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Agencies concerned about mercury storage at Hanford
published Monday, September 14, 2009  2625 Views :: 3 Comments
Monday, Sep. 14, 2009

Agencies concerned about mercury storage at Hanford

By Annette Cary, Tri-City Herald staff writer

Making Hanford the nation's storage site for tons of excess mercury
could interfere with environmental cleanup of the site, according to
government agencies.

The states of Washington and Oregon, the Hanford Communities and the
Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation each have
submitted written comments to the Department of Energy outlining their
concerns.

"It is unacceptable for the nation's leadership to consider sending
12,000 tons of elemental mercury to Hanford when it will be another 50
years before existing waste is cleaned up," the tribes said in a letter
to DOE.

DOE is looking across the nation for mercury storage sites after the
Mercury Export Ban Act of 2008 prohibited the export of mercury
beginning in 2013 and required the agency to have facilities ready to
manage and store mercury generated in the United States.

DOE expects to need to store up to 11,000 tons of mercury from private
sources over 40 years and possibly an additional 1,300 tons of mercury
left from its nuclear weapons program.

The mercury would be stored in standard industry containers approved for
shipping by the U.S. Department of Transportation, including 76-pound
flasks and 1 metric ton containers. In one proposed scenario, a 10-acre
site would be required with a 150,000-square foot building with
reinforced floors. Floors would be coated to withstand a possible leak
and the air would be monitored for vapor releases.

The Hanford Communities said it was concerned about a proposal to ship
more waste to Hanford in light of the Obama administration's decision
not to complete the Yucca Mountain, Nev., repository for nuclear waste.
The Hanford Communities include the three Tri-Cities, Benton and
Franklin counties and the Port of Benton.

Hanford's high-level radioactive waste, now held in underground tanks,
was expected to be sent to Yucca Mountain once it is treated in the
vitrification plant. Irradiated nuclear fuel that was not processed to
remove plutonium at the end of the Cold War also was expected to be sent
to Yucca Mountain.

Thousands of tons of high-level radioactive defense waste will remain at
Hanford for the foreseeable future and the site will need a facility to
store vitrified waste as it is generated, the letter said.

"In light of this predicament, we believe that no additional waste forms
should be shipped to Hanford," said the Hanford Communities letter.

The group also is concerned about a suggestion that the Fuels and
Material Examination Facility at Hanford be considered for mercury
storage. About $350 million has been spent in sunk capital costs on the
250,000-square-foot building.

It was conceived in the mid-1970s as a place to study and test fuels for
the nation's breeder reactor technology program. Because of nuclear
proliferation concerns it was never used for that mission and has no
radioactive contamination.

"It was built at considerable cost to the taxpayers with design
standards that far exceed those required of a storage facility," the
Hanford Communities said.

The group pointed out that while there has been opposition to using
Hanford and other government sites under consideration for mercury
storage, one commercial waste site, Waste Control Specialists in
Andrews, Texas, apparently wants the mercury.

Other sites under consideration include the Grand Junction Disposal Site
in Colorado, the Idaho National Laboratory, Hawthorne Army Depot in
Nevada, Kansas City Plant in Missouri and the Savannah River Site in
South Carolina.

The state of Washington has supported the ban on exporting excess
mercury, which is an environmental hazard, and agreed that the nation
needs a safe place to store mercury in a letter signed by Jay Manning,
director of the Department of Ecology. While Washington is willing to
have Hanford considered along with other sites to find the best storage
site, according to Manning, it also wants cleanup conflicts considered,
which could rule out Hanford.

"Our first priority is fast and effective cleanup of Hanford," the
letter said. "We would oppose any effort that would divert resources or
focus from Hanford cleanup, or hinder the cleanup in any way."

Storing mercury at Hanford could take resources away from environmental
cleanup of contamination left from the past production of plutonium at
the site for the nation's nuclear weapons program, the letter said. The
footprint of the mercury site also could interfere with current or
future cleanup operations at Hanford, the letter said. Hanford soil and
ground water is contaminated with radionuclides and hazardous chemicals.

The state of Oregon is concerned about either Hanford or Idaho National
Laboratory being used for mercury storage because they are near the
Columbia or Snake Rivers, the state said in its letter to DOE.

"Both are adjacent to water bodies that already exceed Oregon water
quality standards for mercury and have multiple mercury water quality
concerns," the letter said. The state is concerned about releases either
during storage or transportation.

"In addition to our concerns about direct harm to the Columbia River,
Oregon strongly objects to the potential use of the Hanford site for
this action because of how it may negatively impact environmental
cleanup activities underway at the site," the Oregon letter said. "The
cleanup is necessary to help protect the Columbia River."

The tribes shared Oregon's concerns about river contamination.

"The Hanford site includes a portion of the Columbia River, which
already has a heavy load of mercury, and we cannot risk adding more if
the mercury flasks are left unattended at any time in the future," the
letter said. Among the Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian
Reservation treaty rights are fishing in the Columbia River at Hanford.

DOE expects to release a draft environmental study of proposed locations
for mercury storage in November and make a final decision in fall 2010.


 



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