Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.) is the latest official from her state to urge Secretary of Energy Chris Wright to stick with an Oct. 15 target for starting to convert radioactive sludge at the Hanford Site in a stable glass form.
In a Senate floor statement on Friday Sept. 12 should not be “walking back” the Department of Energy’s plans to start converting some of the less-radioactive waste into glass at the Bechtel-built Waste Immobilization and Treatment Plant.
The plant has been under construction for 23 years and cost about $24 billion, Cantwell said in an accompanying press release The work, scheduled to begin on Oct. 15, would employ around 3,000 people at the site, she said.
“Our current energy secretary, if he’s thinking about ignoring these commitments to science or the Tri-Party Agreement — he needs to rethink that,” Cantwell said. “I know that we must continue our obligations at the facility. I know that we can’t walk away from this commitment. I know that the vitrification process has been proven scientifically, and unless there is a problem at this plant, we need to move forward with the production that people have been counting on for years.”
Also on Friday, Feb. 12, Washington Gov. Bob Ferguson (D) promised legal action, through an existing federal court order, should DOE attempt to cancel the long-awaited Waste Treatment Plant.