House lawmakers Friday approved the Fiscal Year 2014 National Defense Authorization bill, which included a provision that would open the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant to non-defense-related transuranic waste. The language was in an amendment offered by Rep. Steve Pearce (R-N.M.), which was incorporated into the bill late Thursday. In addition to defense transuranic waste, the legislation would open the repository to “the transportation and disposal of any non-defense Federal Government-owned transuranic waste that can be shown to meet” WIPP’s acceptance criteria. Given that efforts to dispose of the Department of Energy’s legacy defense transuranic waste are expected to wind down in the next few years, Pearce has said he hopes that the facility will soon legally be able to accept additional waste in order to sustain jobs near the site.
The House bill also included two provisions offered by Rep. Doc Hastings (R-Wash.). One would establish a Manhattan Project National Historical Site at Hanford, Los Alamos and Oak Ridge, which has been the subject of legislation in the House and Senate. Another amendment would transfer a 1,641 acre parcel of Hanford land from DOE no longer needed for cleanup activities to Hanford’s Community Reuse Organization. “As Hanford is cleaned up it should not remain in the hands of the federal government indefinitely,” Hastings said in a statement. “This proposal is consistent with the Comprehensive Land Use Plan, with efforts to prepare the Tri-Cities for life after cleanup and with shrinking the Hanford site.”
