The Nye County Tritium Sampling and Monitoring Program (TSaMP) was established in 2015 through an 11-year grant from the DOE to sample for tritium downgradient and offsite from the Nevada National Security Site (formerly the Nevada Test Site). The purpose of the TSaMP program is to evaluate weather samples from wells and springs are found to contain elevated quantities of tritium. Each year the TSaMP takes water samples from 20 locations (10 core locations sampled every year plus an additional 10 selected locations) and has them analyzed by a Nevada Certified lab using EPA-approved unenriched techniques with a minimum detection concentration(MDC) of approximately 300 picocuries per liter (pCi/L). The EPA’s Safe Drinking Water Act limit for tritium in drinking water is 20,000 pCi/L. As of 2024, after ten years of sampling, the TSaMP program has not had any sample results come back showing tritium concentrations above the MDC.
More information can be found on the Desert Research Institute (DRI) website.
TSAMP presentations can be found by going to the Downloadable Data page HERE.