At Columbia Generating Station, we use the LMP-2000 & 3000 for carbon filter testing. These generally-licensed devices contain EC detectors with 300 mCi tritium foil sources. The LMP units are occasionally shipped back to the manufacturer for repair or source replacement. Our internal auditors identified a gap in in our shipments of the LMPs in that smears taken to ensure that the 49 CFR 173.443 contamination limits are met were being counted with a standard hand-held pancake frisker, which of course wouldn't be able to detect tritium. The questions we would like some benchmarking on are then:
1) The LMP units are excepted from semi-annual leak testing by 10 CFR 31.5(c)(2)(ii) - does any know if there's a similar exception or exemption in the DOT regs for the surface contamination measurements? 2) Do you use LSC or some other method for counting tritium smears? Thanks in advance for your response, Michael J. McLain Principal Health Physicist Columbia Generating Station [email protected]<mailto:[email protected]> 509-377-2062
