A safety rule that has minimized radiation exposure in the United States for half a century has been marked for elimination by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, and South Shore residents are speaking out to oppose the plan.
The commission has proposed removing the ALARA principle, which requires that radiation exposure in a wide-ranging set of contexts, including medical treatments and nuclear power plants, be kept “as low as is reasonably achievable.”
The mandate to minimize exposure applies even when federal dose limits would allow more radiation.
“CAT scans, and this and that … they are under ALARA, but when this rule goes through, they will not be required to be as low [in radiation exposure],” said Mary Lampert, director of the Duxbury-based activist group Pilgrim Watch. The group’s work focuses on the Pilgrim Nuclear Power Station in Plymouth.
Lampert has submitted one of the more than 300 written comments on the proposal to date. The deadline to comment is Aug. 31.
Under the Nuclear Regulatory Commission plan, radiation exposure would be capped by federal dose limits.
The proposal follows an executive order by President Trump in May of 2025. It criticized both ALARA and the scientific model on which it is based, the linear no-threshold model of radiation risk.
The model posits that a linear relationship exists between radiation dose and health risk — particularly cancer risk — and that there is no threshold below which the risk is zero.
In his executive order, Trump called the model “flawed” and said the Nuclear Regulatory Commission should adopt science-based radiation limits.
Lampert said the idea of relying on federal dose limits assumes, without evidence, that a safe dose of radiation exposure can be determined.
“We are in a different world now, with Trump's multiple orders regarding decreasing safety for reactors,” she said.
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission argues that dropping ALARA would reduce unnecessary ambiguity in federal regulations.
“We’re raising the standard for regulatory clarity, not lowering the standard for safety,” commission Chairman Ho Nieh said in a July 1 press release announcing the plan.
Patrick O’Brien, a spokesperson for Pilgrim owner Holtec International, said making radiation exposure meet the ALARA standard burdens the nuclear industry without improving health or safety.
Federal radiation dose limits for nuclear plant workers (5 rem per year), Holtec’s internal limit for workers (2 rem per year), and the federal limit for the public (0.1 rem per year) would stay unchanged.
“Existing safety margins remain and ensure protection well below levels associated with health risk,” O’Brien said.
But some local residents find little comfort in following existing limits.
Rebecca Chin, who with Lampert chairs the Nuclear Advisory Committee for the town of Duxbury, said current dose limits are not sufficiently protective.
“These radiation protection standards fall short of protecting the most vulnerable to the harmful effects of radiation,” she wrote in a comment submitted through the federal portal.
A July 13 article in the trade publication Nuclear News said the proposed rule would allow radiation workers to receive a higher annual dose without the regulatory exemption employers need under current rules. Exposure can be higher during maintenance periods, for example.
The new proposal would allow radiation workers to receive doses up to twice the annual limit, provided the worker’s five-year average dose remained below the annual limit, Nuclear News reported.
