Reports

Emergency and Continuous Exposure Guidance Levels for Selected Submarine Contaminants: Volume 3 (2009)

U.S. Navy personnel on submarines live and work in an enclosed and isolated environment for days or weeks at a time at sea, and they are potentially exposed to air contaminants 24 hours a day. To protect them from potential adverse health effects, the U.S. Navy has established exposure guidance levels for a number of contaminants. For this latest report, the Navy asked the National Research Council to review, and develop when necessary, exposure guidance levels for 5 contaminants -- acetaldehyde, hydrogen chloride, hydrogen fluoride, hydrogen sulfide, and propylene glycol dinitrate. Overall, the committee found the Navy's current guidance levels to be health-protective, although the committee recommends 90-day continuous exposure levels for hydrogen fluoride and propylene glycol dinitrate at about half the Navy's current levels. The committee notes recent efforts to better characterize the submarine atmosphere but renews a call to investigate potential interactions between contaminants in the submarine.
More...

Reports

Navigate