EnergySolutions has asked the Utah Department of Environment Quality to put on hold its review of the depleted uranium disposal Performance Assessment (PA) at its Clive facility after eight problem areas emerged from the state’s Safety Evaluation Report (SER), the company announced yesterday. DEQ released the SER yesterday finding that the PA meets requirements for protection of the public and inadvertent intruders, but the SER found EnergySolution’s PA deficient in eight areas, including areas related to: the evapotranspiration cover, infiltration, erosion of cover, frost damage, effects of biological on radionuclide transport, clay liner, GoldSim quality assurance, and deep time analysis. The release of the report would have kicked off a seven-week public comment period that would have included public hearings in Salt Lake City and Tooele, Utah, but it appears that comment period will be put on hold.
According to EnergySolutions spokesman Mark Walker, the company did not want to move forward with the public comment period if deficiencies still existed in the report. “Although we are confident we can address these unresolved questions, we believe the public comment period should only proceed once the questions are resolved,” Walker said in a statement. “The company’s position has been and continues to be that science should determine whether DU can be safely disposed of at Clive. The Company will not proceed until these questions are answered to the satisfaction of the appropriate regulatory bodies.”
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