Energy nominee Wright vows to back Hanford cleanup

Chris Wright, President-elect Donald Trump’s nominee for secretary of energy, pledged Wednesday to support ample Department of Energy funding “to clean up the mess” left at the Hanford Site in Washington state.

“I cannot overstate how critical I think it is to finish the job to finish the cleanup at Hanford,” a fracking company chief executive said in response to Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.) during a confirmation hearing by the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee.

“The majority of the country’s plutonium was produced there,” Wright said. “Hanford gave a lot to this country and we in turn left a mess … I am firmly committed to our moral obligation to clean up the mess that was left in your state.”

Decades of plutonium production at Hanford left behind about 56 million gallons of liquid radioactive and hazardous waste stored in underground tanks. After years of trying, DOE and Bechtel National say they are about ready to start solidifying some less-radioactive waste into a glass form this August. 

DOE’s Office of Environmental Management has lately been budgeted at more than $8 billion about a third of that has typically been earmarked for Hanford.

Cantwell said she has voted for Republican energy secretary nominees in the past, so long as they are serious about Hanford remediation. Cantwell also said it is important for Wright to continue to back the recently-amended Tri-Party Agreement for Hanford cleanup between DOE, Washington state and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

Cantwell cautioned Wright as energy secretary he might encounter Office of Management and Budget officials who think Hanford cleanup can “be done on the cheap.”

Another Democrat on the panel, Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto (D-Nev.) was disappointed that Wright seemed to stop short of calling the Yucca Mountain repository for high-level waste in Nevada dead.

“I’m new to politics,” Wright said, adding there is “a clear record that Nevadans oppose the project.” Wright went on to say that “local buy-in” is key to siting any nuclear waste facility. President Barack Obama cancelled the project that was not revived during the first Trump administration.

On other subjects, Wright said his company, Liberty Energy, is a minority owner in Oklo, a small modular reactor company that could build its first unit at the Idaho National Laboratory. 

Wright repeatedly deemed himself a supporter of nuclear energy and of reviving the National Nuclear Security Administration’s plutonium pit production. The energy company executive also said he would support continued research at DOE national labs, while looking for ways to protect sensitive data generated by the labs.