Pubhc safety

The requirement for an explosive train, that is, a primary explosive to initiate the secondary explosive, is a safety feature. In the past, people wishing to illegally use explosives usually had to steal the detonators (e.g., Timothy McVey). Consequently, the effective control of access to detonators has been widely regarded as a key pubhc safety measure by many governments and law enforcement agencies. However, recently, triacetone triperoxide (TATP) has been used as the primary explosive (e.g., Richard Reid s shoe bomb) and TATP is readily, although hazardously, synthesized from acetone, hydrogen peroxide, and acid. 

The unusual danger to pubHc safety in the case of peroxide explosives is not their explosive performance but their ease of initiation and the ease with which terrorists have acquired and used the materials for their synthesis, although synthesis is actually quite hazardous. Both TATP and HMTD are classed as primary explosives. For example, Richard Reid, the would-be shoe bomber, used TATP as part of his firing train in the attempted bombing of a US airfiner in December 2001, or the use of HMTD in the London bombings of 7 July 2005. HMTD was also one of the materials prepared and carried over the US/Canadian border in December 1999 by Ahmed Ressam as the ingredient for the initiators of his devices. 

National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health. Guidelines for Prevention of Transmission of Human Immunodeficiency Virus and Hepatitis B Virus of Health-Care and Pubhc Safety Workers. DHSS (NIOSH) Pubhcation No. 89-107. Washington DC ... 

Other matters as justice and pubhc safety may require. 

Because chemistry is so central to our lives, reports on matters of chemical significance appear in the news nearly every day. Some reports teU of breakthroughs in the development of new pharmaceuticals, materials, and processes. Others deal with energy, environmental, and pubhc safety issues. As you study chemistry you will develop the skills to better understand the importance of chemistry in yourhfe. Here are summaries of a few recent stories in which chemistry plays an important role. 

Most telephone companies can designate as an essential service a limited block of telephone numbers at a given location for lifeline communications. Lines so designated are usually found at hospitals and pubHc safety headquarters. Contact your local phone company representative to see if your facility can qualify. Many broadcasters who have close ties to local government emergency management should easily qualify. 

The table refers transportation carriers and shippers to Emergency Response Guide (ERG) number 154, governing toxic and/or corrosive (non-combustible) substances. The ERG covers potential hazards to health and fire/explosion pubhc safety in regards to first steps when a spill occurs, protective clothing and evacuation procedure and emergency responses to fire, spills, leaks, and first aid. 

Univo sity of Delaware, Office of Campus and Pubhc Safety, Department of Environmental, Health, and Safety. Laboratory Incidents at the University of Delaware Research - Splashes Nitric Acid on Face http7/www.udel.edu/ehs/research/downloads/nitricacidsplash.pdf, (accessed Jan 2015). 

Courtney, W.J. Kalkbrenner, D. Yie, G. 1977. Effectiveness of Programs for Prevention of Damage to Pipelines by Outside Eorces. Pinal Report DOT/NTB/OPSO-77/12. Washington, DC U.S. Department of Transportation, Materials Transportation Bureau, Office of Pipeline Safety Operations contract DOT-OS-60521. 290 p. (The Office of Pipeline Safety Operations later became the Office of Pipehne Safety within the DOT S Research and Special Programs Administration.) Transportation Research Board, National Research Council. 1988. Pipelines and Pubhc Safety. Special Report 219. Washington, DC. 

Chapter 140 - Pubhc Safety/Emergency Response Right to Know... 

The two levels of NAAQS, primary and secondary, are Hsted in Table 3. Primary standards were set to protect pubHc health within an adequate margin of safety secondary standards, where appHcable, were chosen to protect pubHc welfare, including vegetation. According to the CAA, the scientific bases for the NAAQS are to be reviewed every 5 years so that the NAAQS levels reflect current knowledge. In practice, however, the review cycle takes considerably longer. 

Once a substance is designated by EPA as a ha2ardous air pollutant (HAP), EPA has to promulgate a NESHAP (National Emission Standard for Ha2ardous Air Pollutants), designed to protect pubHc health with an ample margin of safety. 

The most popular natural antioxidants on the market are rosemary extracts and tocopherols. Natural antioxidants have several drawbacks which limit use. Tocopherols are not as effective ia vegetable fats and oils as they are ia animal fats. Herb extracts often impart undesirable colors or flavors ia the products where used. In addition, natural antioxidants cost considerably more than synthetic ones. Despite this, the pubHc s uncertainty of the safety of synthetic antioxidants continues to fuel the demand for natural ones (21). 

