In May the Department of Energy expects to begin a 60-day public comment period on modifying dangerous waste permit for the Hanford Site in Washington state to allow disposal of mixed low-level waste in one of its main landfills, according to a notice published Monday by the state.
The proposed permit change addresses Hanford’s Integrated Disposal Facility (IDF) leachate collection system, according to the announcement from the Washington state Department of Ecology. A start date for the comment period has not been set yet, although a virtual public meeting is expected to be held sometime in June.
The DOE Amentum-led contractor Central Plateau Cleanup Co. are seeking a Class 3 modification to the IDF chapter of the permit to add the facility’s leachate collection system as a “miscellaneous unit” under state regulation
The IDF’s two disposal cells include an engineered liner to collect water from rain, snowmelt and dust suppression to protect the groundwater. Leachate collected from each disposal cell is pumped to the IDF leachate collection system. The leachate system consists of two collection units and connected pipelines that allow leachate to be transferred between the units. Each collection unit is approximately 100 feet in diameter and 8 feet high, with a working capacity of 375,000 gallons.
The IDF is integral to Hanford’s direct feed low-activity waste program, which is slated to begin treating turning tank waste into glass by the end of 2023 at the Waste Treatment Plant being built by Bechtel. Hanford is home to roughly 53 million gallons of radioactive waste leftover from decades of plutonium productions and held in 177 underground tanks.
Questions about the issue can be emailed to Jennifer Colborn of Leidos-led contractor Hanford Mission Integration Solutions, at [email protected].
The DOE’s Hanford Site is regulated by Washington Department of Ecology and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. The three organizations are also signers of the Tri-Party Agreement which sets milestones for cleanup of the former plutonium production complex.
