Brian Bradley
WC Monitor
11/13/2015
As part of the Energy Department’s Office of Environmental Management’s West Valley Demonstration Project (WVDP) in upstate New York, high-level waste has been placed in long-term outdoor storage for the first time, with the first waste canister being moved on Nov. 10, EM officials said this week. The agency is working with the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA) and project contractor CH2M HILL BWXT West Valley, LLC, to relocate 55 casks from the site’s Main Plant Process Building to an “interim storage pad” by the end of 2018, according to an EM press release. This is to make way for the subsequent slated demolition of that structure. All of the liquid waste was vitrified in 2002, the release states.
“I could not be more proud of this team,” EM WVDP Director Bryan Bower said in a statement. “This effort is a culmination of four years’ work to begin the safe removal of the high-level waste canisters from the former reprocessing facility, allowing for the eventual demolition of the building.”
West Valley once served as the first and only commercial nuclear fuel reprocessing plant in the U.S., and sits about 35 miles south of Buffalo. Reprocessing ended at the Main Plant Process Building in 1972. The waste was vitrified from 1996 to 2002; workers put the material into 275 10-foot-tall canisters and stored them in the building, according to the release.
“The workers have dedicated the past four years working tirelessly to plan, construct, train, and operate the specialized equipment to perform this important work,” David Brown, CHBWV project manager for the HLW Project, said in a statement. “This project is called the West Valley Demonstration Project, and once again this workforce demonstrated a first-of-its-kind operation.” CHBWV has worked its WVDP contract since 2011.
To prepare for the demolition, workers transferred the first five canisters to “five-compartment, stainless-steel overpacks inside vertical storage casks,” the release states. Sixteen vertical storage casks have been made on site, and each has a minimum design life of 50 years, a 4-inch-thick steel liner, and 20 inches of steel-reinforced concrete. CHBWV bought special equipment to transport the casks, which weigh up to 87.5 tons, to the outdoor storage pad.
“The relocation of the high-level radioactive waste to the new interim storage facility is a significant step forward in the cleanup effort at the West Valley Site,” Paul Bembia, director for NYSERDA’s West Valley Site Management Program, said in a statement. “This is yet another major accomplishment from the dedicated and talented workforce at the West Valley Demonstration Project.”