The development of malathion in 1950 was an important milestone in the emergence of selective insecticides. Malathion is from one-half to one-twentieth as toxic to insects as parathion but is only about one two-hundredths as toxic to mammals. Its worldwide usage in quantities of thousands of metric tons in the home, garden, field, orchard, woodland, on animals, and in pubHc health programs has demonstrated substantial safety coupled with pest control effectiveness. The biochemical basis for the selectivity of malathion is its rapid detoxication in the mammalian Hver, but not in the insect, through the attack of carboxyesterase enzymes on the aUphatic ester moieties of the molecule. 

The latest government regulations set forth under the Toxic Substances Control Act and in PubHc Health Service pubHcations should be checked before formulating new lubricants. Users of lubricants should request Material Safety Data Sheets for each substance involved plus certification of compliance from vendors. Lubricant compounders should insist on similar information from their suppHers for any additive packages. Manufacturers of both additives and lubricants commonly make toxicity checks on commercial products. 

The American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) United Engineering Center 345 East 47th Street New York, NY 10017 The ASME Boiler and Pressure Vessel Code, under the cognisance of the ASME PoHcy Board, Codes, and Standards, considers the interdependence of design procedures, material selection, fabrication procedures, inspection, and test methods that affect the safety of boilers, pressure vessels, and nuclear-plant components, whose failures could endanger the operators or the pubHc (see Nuclearreactors). It does not cover other aspects of these topics that affect operation, maintenance, or nonha2ardous deterioration. 

R. J. Lewis, Sr. and R. L. Tatkin, eds.. Registry of Toxic Effects of Chemical Substances, 8th ed.. National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, Pubhc Health Service Center for Disease Control, U.S. Government Printing Office, Washington, D.C., 1979. 

The Hanford N Reactor. The Hanford N reactor was built in 1964 for purposes of plutonium production during the Cold War. It used graphite as moderator, pierced by over 1000 Zircaloy 2 tubes. These pressure tubes contained slightly enriched uranium fuel cooled by high temperature light water. The reactor also provided 800 MWe to the Washington PubHc Power Supply System. This reactor was shut down in 1992 because of age and concern for safety. The similarity to the Chemobyl-type reactors played a role in the decision. 

The safety record for transport of radioactive materials including spent fuel and wastes is excellent. Information about transportation of radioactive materials including waste is managed by DOE. Codes such as RADTRAN that can calculate pubHc radiation dose owing to the passage of shipments have been developed. The maximum dosage from such shipments is a very small fraction of the typical annual radiation dose from all other sources. 

The accident at the Three Mile Island (TMI) plant in Pennsylvania in 1979 led to many safety and environmental improvements (4—6). No harm from radiation resulted to TMI workers, to the pubHc, or to the environment (7,8), although the accident caused the loss of a 2 x 10 investment. The accident at the Chernobyl plant in the Ukraine in 1986, on the other hand, caused the deaths of 31 workers from high doses of radiation, increased the chance of cancer later in life for thousands of people, and led to radioactive contamination of large areas. This latter accident was unique to Soviet-sponsored nuclear power. The Soviet-designed Chemobyl-type reactors did not have the intrinsic protection against a mnaway power excursion that is requited in the test of the world, not was there a containment building (9—11). 

If possible comparisons are focused on energy systems, nuclear power safety is also estimated to be superior to all electricity generation methods except for natural gas (30). Figure 3 is a plot of that comparison in terms of estimated total deaths to workers and the pubHc and includes deaths associated with secondary processes in the entire fuel cycle. The poorer safety record of the alternatives to nuclear power can be attributed to fataUties in transportation, where comparatively enormous amounts of fossil fuel transport are involved. Continuous or daily refueling of fossil fuel plants is required as compared to refueling a nuclear plant from a few tmckloads only once over a period of one to two years. This disadvantage appHes to solar and wind as well because of the necessary assumption that their backup power in periods of no or Httie wind or sun is from fossil-fuel generation. Now death or serious injury has resulted from radiation exposure from commercial nuclear power plants in the United States (31). 

The sum total of risks of the nuclear fuel cycle, most of which are associated with conventional industrial safety, are greater than those associated with nuclear power plant operation (30,35—39). However, only 1% of the radiological risk is associated with the nuclear fuel cycle so that nuclear power plant operations are the dominant risk (40). Pubhc perception, however, is that the disposition of nuclear waste poses the dominant risk. 

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