Hanford Watch, Portland, Oregon

HANFORD WATCH NEWSLETTER
June 6, 1999

PIPE WELDS IN K BASINS SUBSTANDARD, TESTS SHOW
Tri-City Herald -- June 4, 1999
More than 60 percent of the welds checked so far in a key K Basins
filtering network are defective, a federal official told the Hanford
Advisory Board on Thursday. The K Basins are two indoor water-filled
pools near the Columbia River that hold 2,300 tons of spent nuclear
fuel -- radioactive waste -- in corroding canisters. The Department
of Energy is investigating how the defective welds slipped through
quality control systems meant to catch the problem. And DOE is trying
to figure out how to fix the problems and to find what ramifications
this will have on the costs and timetables of the troubled K Basins
project.

Doug Sherwood, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's Hanford site
manager, voiced concerns over the K Basins project encountering
numerous complications, quality problems, missed analyses and other
delays. He wondered about their cumulative effect on Fluor being able
to begin moving spent fuel by the Tri-Party Agreement's November 2000
deadline. "In the grand scheme of things, it seems that everything in
the K West Basin is in trouble," Sherwood said.
http://www.tri-cityherald.com/news/1999/0604.html#anchor596744

FLUOR'S $330,000 FINE SHOULD BE WAKEUP CALL
Tri-City Herald editorial -- May 30, 1999
DOE's decision to levy a $330,000 fine is just the latest in a long
line of problems since Fluor took over, including internal management
turnover, lackluster evaluations, dustups with regulators and the
now-quelled rumors that Fluor's parent company wanted to sell off the
division that handled the Hanford contract. The newfangled
performance-based contract Fluor assumed has posed its own problems.
http://www.tri-cityherald.com/OPINION/0530.html#anchor596414

HANFORD DOWNWINDER FILES APPEAL OVER RELEASES
Tri-City Herald -- June 2, 1999
Hanford downwinders are trying again to force the Department of Energy
to pay for medical monitoring of people exposed to Cold War radiation
releases. On Tuesday, Trisha Pritikin filed a notice of appeal in
U.S. District Court in Yakima over a decision by Judge Edward Shea. In
late April, Shea agreed with federal attorneys who said a private
citizen does not have the right to require DOE to pay for medical
monitoring under the Comprehensive Environmental Response,
Compensation and Liability Act or CERCLA. He dismissed Pritikin's
suit.

The Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry decided in 1997
that a program was needed to monitor the thyroids of 14,000 people who
lived downwind of Hanford in Eastern Washington and Oregon in the
1940s and 1950s. Airborne radiation was released during tests and by
production of plutonium at Hanford during those years.
http://www.tri-cityherald.com/news/1999/0602.html#anchor596920

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Other DOE news
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ENERGY POURED $489 MILLION DOWN NUCLEAR DRAIN
The Spokeman-Review -- June 2, 1999
After spending 16 years and $489 million on a crucial step in its plan
to safely store millions of gallons of highly radioactive waste, the
Energy Department has abandoned the procedure because it produces
explosive gases. The plan is intended to solidify wastes left over
from nuclear weapons production that will be dangerously radioactive
for thousands of years. About 34 million gallons of the wastes are
stored in 51 aging underground tanks at the Savannah River site, near
Aiken, S.C.

The Energy Department has even more wastes in underground tanks at its
Hanford Nuclear Reservation, near Richland, and these are leaking into
the Columbia River. It is working with BNFL to devise a system for
solidifying the wastes there, but the Energy Department had tried to
solve the problems at Savannah River first because they were
considered chemically simpler. Savannah River was built by DuPont and
operated by that company for 30 years beginning in the early '50s;
Hanford was run by a variety of companies with far less chemistry
experience.
http://www.spokane.net/news-story.asp?date=060299&ID=s587602&cat=secti
on.Environment

PLAN TO SOLIDIFY NUKE WASTE FAILS
Las Vegas SUN -- June 2, 1999
The first stage in the plan was to concentrate the wastes so the
volume would be manageable. For the second stage, mixing the
radioactive material into molten glass, the department has built a $2
billion factory. The factory works, but the process that Westinghouse
wanted to use to concentrate the wastes created benzene, a chemical
found in gasoline that can burn or explode. With that approach
abandoned, the department may be forced to spend billions more and
take many more years to develop an alternate.
http://www.lasvegassun.com/sunbin/stories/text/1999/jun/02/508875193.h
tml

