-sought beryllium exposure standard to be issued by OSHA in the final days of the Bush administration. The latest Department of Labor semiannual regulatory agenda, which was published this week, lists one more step in its evolution - a March 2009 completion of a peer review of health effects and risk assessment - but nothing further, such as an NPRM. The agency says it has been working on this rule for more than six years. In 1999 and 2001, the Paper Allied-Industrial, Chemical, and Energy Workers Union, Public Citizen Health Research Group, and others petitioned OSHA to regulate worker exposures to beryllium via an emergency temporary standard.

New study of Y-12 employees blames exposure, genetics OAK RIDGE - Results from a new study involving beryllium workers at the Y-12 nuclear weapons plant reinforce what's long been conjectured about the cause of beryllium disease - it's likely a combination of a person's genetics and his or her exposures to the toxic metal. "Genetics loads the gun, but the environment pulls the trigger," Dr. Lisa Maier, a physician at National Jewish Health in Denver and leader of the project, said Monday at Y-12's New Hope Center.

In the latest issue of the journal Public Health Reports, there is debate about the role that beryllium giant Brush Wellman played in stalling OSHA action on beryllium, and whether Brush waged a public relations campaign to minimize the hazards of the toxic metal.

Kelye Allen still speaks with pride about her 18-year career with Lawrence Livermore Laboratory, where she worked as a machinist helping to build components for nuclear weapons. A feeling of patriotism and duty animates the workforce there, Allen said. "You want to protect the country," she said. "Stuff we do there directly affects national security." Along with her enduring pride, however, Allen is left with a permanent health condition from her work with a prized but hazardous metal called beryllium. The Department of Energy, which oversees the lab, is currently conducting an enforcement investigation into whether the lab violated health and safety regulations related to its chronic beryllium disease prevention program.

That's how much time has passed since Lockheed Martin Corp. discovered an underground plume of toxic waste beneath an old beryllium plant it owned in Tallevast. And nearly a year has passed since Lockheed submitted its revised clean-up plan to state environmentalists, claiming it would take more than a half-century to clean up the spill. TIFFANY TOMPKINS-CONDIE/ttompkins@bradenton.com Tallevast Road through the small community greatly affected by the dangerous chemicals released from the old beryllium plant. Buy it: Order this photo now Buy it: Order this photo now Buy it: Order this photo now Buy it: Order this photo now Buy it: Order this photo now Buy it: Order this photo now CLICK FOR MORE PHOTOS * * * * * * * Tallevast * Tallevast Special Section While limited clean-up of the beryllium plant campus is under way, the final clean-up plan still awaits state approval. The Department of Environmental Protection has sent Lockheed back to the drawing boards three times in the past nine months with requests for more information and modification.

"A worker says she suffered permanent respiratory damage from working with a saw containing beryllium, a toxic chemical. Lisa Monahan says she was overcome by toxic fumes from the saw blade that her employer, Richardson Trident Co., bought from Metal Saw Systems. Monahan says in her federal complaint that Metal Saw Systems "installed the saw in the facility at plaintiff's employer and was negligent in failing to install a proper exhaust device when it knew or should have known that using beryllium copper blades would emit fumes throughout the facility."

Free health screenings, available through the University of Iowa, for those who worked for the Department of Defense at the Iowa Army Ammunition Plant, will wrap up in the next two to three months, and researchers are looking for another 200 participants. The program, initiated about two years ago, includes screening of sensitization to beryllium alloy and also aims to assess exposure to beryllium alloys among conventional weapons workers at the plant.

A Marion, Ohio, company that bills itself as the "World's Largest Manufacturer of Beryllium Copper Plunger Tips" has been charged by U.S. OSHA with repeat violations of standards to protect workers from overexposure to beryllium. OSHA says it opened its inspection in October 2007 to determine if the company had corrected safety hazards found during a 2005 inspection. According to OSHA, the company had not righted the problems.