The U.S. Energy Department’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico briefly held up some shipments of transuranic waste from the Idaho National Laboratory in November after discovery of a hole in one drum, according to the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board (DNFSB).
The 4 millimeter-hole was discovered Nov. 2 by WIPP inspectors in a corroded area on the outside of a 55-gallon drum of sludge waste from INL, according to a regular monthly report filed by engineer Alexander Velazquez-Lozada with DNFSB Technical Director Christopher Roscetti on Dec. 6.
No radiological contamination turned up on the drum shipped from INL on Oct. 23. The Energy Department has criteria on how much damage is acceptable on WIPP-bound shipments, but the question of how much rust is allowable is still largely a judgment call, according to the report.
The Waste Isolation Pilot Plant suspended at least some shipments of INL waste upon discovery of the drum with the hole, but has since resumed taking them, according to the document, which did not say how long new shipments were held up. Fluor Idaho, the DOE contractor that manages waste packing and all other cleanup at the lab, is tightening its drum inspection procedures, according to the DNFSB report.
Six of the 10 shipments received at WIPP during November came from INL, according to a public DOE database. Idaho National Laboratory is by far the No. 1 shipper to WIPP, accounting for 225 of the 285 shipments emplaced at the facility through November.
The problem drum was actually packed with waste in 2014 prior to shipment. The transuranic waste disposal site near Carlsbad, N.M., was out of service nearly three years after a February 2014 underground radiation release.