The Department of Energy’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant has updated its pending 10-year permit renewal application with the state of New Mexico to reflect the latest plans for transuranic waste disposal within the mine’s Panels 11 and 12.
The proposal was submitted as part of the facility’s updated permit renewal application with the New Mexico Environment Department (NMED). DOE initially submitted the new panel application under a separate request, but the state asked the proposal be folded into the 10-year recertification, according to a WIPP spokesperson
The latest Hazardous Waste Permit modifications sought by DOE were filed with the state April 12. The DOE and its Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) prime contractor, Nuclear Waste Partnership, discussed the filing in an online town hall presentation April 28. The state requested and received a new “red line” edited version of the DOE modifications concerning the new panels, according to a DOE slide deck from the online meeting.
The updated permit modification for the panels was filed with NMED March 17, according to a recent online notice. An earlier modification document on the panels was filed July 30, 2021.
Waste emplacement at Panel 7, portions of which were contaminated during an underground radiation leak in February 2014, should conclude this summer, WIPP managers have said. Waste disposal will then begin at Panel 8, where mining has been completed to create space for the waste.
The Government Accountability Office (GAO) raised concerns in a March report that Panel 11 might not be ready in the summer of 2025 should DOE finish filling Panel 8 by then.
DOE no longer plans to dispose of transuranic waste in Panels 9 and 10, the final two panels included in WIPP’s original certification from the Environmental Protection Agency. The panels, basically hallways adjoining the first eight panels, won’t be used anymore, partially because DOE couldn’t properly maintain them while WIPP operations were suspended for about three years after the 2014 accident.
The DOE submitted its 10-year WIPP renewal application to the state in March 2020, according to the GAO report. The application covered the period spanning from 2021 through 2030. The underground disposal facility continues to work under prior permit until the state acts on the renewal application. DOE expects that to happen within the next year.
