The Energy Department and the state of Idaho have yet to discuss potential shipments of transuranic waste from the Separations Process Research Unit (SPRU) in New York state to the Idaho National Laboratory during fiscal 2020 and 2021.
The fiscal 2020 budget justification for DOE’s Office of Environmental Management envisions sending 24 containers filled with defense transuranic waste from the New York site to INL in 2020. The Idaho National Laboratory would evidently serve as a stopover location for the material before it is shipped to the federal agency’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) near Carlsbad, N.M.
New York Department of Environmental Conservation spokesman Jomo Miller said Thursday his office is not familiar with any schedule for shipping the waste from SPRU to another location. State officials do realize the defense transuranic waste at the site will likely need “analysis and/or repackaging,” he said by telephone.
“To date, Idaho has not been approached about these shipments,” Brian English, hazardous waste permits manager with the Idaho Department of Environmental Quality, said in a Wednesday email.
In the past, INL has characterized and packaged transuranic waste for WIPP, English said. Both the Advanced Mixed Waste Treatment Project (AMWTP) and the Idaho Nuclear Technology and Engineering Center have the necessary permits and have handled TRU waste previously, he added. The AMWTP is winding down its mission to process 65,000 cubic meters of on-site legacy waste, much of which originated from the Rocky Flats nuclear weapons plant in Colorado.
Only about 7,000 cubic meters of the material remain and AMWTP has been slated for retirement by the end of 2019.
Any TRU waste shipped to INL would be subject to the requirements of the Idaho Settlement Agreement, a 1995 legal deal between the state, DOE, and the U.S. Navy over nuclear waste storage in Idaho. Under the deal, waste must be treated within six months of receipt and be shipped outside of Idaho no more than six months after treatment is complete, English said.
The SPRU facility housed an old pilot plant used in the 1950s for research and development of chemical processes to separate plutonium from other radioactive material at the Knolls Atomic Power Laboratory in Niskayuna, N.Y.
Remediation of the site is largely finished. Demolition of buildings there generated 24 containers of potential transuranic waste or mixed TRU waste regulated by the New York state Department of Environmental Conservation. A February 2018 consent order between DOE and New York allows for continued outdoor interim storage of the material in Conex boxes.
The waste includes system components, equipment, and residues from walls, piping and insulation. The material is shielded with lead and located inside 55- or 85-gallon drums within the Conex boxes. A permit that the state should rule on this year could allow continued storage at SPRU for up to 10 years.
Idaho is the approved location to ship waste from the department’s “small sites” remediation programs for treatment.
The budget proposal for the fiscal year starting Oct. 1 would put SPRU site remediation funding at roughly $15 million for the second year in a row. Energy Department budget documents currently anticipate completion of SPRU cleanup in fiscal 2021.
The Energy Department did not comment by press time.
