The Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico is taking steps to address a recent series of errors in waste handling and keep them from recurring, a spokesman said Wednesday.

Among other things, LANL voluntarily suspended all waste shipments from Dec. 18 through Feb. 28, while it investigated how it had mislabeled a container of hazardous waste sent to contractor Veolia in Colorado. The container included “chemical solvents and things of that nature,” according to lab spokesman Peter Hyde. A second mislabeled container was discovered before it was sent to Veolia, the spokesman said.

However, the pause on waste shipments resulted in five containers of mixed-low-level radioactive waste and hazardous waste being kept too long in temporary storage areas, Hyde acknowledged. As a result, the New Mexico Environment Department plans to penalize LANL for keeping three containers in a central storage area beyond the allowed 90-day limit. The lab also will be cited for keeping the two other containers in an area beyond the allowed one-year limit.

The current situation stems from transposed numbers being placed on two containers in November, which resulted in the mislabeled containers, the spokesman said. Although LANL knew holding up shipments would result in storage citations from the state, it wanted to be “confident that we had fully addressed the issue” of mislabeling, Hyde added.

“We are working closely with the state to evaluate our processes and procedures to make sure that our shipping program is in compliance with all regulations,” Hyde said.

In a separate instance, LANL acknowledged it misplaced 2 gallons of chemical solvents between Feb. 1 and Feb. 5. It was ultimately discovered the solvents had been placed in the wrong container, Hyde said. To avoid a repeat, LANL will ramp up from monthly to weekly inventory reviews, Hyde said: “We take these situations very seriously.”

One local watchdog remained of the lab’s efforts. “It’s paperwork that needs to get done correctly and isn’t,” Scott Kovac, operations and research director of Nuclear Watch New Mexico, said via email. “Lord knows they have enough people and budget to do the job correctly.”