The Hanford Site in Washington state and other Department of Energy nuclear facilities in the northern United States could see single-digit temperatures and cold winds in the days leading up to Christmas, according to forecasts from the National Weather Service.
For example, the Richland, Wash., area, where Hanford is located, could see a Wednesday night low of minus-6 degrees Fahrenheit and a high Thursday of only 7 degrees. A wind chill advisory has been posted for from Wednesday night through Friday night.
Piketon, Ohio, home of the Portsmouth Site, will enjoy relatively balmy daytime highs in the 40s —until Thursday night when the low will plummet to 8 degrees. After a Friday daytime high of 11, the nighttime low will be only 2 degrees.
Things are not any better in Paducah, Ky., where DOE’s other former gaseous diffusion plant is located. After enjoying temperatures in the 40s Thursday afternoon, Paducah’s nighttime low is forecast to hit zero degrees. The Friday high is predicted to be 13 degrees and the low that night 3 degrees.
In Kansas City, Mo., where DOE’s National Security Campus is located, the daytime high on Thursday through Saturday is not forecast to exceed 12 degrees and the nighttime low for Friday could be negative 2 degrees.
Ashford, N.Y., in Cattaraugus County, the home of the West Valley Demonstration Project, is located 30 miles from Buffalo and no stranger to cold winters. After seeing a warm Friday high of 43 degrees, the nighttime low around the West Valley area should drop to 2 degrees with snow, according to the forecast. The temperatures are not expected to climb above the mid-teens on Christmas weekend.
The National Weather Service (weather.gov) overall outlook on Tuesday morning says: “A surge of Arctic air behind a cold front crossing the U.S. through the week will bring widespread, dangerous wind chill temperatures through much of the central U.S. and a potential flash freeze from the mid-South to the East Coast.”