EDITORIAL: ANOTHER COLOSSAL BLUNDER
Las Vegas SUN -- June 3, 1999
The General Accounting Office released a report this week that
uncovered a shocking failure by the Department of Energy's attempt to
solidify 34 million gallons of nuclear weapons waste at the Department
of Energy's Savannah River Site in South Carolina. The Department of
Energy spent 16 years and nearly $500 million before finally
acknowledging this week that it will abandon a plan to vitrify and
store millions of gallons of radioactive waste, because the procedure
scientists developed to change the liquid into a solid is dangerous,
producing an explosive benzene gas.

A worrisome pattern has developed over the years regarding Department
of Energy projects, especially those dealing with nuclear waste
storage and cleanup: Scientists and government officials often ignore
the obvious pitfalls inherent in some technologies. They would rather
rush along and try to find a solution -- even if it's not feasible.
http://www.lasvegassun.com/sunbin/stories/text/1999/jun/03/508880004.h
tml

AUDITORS CRITICIZE SRS FACILITY FAILURE
The Augusta Chronicle -- June 3, 1999
U.S. Department of Energy officials will take numerous steps to ensure
they don't repeat mistakes that led to a failed multimillion-dollar
(waste concentration) plant at Savannah River Site, department
officials said Wednesday. To prevent recurrences of those mistakes,
department officials will seek outside reviews of the technology it
selects to replace the In-Tank Precipitation Facility plant. The
National Academy of Sciences will conduct a review after Energy
Department officials select one of four possible technologies in
October. SRS officials also are exchanging information with engineers
at other Energy Department sites that must treat similar wastes.
http://augustachronicle.com/stories/060399/met_066-6184.001.shtml

--> A QUESTION FOR THE EXPERTS on this e-mail list: Will the failure
of the waste concentration plant at Savannah River Site affect the
tank waste cleanup project at Hanford? Please respond to this list
or to lporter@teleport.com. Thanks.

QUESTIONS MULTIPLY OVER NEVADA NUCLEAR-WASTE SITE
Christian Science Monitor -- June 3, 1999
New research has raised more questions about whether Yucca Mountain --
the controversial site slated to accept much of America's nuclear
waste -- is safe. The new concerns center on three separate
discoveries, discussed at a Boston meeting of the American Geophysical
Union this week.
* Radioactive material can move through ground water in ways that
Yucca site planners have not taken into account.
* Warmth generated by radioactive waste could heat the rock in the
repository to the boiling point of water. The heating could affect
the rock in a number of ways, and scientists have said they may never
be able to fully understand the process.
* A Russian researcher has raised new uncertainty about the
possibility of ground water rising from below to saturate the
chamber. The chamber must remain dry to prevent waste containers from
corroding.
[Hanford's high-level nuclear waste is supposed to go to
Yucca Mountain.]
http://www.industrywatch.com/story/19990602/23/36/4249052_st.html

BUGS' APPETITE FOR POLLUTION BETTER THAN HOPED
The Spokeman-Review -- June 2, 1999
The bugs that scientists are using to clean up the Idaho National
Engineering and Environmental Laboratory have a bigger appetite for
pollution than anyone guessed. The first real-world experiment using
microbes to clean up groundwater contamination at the site has
surprised almost everyone with its effectiveness. The results could
help drive a more natural approach to cleaning up pollution there.
http://www.spokane.net/news-story.asp?date=060299&ID=s587382&cat=secti
on.Environment

LAB DELIGHTED BY NEW INTEREST, NEW DIRECTION FOR NUCLEAR RESEARCH
The Knoxville News-Sentinel -- May 31, 1999
The Nuclear Energy Research Initiative is managed by the U.S. Department of Energy, which recently announced $19 million in funding for 45 projects. The nation's budget for nuclear research and development declined for 12 years in a row, bottoming out to "essentially zero" in 1998. Instead of promoting mega-projects like breeder reactors and advanced light-water reactors, federal planners are taking a broad-based, fundamental look at nuclear energy. The ORNL projects range from tech development for a new generation of reactor control rooms to fundamental research on the micro-structural changes that cause materials to become embrittled in high-radiation environments.
http://www.knoxnews.com/science/munger/fm05311999.shtml