The Energy Department’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant near Carlsbad, N.M., is expected to receive 330 shipments of transuranic waste over the next 12 months, with some coming from sites that have not shipped material in years.
The Energy Department and its WIPP contractor, Nuclear Waste Partnership, held a breakfast presentation Monday for New Mexico lawmakers, which includes shipping estimates for February 2019 through January 2018.
The Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California is expected to move 10 shipments to WIPP during the period, and three will come from the Sandia National Laboratories in New Mexico.
The disposal facility last received TRU waste from Livermore in 2005, with Sandia sending its most recent shipment in 2012, according to contractor spokesman Bobby St. John. 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.
Livermore plans to send contact-handled TRU comprised of debris from nuclear research and development. The lab was negotiating with DOE’s Carlsbad Field Office to prepare for TRU shipments at the time of the WIPP accident, Livermore spokeswoman Breanna Bishop said by email Wednesday.
In addition to lining up the necessary funds, Livermore coordinated with the Carlsbad office and the contractor to make the necessary equipment and personnel available to characterize the waste prior to shipping it to WIPP, Bishop said. Livermore continues to generate TRU waste, so the total number of shipments is not known.
Sandia’s shipments to the disposal site are expected to be completed in the spring or summer, lab spokeswoman Stephanie Holinka said Thursday.
The Idaho National Laboratory should again account for more than half of the annual shipments to WIPP, with 168 anticipated in the February-January period, as the site continues to work off a backlog of TRU waste. Other shippers will include the Argonne National Laboratory in Illinois with five; the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico with 57; the Oak Ridge Site in Tennessee with 50; the Savannah River Site in South Carolina with 35; and Waste Control Specialists in Texas with two.
During 2018, WIPP’s first full year of waste emplacement after the accident, it received 311 shipments of defense transuranic waste. That is far less than the 724 shipments in 2013, the last full year of operation prior to the radiation release. The site won’t get back to pre-accident levels until a new underground ventilation system is operational in fall 2021.
In December, Nuclear Waste Partnership issued a request for proposals for construction of an underground ventilation shaft and mine tunnels, which are also known as “drifts.” The target date for the subcontract is July.
The Waste Isolation Pilot Plant was shut down for maintenance between Jan. 7 and Jan. 27. During the outage workers performed upkeep on electric substations; resurfaced a floor where contact-handled waste is temporarily held; made repairs to the fire system; replaced an underground airline; and replaced ropes and realigned steel on a waste hoist.
Contractor to Start Recording WIPP Waste Under New Method; State Reviewing Order
Nuclear Waste Partnership is ready to start measuring underground waste volume through a new method recently approved by the state government.
Effective Jan. 20, the contractor will no longer calculate waste, under the 1992 WIPP Land Disposal Act, based on the size of the outer disposal container. The change is allowed under the revised state permit via an order signed in December by the then-head of the New Mexico Environment Department. It is still tracking waste under the prior method for other government reports.
“The required policy has been completed,” NWP spokesman Donavan Mager said in an Jan. 23 email.
By counting only transuranic waste, and not the empty space between drums or packing material, the retroactive change reduces the amount of material now at WIPP from roughly one-half to one-third of its maximum allowed 176,000 cubic meters. The DOE and its contractor have said this is a more accurate method of recording waste and prevents premature closure of WIPP.
The advocacy groups Nuclear Watch New Mexico and the Southwest Research and Information Center (SRIC) filed a legal challenge against the move in January at the New Mexico Court of Appeals. The Land Withdrawal Act “does NOT say that there can be more than one way to measure that capacity,” SRIC Administrator Don Hancock said in a Jan. 23 email. Opponents believe they can show the state decision was incorrect as a matter of law.
The legal process at the New Mexico Court of Appeals requires the parties meet with a court-appointed mediator to seek a mutual solution, Hancock said. If the mediation does not resolve the matter, then legal briefs are filed.
Administrative Hearing Officer Pam Castaneda has been appointed to the case, according to the court website.
New Mexico Environment Secretary-designate James Kenney, nominated by newly elected Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham (D), told the New Mexico House Appropriations and Finance Committee on Jan. 25 the agency is looking into the waste volume order issued in December by the prior administration. According to an article in NM Political Report, Kenney also pointed to the recent appeal. “We’re working through that to see if we can come up with a mediated plan or approach that would maybe be more satisfactory for all the parties involved there.”
