Stormwater discharges from legacy nuclear work at the Department of Energy’s Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico, the subject of litigation in recent years, will be the focus of a virtual meeting on Wednesday.
The DOE Office of Environmental Management and its Los Alamos cleanup prime, Newport News Nuclear-BWXT Los Alamos (N3B), said in a Monday press release, they will report on the annual status of its National Pollution Discharge Elimination System Individual Permit during Wednesday’s scheduled meeting. The DOE site’s water runoff monitoring will also be discussed.
The permit, issued in August 2022 by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) allows stormwater discharges from laboratory areas where Cold War and Manhattan Project nuclear work took place. The meeting, set from 2:00 p.m. to 4:00 p.m. Mountain Time, will discuss “corrective actions completed in the last two years,” according to the release.
The agenda for the Feb. 28 meeting includes time for public comment.
According to a DOE spokesperson, the meeting will not discuss and is not in response to litigation filed against EPA in September 2019 by Amigos Bravos, a Taos-based water advocacy group, claimed runoff from the lab’s nuclear work sites hurt water quality in Los Alamos County, N.M.
Editor’s note Feb. 27, 2024, 4:10 p.m. Eastern time. The story was changed to clarify that the meeting is unrelated to pending litigation initiated by Amigos Bravos.
