Idaho state regulators are reviewing documents drafted by Fluor Idaho, which the company hopes will allow resumption of sludge repackaging this spring at the Idaho National Laboratory facility where four waste drums overheated and ejected their lids last April.
The “corrective action plan” and “evaluation of the safety of the situation” reports are being discussed by the state and the Department of Energy, Brian English, hazardous waste permits manager with the Idaho Department of Environmental Quality, said by email Friday.
The cleanup contractor at the Idaho National Laboratory told the state on Feb. 28 it wants to resume radioactive sludge repackaging in April at the Accelerated Retrieval Project No. 5 facility within the Radioactive Waste Management Complex.
The documents outline various steps, most of them due to be completed this month or next, that should minimize the chances of such an event occurring again. The measures include additional staff training, additional waste characterization, and safety culture improvements.
At about 10 p.m. on April 11, 2018, four 55-gallon drums of waste sludge overheated to about 150 degrees Celsius after depleted uranium contacted air for the first time in decades. The containers from the Rocky Flats weapons site in Colorado were being reopened and the material repackaged after having been buried at INL for decades. No one was hurt in the incident, although waste ejected onto the ceilings and walls.
