The city of Oak Ridge, Tenn., this week asked the Department of Energy again not to despoil the natural landscape near the Y-12 National Nuclear Security Complex with power lines for a next-generation uranium-processing plant.
The Department of Energy (DOE) contracted with the Tennessee Valley Authority to build the lines on a hilltop known locally as Pine Ridge. The lines, along with a new substation also to be built by the authority, will power the Uranium Processing Facility that Bechtel National is building at Y-12. The facility will help refurbish U.S. nuclear warheads.
To accommodate the new lines, DOE plans to carve a path about 100 feet wide and 2 miles long over the wooded hilltop: work the agency thinks would take a little more than seven months to finish, according to a flyer distributed to locals from Y-12 in November.
“This project will permanently scar the beautiful viewshed that attracts residents, visitors and their investment to our community,” Oak Ridge Mayor Warren Gooch said Monday in a press release from the Oak Ridge City Council.
Logging had not started as of Friday, according to a spokesman for DOE’s National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA). The Energy Department had planned to start clearing the hilltop on Nov. 16, but agreed to a delay at Gooch’s request.
DOE has been planning lines on Pine Ridge for more than two years, and Oak Ridge officials acknowledged as much Monday. A publicly available document from 2016, signed by DOE National Environmental Policy Act compliance officer Jack Zanger, discloses the location of the planned power lines and substation, but little else. Oak Ridge officials said Monday they were briefed about the project for the first time Nov. 7.
Meanwhile, the NNSA said Tuesday that it was not considering rerouting the planned Pine Ridge power lines, as the city requested.
“NNSA considered a number of alternatives to minimize the visual impact to the community and determined the only feasible option is to alter the color of the pole,” the agency spokesperson said by email.
