The Department of Energy’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico received 50 shipments of transuranic waste during January, according to the facility’s public website.
39 of the 50 came from the Idaho National Laboratory while five were shipped from the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico, four from the Savannah River Site in South Carolina and two from the Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee.
That marks a big jump from the 31 shipments of defense-related transuranic waste received at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) underground salt mine near Carlsbad in January 2023.
Since fiscal year 2024 started on Oct. 1, WIPP has received 164 shipments, up from the 129 during the first four months of fiscal 2023.
WIPP took in a total of 473 shipments during fiscal 2023, which ended Sept. 30, and is targeting 525 during fiscal 2024, DOE’s Carlsbad Field Office Manager Mark Bollinger told the New Mexico legislature on Jan. 31.
2023 was WIPP’s busiest calendar year for waste shipments in nearly a decade, with 489 shipments. Prior to 2014, it was not unheard of for the salt mine to dispose of about 700 shipments annually. In February 2014, however, a drum from Los Alamos burst open from a chemical reaction and caused an underground radiation leak that closed the facility for about three years.
Around mid-year, WIPP crews are expected to finish commissioning the new Safety Significant Confinement Ventilation System that should roughly triple underground airflow and help the facility return to pre-2014 productivity levels. Final work on a new underground utility shaft is resuming after a November accident where a basket of tools and materials fell 2,150 feet. No one was hurt in the mishap.
Earlier this month, Bechtel’s Salado Isolation Mining Contractors, completed its first full year as DOE’s prime contractor for WIPP. The team replaced an Amentum-BWX Technologies joint venture. Salado President Ken Harrawood has said WIPP will use February for maintenance work, and not take shipments. February also tends to be prone to winter weather-related disruptions.
