News - Northwest - Northwest McClatchy

POSTED: Monday, Sep. 14, 2009

Agencies concerned about mercury storage at Hanford

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.