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Nashua Telegraph - Tuesday, October 23, 2012


Radioactive element found at safe levels in NH fish in first round of tests

By DAVID BROOKS
Staff Writer

Courtesy photo
Vermont Yankee Nuclear Power plant uses the Connecticut River for cooling. A leak of tritium-contaminated cooling water in 2010 led to concerns that radioactivity might enter the food chain.

Fish tested in New Hampshire have safe levels of the radioactive element strontium-90, whose presence in the food chain became a concern after the release of tritium from the Vermont Yankee Nuclear Power Plant in January 2010.
The state Public Health Lab said 17 samples of largemouth bass taken from Hermit Lake in Sanbornton in May had levels of the isotope “well below the FDA level of concern for consumption. Both edible (flesh) and inedible (bones, head, scales, guts) portions are being tested as part of the study.”
More fish are being tested, including samples from fish caught in September at fishing derbies around the state.
The derbies involved the Nashua River in Nashua, Lake Winnipesaukee and Squam Lake. The final sampling will be completed in May.
The idea of testing fish in these bodies of water, which are not connected to the Connecticut River, is to establish baseline levels of strontium-90, so that any contamination from the power plant can be measured.
The Connecticut River is used by Vermont Yankee for cooling water.
Strontium-90 is a radioactive isotope that is part of fallout from atmospheric nuclear bomb testing and the Chernobyl incident. These tests have led strontium-90 to be part of background environment of so-called radionuclides, or atoms undergoing radioactive decay.
In 2010, Vermont collected and tested a fish that was caught approximately 8 miles upstream from the Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant. The fish was found to have a slightly elevated level of strontium-90, although the level was below the FDA safe limit for fish consumption.
“This was when the three states recognized the need to define the environmental levels of strontium-90 in fish,” said the New Hampshire Department of Health and Human Service press office in a release. “A multistate project is under way to evaluate these background levels in fish found in freshwater bodies in northern New England that are not connected to the Connecticut River and therefore are not part of a water body that passes by a nuclear power plant. Knowing these background levels will help allow states to compare any future findings with levels that are expected.”
Testing is done in partnership with the Food and Drug Administration’s Winchester Engineering and Analytical Center laboratory.
David Brooks can be reached at 594-6531 or dbrooks@nashua telegraph.com. Also, follow Brooks’ blog on Twitter (@GraniteGeek).