About TAP

The Tritium Awareness Project is an initiative of the Canadian Coalition for Nuclear Responsibility, Concerned Citizens of Renfrew County le Movement Vert Mauricie and other groups.

TAP aims to raise awareness about tritium, demystify the nature of this dangerous material for public and politicians alike, and tighten standards and reduce emissions and exposures of Canadians to tritium.

The TAP steering committee is comprised of the following members:  Gordon Edwards, President of the Canadian Coalition for Nuclear Responsibility, Bob Del Tredici of the Atomic Photographers Guild, Michel Duguay  of Laval University, Michel Fugere of le Movement Vert Mauricie and Lynn Jones of Concerned Citizens of Renfrew County.

In Memorium

Rosalie Bertell, PhD     Founding TAP advisory board member Dr. Rosalie Bertell, passed away on June 14, 2012. Rosalie was an inspiration to many and as TAP founding member Gordon Edwards wrote she was “A giant in the struggle to illuminate our hearts and minds”.  Rosalie was a member of the Grey Nuns of the Sacred Heart. She received her doctorate degree in Biometrics with minors in Biology and Biochemistry from the Catholic University of America in 1966. After receiving her doctorate, she worked as a biometrician and environmental epidemiologist. From 1969 to 1978 Dr. Bertell was senior cancer research scientist at Roswell Park Memorial Institute. She served as a consultant to the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission, the US Environmental Protection Agency, and to Health Canada. Other appointments included being a member of the Science Advisory Board of the US-Canada International Joint Commission on the Great Lakes, and Co-Chair of the Working Group on Ecosystem Health. She participated in joint research with the Japanese Association of Scientists, the Institute for Energy and Environment in Germany, the people of Rongelap Atoll in the Republic of the Marshall Islands, the Consumers Association of Penang, Malaysia, and the Centre for Industrial Safety and Environmental Concerns in Quilan, India. Dr. Bertell was the founding President of the International Institute of Concern for Public Health and she authored Handbook for Estimating the Health Effects of Ionizing Radiation (1984, 1986) and the popular non-fiction book: No Immediate Danger: Prognosis for a radioactive Earth. She was the recipient of numerous awards and five honorary Doctorate degrees.

Rosalie’s contribution to the knowledge and understanding of tritium’s hazards was invaluable. We miss her a great deal, but her spirit remains alive and active here at the Tritium Awareness Project and throughout the world. Tribute to Rosalie on the TAP website here.

Read Rosalie’s 2006 written intervention to the CNSC on the Health Effects of Tritium here and here on the TAP website.

 

Meet the TAP Advisory Board:

 

Michael A. Dworkind, MD received his Medical Degree in 1974 from the McGill Medical School. Dr. Dworkind is Associate Professor of Family Medicine at the McGill School of Medicine, a fellow of the College of Family Physicians of Canada and an associate of the McGill Cancer Prevention Unit; ionizing radiation division. He is full-time senior academic staff at the Sir Mortimer B. Davis Jewish General Hospital (JGH) and Herzl Family Practice Centre and current President of Physicians for Global Survival.

 

Ian Fairlie, PhD is an independent consultant on radioactivity in the environment. He has degrees in chemistry and radiation biology. His PhD studies at Imperial College in London, UK, examined the radiological impacts of emissions from nuclear facilities. He has worked for several UK Government departments and regulatory agencies, and between 2001 and 2004 he was Secretariat to the UK Government’s Committee Examining the Radiation Risks of Internal Emitters (CERRIE) (www.cerrie.org). He has written extensively on the radiological hazards of environmental releases of radioactive isotopes including tritium. He currently advises environmental NGOs and the European Commission.

 

Dorothy Goldin Rosenberg, PhD, MES holds a Masters in Environmental Studies from York University and a PhD in Environmental Education from the University of Toronto. She teaches at the University of Toronto and researches, writes and speaks on environmental health. She produced the documentary video, Exposure: Environmental Links to Breast Cancer. Her latest documentary work, Toxic Trespass, is a film on children’s health and the  environment, co-produced with the National Film Board. Dr. Goldin Rosenberg has worked with the Toronto Department of Public Health and Toronto City Council on a resolution calling for stricter standards for tritium in drinking water. She has received awards from the Governor General of Canada, the United Nations and the Canadian Auto Workers. In 2005 she was declared Woman of the Year by the American Biographical Institute.

 

Frank Greening, PhD. After receiving his Ph.D. in Physical Chemistry from McMaster University in 1974, Dr. Greening undertook post-doctoral studies in the NRC molecular spectroscopy group of Nobel prize winner Gerhard Herzberg in Ottawa. Dr. Greening joined Ontario Hydro, (later OPG), Research Division in Toronto in 1978. From 1978 to 2000 he worked on problems associated with pressure tubes and feeder pipes at the Pickering, Darlington and Bruce Nuclear Stations. This work included measuring tritium, carbon-14, and trans-uranic isotopes in samples from these facilities. In 1998 Dr. Greening received OPG’s Technical Excellence award for his research on deuterium uptake by pressure tubes. Before retiring from OPG in 2000, Dr. Greening participated in a tritium emission reduction study for OPG’s nuclear stations. More recently he has made numerous submissions to the CNSC’s Public Hearings on licensing and refurbishment issues for the Pickering and Bruce reactors.

 

Theresa McClenaghan, LL.B., LL.M. Appointed as Executive Director of the Canadian Environmental Law Association in November 2007, Theresa McClenaghan holds an LL.B. from the University of Western Ontario (1984), an LL.M. (constitutional law) from Osgoode Law School (York University, 1999) and a diploma in Environmental Health from McMaster University (1999).  She is a member of the Bars of Manitoba and Ontario.  Theresa has practised public interest environmental law, both in private practice since 1985 and at the Canadian Environmental Law Association as counsel from 1998 to 2006.  From 2006 to 2007, Theresa was senior water policy advisor to the Ontario Minister of the Environment.  She has been involved in litigation, regulation and standard setting matters involving nuclear power, including specific issues regarding tritium emissions and standards since the late 1980′s. Theresa lives in Paris, Ontario, with her husband and their four children.

 

Éric Notebaert, MD, M.Sc is Emergency Physician / Department of Family Medicine, U. of Montreal.

Assistant Professor of Medicine, University of Montreal. Areas of research: Toxicology – Hemayology. President, Health Professionals for Global Survival ( Quebec chapter of Physicians for Global Survival)

 

Tritium Awareness Project