The Department of Energy has been given three more years to meet milestones for building additional caps over contaminated soil in Hanford tank farms after it became apparent it could not meet the project’s previously set milestones. The agency built two waste barriers the size of football fields or larger in 2007 and 2010. Under the Tri-Party Agreement with Washington state and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency it was to have two more built in October 2015, another by this week, and the fourth a year from now.
The revised milestones call for construction to be completed on the first two of the additional four barriers in October 2018. The remaining two are required to be built in October 2019 and October 2020. The caps already built use a layer of polyurea plastic or asphalt with polymers as covering to keep rain or snowmelt from seeping through the soil and spreading tank waste contamination deeper into the ground.
DOE and the Washington state Department of Ecology spent more than a year discussing the proposed changes. Ecology levied a $5,000 fine against DOE, accusing the federal government of failing to meet its requirement to disclose the milestone was at risk from October 2014 through March 2015. DOE agreed to pay $2,500 in late September to settle the matter, but denied that it had failed to disclose information. The document resolving the dispute, which was signed by the state and federal agencies, said the matter was being settled to avoid the expense of litigation and to resolve any administrative or judicial claims.
