The Department of Energy’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant near Carlsbad, N.M., received 31 shipments of transuranic waste during January, according to figures posted recently on the agency’s public website.
Most of the shipments, 23, came from the Idaho National Laboratory. Six originated from the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico and there was one each from the Oak Ridge Site in Tennessee and the Savannah River Site in South Carolina.
The 31 shipments represent a sharp year-over-year increase from eight in January 2022. So far in fiscal 2023, which started Oct. 1, WIPP has received 129 shipments, compared with 69 during the same period in fiscal 2022. That is nearly double the pace for the first third of the year-ago period.
A Bechtel affiliate, Salado Isolation Mining, became the new managing contractor for WIPP on Feb. 4, replacing Nuclear Waste Partnership, a team of Amentum and BWX Technologies.
