As is the case nationally, the COVID-19 pandemic continues to take a heavy toll on the 16 nuclear cleanup properties overseen by the Department of Energy’s Office of Environmental Management, including a death at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant that, a state regulator said, showed the site cannot protect people from the disease.
The prime contractor for the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) confirmed the death, but not the cause. A New Mexico Environment Department official disclosed the fatality this week, writing that while the circumstances surrounding the employee’s passing “are currently unknown, it is clear that the Permittees are unable to successfully mitigate COVID-19 risk to protect human health.”
“Nuclear Waste Partnership or DOE does not comment on our employees’ specific private health issues out of respect for them and their families, however we can confirm that a member of our community has passed away,” the prime contractor said in an emailed statement. “The entire WIPP family mourns the loss of our colleague and sends its condolences to the family.”
There are currently 275 active COVID-19 cases in the cleanup complex this week, a spokesperson for the Office of Environmental Management (EM) said in a Thursday email. The figure is close to double the 141 active cases reported last week and nearly four times the 70 active cases cited during the last week in September.
The question of whether on-site staffing must again be scaled back due to increasing infections will ultimately be left up to DOE managers at the sites, the EM spokesperson said.
“We are continually monitoring and assessing local conditions and are prepared to adjust the pace of operations as necessary,” based on local health data, government restrictions and guidance from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the spokesperson said.
During the past week the head of the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico revealed one employee died due to the coronavirus. News outlets such as the Los Alamos Reporter cited an email this week by the lab’s director, Thom Mason, saying a worker had died as a result of the virus. The individual worked for the lab’s management contractor, Triad National Security, which handles active nuclear weapons programs for DOE’s semi autonomous National Nuclear Security Administration.
Last Friday, New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham (D) imposed an order telling most New Mexico residents to stay at home except for trips to secure food, medical supplies and other basic needs through Nov. 30. Most non-essential businesses are instructed to close. Spokespersons for the Los Alamos National Laboratory as well as the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant near Carlsbad said in emails that those DOE facilities are considered essential and exempt from the order.
But the DOE complexes are not immune to the virus itself.
The Los Alamos fatality came a few weeks after a staff report from the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board pointed to lapses in the coronavirus control efforts at the laboratory.
“Notably, Triad has experienced several instances of workers arriving onsite with symptoms,” and coming into close contact with co-workers in break rooms, according to the board. The board report also mentioned Los Alamos management was taking corrective measures and switching more people back to telework.
At the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP), the New Mexico Environment Department this week refused to renew a temporary work authorization order allowing crews to continue sinking a utility shaft while the state considers final permit approvals for the project. A six-month work authorization was approved by the state back in April.
In her decision, Stephanie Stringer, director of the state Environment Department’s resource protection branch, noted that the temporary work authorization actually expired Oct. 24. Stringer said it’s up to the state to ensure the project does not “endanger human health or the environment, as the state is currently under a Public Health Order associated with the COVID-19 pandemic.”
Stringer went on to say that WIPP experienced 20 cases of COVID-19 during the first week of November and the DOE facility has not fully satisfied the state’s request for detail on mitigation measures being used to hinder the spread of the virus.
This past week,WIPP uncovered 20 more cases among its workforce, Of the 124 WIPP people infected with the virus, 54 of them have recovered, prime contractor Nuclear Waste Partnership said in a press release. Of the 20 people most recently confirmed to have a case, 15 work for the prime contractor, four work for a subcontractor and one works for the DOE’s Carlsbad Field Office.
Further west, in a Nov. 12 online memo, DOE’s Hanford Site manager, Brian Vance, said escalating numbers of infections at the former plutonium production facility in Washington state might be attributed in part to COVID “fatigue,” and growing lax on precautions headed into the holidays.
“There are numerous factors that may be contributing to the situation, from “COVID-19 fatigue” causing some to let down their guard, to cooler temperatures that increase our time indoors and near others,” Vance said in the memo to Hanford workers. Whatever the cause, staffers must continue to be vigilant about wearing masks, social distancing and other necessary safety practices, he said.
Eight more workers informed management at the Hanford Site this week they have tested positive.
The latest confirmed coronavirus infections were reported in a Monday post on Hanford’s emergency operations website, which is run by site services contractor Mission Support Alliance.
That brings the confirmed total of COVID-19 cases at the former plutonium production complex to 224 based upon recent bulletins posted daily on the website.
The governor of Washington, Jay Inslee (D) also issued an emergency order last Sunday. instructing people to stay home and restricting operation of businesses deemed non-essential. Hanford operations are not covered by the order, a spokesperson said.
As of Friday morning, there have been 11.7 million cases of COVID-19 in the United States and 252,000 deaths as a result, according to data from Johns Hopkins University.
