The Energy Department Office of Environmental Management has delayed completion of the draft record of decision on a proposed new landfill facility for the Oak Ridge Reservation in Tennessee until August.
Previously, the draft ROD was expected May 7. State and federal regulators approved a three-month extension for submitting the document for the proposed Environmental Management Disposal Facility, an Energy Department spokesman said May 10. Following the Aug. 2 submission, regulators will have 60 days to comment on the draft.
The record of decision is a formal document that outlines plans for operation and eventual closure of a DOE project.
Publication was delayed in the face of a dispute between DOE and its regulators for the project, the state of Tennessee and the Environmental Protection Agency’s Region 4, over water discharge standards at Oak Ridge.
The parties hope to resolve the standards for radionuclides in water discharges before moving ahead with final approval for the planned new 2.2-million-cubic yard landfill. The facility would replace the existing landfill, which is expected to run out of space in the mid-2020s.
“We will use this time to address the questions we received from regulators and the public,” the DOE spokesman said in an email.
EPA Region 4 wants a far more stringent standard on water discharges at Oak Ridge than those now used at federal and commercial nuclear sites, according to DOE, which has asked EPA Administrator Andrew Wheeler to overrule the Atlanta-based regional office.
Wheeler’s office has asked DOE to submit more information on its position, and the state of Tennessee will then be granted an opportunity to respond.
The new facility would take low-level radioactive and mixed waste primarily from remediation at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory and the Y-12 National Security Complex. The Energy Department published its preferred alternative for the new landfill site on agency property in Oak Ridge in September 2018, and concluded a comment period on the project in December.
EPA Region 4 says the new landfill would rely too much on dilution, rather than technology, to prevent discharges of contaminated runoff into Bear Creek.
