DOE Officially Names Charboneau as New Richland Office Manager
WC Monitor
12/5/2014
Stacy Charboneau, as expected, was officially named the new Manager of the Department of Energy’s Richland Operations Office this week. WC Monitor first reported in late November that Charboneau, who previously held the title of acting deputy manager, was the top candidate to head the Richland Operations Office at Hanford. The position of Richland Operations Office manager has been vacant on a full-time basis since Matt McCormick retired from DOE in June. Since then, the office has been headed on an acting basis by Deputy Manager Doug Shoop. “Stacy is a talented and seasoned senior executive with tremendous technical and managerial expertise on all aspects of the Hanford cleanup,” Mark Whitney, acting Assistant Secretary of Energy for Environmental Management, said in anannouncement. “Her education, technical and programmatic expertise, and past experience make her uniquely qualified to lead the talented workforce responsible for completing the next and critical phase of the important RL cleanup work.”
Charboneau has held a number of managerial roles for DOE at Hanford, including having previously served as assistant manager for safety and environment at the Richland Operations Office, deputy manager of the Office of River Protection, assistant manager for the tank farms project at the Office of River Protection and deputy assistant manager for River Corridor cleanup at the Richland Operations Office, among other positions. Charboneau’s career at Hanford began in 1994, according to DOE, when she served as an engineer in the Waste Operations Division, and prior to coming to Hanford, she was at the U.S. Department of Defense’s Naval Undersea Warfare Center.
Dispute Process Over Missed K Basin Sludge Deadline Moving Forward
WC Monitor
12/5/2014
The Department of Energy has submitted a statement of dispute to the Environmental Protection Agency over DOE’s failure at Hanford to meet a Tri-Party Agreement milestone at the end of September to start removing sludge from Hanford’s K West Basin. When DOE missed the milestone and proposed no new milestone, EPA began to fine DOE up to $10,000 a week. EPA said the original 2002 date by which sludge removal was to be completed has been extended 13 years.
DOE submitted the statement of dispute this week, but declined to make the document public and also refused to allow EPA to release it. “While the dispute process moves ahead, we can say that our goal remains the same – to reach an agreement with the Department of Energy to get this important K Basins cleanup work completed as quickly as possible, helping to protect the Columbia River,” EPA said in a statement. The sludge is stored in underwater containers in a basin built in the 1950s about 400 yards from the river. DOE said it was working with EPA under the Tri-Party Agreement dispute process to resolve differences about setting a new milestone.
DOE, EPA Issue First ROD for a Hanford Reactor Area
WC Monitor
12/5/2014
The Department of Energy and the Environmental Protection Agency have issued the first record of decision for a Hanford reactor area, but it does not incorporate changes recommended by the Hanford Advisory Board and other groups. The ROD for the area near Hanford’s former F Reactor would leave radioactive waste deep underground in one place to decay over 264 years. Groundwater contamination would be left to dissipate over 150 years. “Energy is choosing to ignore overwhelming, common-sense input from citizens throughout the Pacific Northwest who want to see a proactive approach to reducing pollution that reaches the Columbia River from the Hanford Site and the F Reactor area,” said Dan Serres, conservation director for Columbia Riverkeeper.
Most of the cleanup of the area around F Reactor has already been completed under interim decisions, with the ROD determining the remaining work that should be completed. The Hanford Advisory Board has been following plans closely, aware that the decision for the area around F Reactor could set the stage for final decisions on cleanup around the other eight plutonium production reactors that line the Columbia River at Hanford. The board had recommended that DOE and EPA take action to significantly reduce the time for cleanup goals to be reached after DOE released its proposed plan. The plan was largely adopted in the final decision. The board also was concerned about DOE’s ability to maintain institutional controls on areas with contamination far into the future.
DOE Wants to Leave Some Contamination Below 15 Feet in Place
The ROD requires digging up contamination in 91 places, but leaving radiological contamination deeper than 15 feet below ground in 15 places. Excavation restrictions to prevent contact with the contaminated soil would need to be in place, with limits at different sites lasting from the year 2033 to the year 2278. In one place, irrigation would need to be prohibited to prevent water from carrying contamination down to groundwater. The agencies considered active treatment of already contaminated groundwater, including using a pump and treat system, but instead settled on letting the contamination gradually dissipate. Natural processes such as biodegradation, dispersion, dilution and radioactive decay would reduce contamination over 150 years to drinking water standards, the ROD said.
The cost of actively treating the groundwater would be $177 million to $194 million, while letting it dissipate while monitoring it with wells and restricting its use would cost $36 million, according to the ROD. “We are disappointed that Energy has not opted to use available technologies for a thorough cleanup,” said Emily Bays of Hanford Challenge, in a statement.
DOE Says Pump-and-Treat Approach Would Not Be Effective
DOE said in the ROD and at a recent Hanford Advisory Board committee meeting that it had good reasons for the choices made. The groundwater contaminant that will take the longest to dissipate, 150 years, is strontium. However, a pump and treat plant for much higher levels of strontium near Hanford’s N Reactor did little to reduce contamination there. A pump and treat system could reduce other contaminants near F Reactor, including nitrates and hexavalent chromium, but the groundwater would still be contaminated with strontium for 150 years, preventing its use, the ROD said. Near N Reactor, injecting chemicals to create an underground apatite barrier to bind the strontium in place and prevent it from reaching water is being used. But the ROD for the area around F Reactor concluded that the strontium contamination near F Reactor is bound to the soil in a specific area and is not migrating. Adding the apatite barrier would not reduce the 150 years needed for it to decay, according to DOE.
Leaving contaminated soil deeper than 15 feet should not be a concern for most uses of the land, according to DOE. That would allow a residential basement to be dug, for example, without excavation reaching contaminated soil.
The federal government would be responsible for institutional controls to ensure that contaminated water is not used and that digging of wells or other deep excavation does not expose contaminated soil over 100-plus years. “We realize there are always going to be concerns about how long these can be maintained and how reliably,” said Greg Sinton, the DOE project lead for the decision document at the advisory board committee meeting. However, reviews will be done at least every five years, as required by the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation and Liability Act (CERCLA), he said. That should keep attention on the remaining contamination and not allow it to be forgotten, he said. If the reviews find that contamination is not dissipating as expected under the decision just made, new cleanup plans could be adopted, he said. The Hanford Advisory Board gave advice to DOE and EPA on the pending final decision for cleanup in the area of F Reactor in June 2013 and September of this year and could choose to provide advice again now that the ROD has been issued.
