The New Mexico Environment Department will continue non-regulatory oversight of the Energy Department’s environmental monitoring programs at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant under a five-year, $2-million grant extension announced Thursday.
The grant now will run through June 30, 2022, DOE’s Office of Environmental Management wrote in a press release.
The Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) is the nation’s only deep-underground permanent disposal facility for the radioactively contaminated material and equipment known as transuranic waste.
Besides the unofficial oversight funded through this grant, the New Mexico Environment Department is the main state regulator for WIPP, which falls under the federal Resource Conservation and Recovery Act as a disposal site for hazardous, solid waste.
