The Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico sent 11 shipments of transuranic waste to the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant between October and March, the lab’s cleanup contractor said recently.
The shipments totaled a little more than 32.5 cubic meters in volume, according to a second-fiscal-quarter update posted on the website of Newport News Nuclear BWXT Los Alamos (N3B).
There were five shipments in the first quarter of fiscal year 2024 and six in the second. At the halfway mark on the government fiscal calendar, that put the agency behind last year’s average pace of more than 14 shipments quarterly, according to the N3B fact sheet.
Meanwhile, the contractor did not say how many of the milestones it met under the Department of Energy’s 2016 consent order with New Mexico, which sets the rules for cleanup of legacy nuclear waste at Los Alamos.
The state and the federal government are renegotiating the terms of that consent order and think they can reach an accord as soon as May, according to a court filing from early April. The administration of Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham (D) wants a tougher deal than the one struck by her predecessor, Gov. Susana Martinez (R).
