EPA begins public input process that could clear way for DOE’s Hanford Test Bed Initiative
The Environmental Protection Agency is considering a variance to allow the Department of Energy’s Hanford Site in Washington to ship 2,000 gallons of radioactive tank waste to commercial disposal sites for solidification.
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) proposes to issue DOE a “treatability variance” from Land Disposal Restrictions, according to a Tuesday Federal Register notice. It is part of the so-called Test-Bed Initiative for Hanford, which explores solidifying some liquid radioactive waste leftover from nuclear weapons production into a concrete-like grout.
Hanford DOE officials are exploring grout as an option for the supplemental low-level waste that cannot be treated at the vitrification plant. DOE is seeking a special permit from the Washington Department of Ecology for the 2,000-gallon test, which is a follow-up to a three-gallon pilot test in 2017.
“Our agency supports EPA’s issuance of this variance,” said a spokesperson for Washington Ecology in a Tuesday email. “We are currently working with Energy on their permit application, and anticipate issuing it for public comment in spring 2024,” the state spokesperson said.
EPA is taking written comments between now and Dec. 28 on the variance, which would support DOE’s proposal to send 2,000 gallons of pretreated tank waste to either EnergySolutions in Clive, Utah or Waste Control Specialists in Andrews County, Texas. The waste would be disposed of at these commercial sites.
DOE petitioned EPA for the variance in August, according to the Federal Register document. Certain Resource Conservation and Recovery Act rules bar the land disposal of hazardous wastes unless such wastes meet treatment standards set by EPA, according to the notice. EPA seeks to minimize the toxicity of the waste and the risk posed to people and the environment.
DOE plans to treat about 60% of Hanford’s low-activity liquid radioactive waste in the Bechtel-built Waste Treatment and Immobilization Plant at Hanford. That portion would be turned into a more stable glass like form, but DOE needs to come up with a way to solidify the remainder.
In underground tanks, Hanford has about 56 million gallons of radioactive liquid waste left over from decades of plutonium production for the military. By volume, most of waste is what DOE calls low-level or “low-activity waste,” meaning it contains less radioactivity than a smaller volume of high-level waste.
