The Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California has finished a readiness assessment as it prepares to make its first shipment of transuranic waste in 14 years to the Energy Department’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico.
The national laboratory on March 29 completed the formal evaluation of its ability to characterize TRU waste and meet the WIPP acceptance criteria, according to a monthly site report from Livermore for the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board.
The Energy Department conducts inspections of waste generator sites to ensure they can properly screen, package, and transport material to WIPP. The agency in 2016 updated the criteria under which waste is allowed for disposal at the site.
The Energy Department and WIPP contractor Nuclear Waste Partnership (NWP) expect the underground disposal facility to receive up to 10 shipments from Livermore between now and January 2020. A source said Tuesday shipments probably will not begin before 2020. Livermore last shipped waste to WIPP in 2005, NWP spokesman Bobby St. John said in January.
Container inspection requirements, documenting radioactive operations, and the operational drill program are among the areas being reviewed at Livermore, prior to issuance of a compliance recertification application, according to the DNFSB memo.
The recertification application is an internal document prepared by Livermore to confirm readiness to start work in a nuclear facility, said lab spokesman Nolan O’Brien. Loading waste containers and off-site transportation were not assessed in this review, he added.
Livermore plans to send contact-handled TRU comprised of debris from nuclear research and development.
The Energy Department disposal site resumed taking waste from generator facilities in early 2017, after going offline for nearly three years following an underground radiation leak in February 2014.
