The Trump administration’s budget request for fiscal 2019 justifies spending cuts for cleanup of the Hanford Site in Washington state by focusing on some of the work that will soon be completed.
The proposed budget would trim funding for DOE’s Richland Operations Office at Hanford to $747 million, down by $169 million from the enacted level in fiscal 2017. Proposed spending of $1.4 billion for the Office of River Protection would be down by $61 million from fiscal 2017.
Until March 23, Hanford and most of the rest of the federal government had operated under a series of short-term budgets that froze funding at prior-year levels for nearly half of fiscal 2018. The omnibus spending bill signed into law last week increased funds for the Richland Operations Office for the current fiscal year to $863 million, not including some additional funding for security, and boosted funding to $1.56 billion for the Office of River Protection.
The newly available breakout for the administration’s fiscal 2019 budget request shows lower spending for the Richland Operations Office from both the 2017 and 2018 fiscal years as projects are expected to be completed, with only limited amounts transferred to other work. The Richland Operations Office manages the Hanford Site and is responsible for all cleanup work not related to management and treatment of the facility’s 56 million gallons of radioactive waste.
The omnibus budget did not provide funding figures for specific environmental remediation projects at Hanford, a former plutonium production complex that is DOE’s largest cleanup program. However, the administration’s fiscal 2019 budget proposal shows a savings of $143 million from fiscal 2017 on demolition of the Plutonium Finishing Plant.
The Plutonium Finishing Plant is expected by the beginning of fiscal 2019, on Oct. 1, to be demolished to slab on grade – though work is currently suspended due to a December radioactive contamination spread. Less money is also expected to be needed for facility modifications and purchasing containers for radioactive sludge stored in the K West Basin, as that project advances to removing radioactive sludge from underwater storage. Work also has wrapped up on removing waste from the 618-10 Burial Ground.
Increased expenses are anticipated for continued design and planning to move cesium and strontium capsules to dry storage. Safeguards and security spending would increase about $13 million to almost $87 million, primarily for cybersecurity costs.
At the Office of River Protection, major construction spending at the Waste Treatment Plant would remain steady at the $690 million budgeted for fiscal 2017. However, $12 million would be added to purchase items, such as spare parts, that will be needed for the operation of the plant. Spending at the tank farms would drop by $73 million to $733 million, reflecting reduced costs for the Low-Activity Waste Pretreatment System. The system is needed to prepare a low-activity radioactive waste feed for treatment at the Waste Treatment Plant until its Pretreatment Facility is ready to separate tank waste into low-activity and high-level radioactive waste streams.
