The mayor of Piketon, Ohio, bitterly opposed to the Energy Department’s strategy for disposal of nuclear waste from demolition of the Portsmouth Site’s uranium facilities, is angling for few minutes alone with Energy Secretary Rick Perry — whenever the DOE chief actually visits the Buckeye State.
“I sent a letter about a month ago asking for a few minutes of his time away from DOE and plant officials and will be asking again today for when he does make it to Piketon,” Mayor Billy Spencer wrote in a Monday email to Weapons Complex Morning Briefing.
Perry announced late last week he would visit the Portsmouth Gaseous Diffusion Plant on Monday. Over the weekend, Sen. Rob Portman (R-Ohio), one of the cleanup site’s primary supporters in Congress, announced Perry had canceled his visit.
Perry attended a meeting of President Donald Trump’s Cabinet on Monday. A DOE spokesperson in Washington did not reply to a request for comment Monday about when the energy secretary might reschedule the trip.
The Village of Piketon has lately contested DOE’s intention to build an on-site disposal cell at Portsmouth, where radioactive waste from demolition of Cold War uranium-enrichment facilities would be stored permanently.
The village, citing an independent study it commissioned from the Washington, D.C.-based Ferguson Group, says DOE has known for years that its preferred site for the landfill sits atop fractured bedrock that could leak radiation into the surrounding land.
Spencer and other village leaders have contended that the disposal facility would undermine DOE’s plans to redevelop and re-industrialize the Portsmouth Site after the cleanup is done.
“A nuclear dump is not the legacy we want for our community,” Spencer has said.
DOE estimates it will finish the Portsmouth cleanup in the mid 2040s or early 2050s, according to the agency’s 2018 budget request.
