Signs increasingly point toward startup by the end of 2018 of operations of the long-delayed Integrated Waste Treatment Unit (IWTU) at the Energy Department’s Idaho National Laboratory.
DOE Idaho Deputy Manager Jack Zimmerman said during a meeting of the Leadership in Nuclear Energy Commission in Boise the IWTU could start treating radioactive waste by the end of the year, according to a Jan. 31 article in the Idaho Falls Post Register. LINE is an advisory panel on INL issues for Idaho Gov. C.L. “Butch” Otter.
Neither INL nor LINE replied to requests for comment.
About 900,000 gallons of liquid radioactive waste are stored in underground tanks at the Idaho Nuclear Technology and Engineering Center, Zimmerman told LINE in October 2017. The IWTU was built in 2012 to treat the waste, but design problems have delayed operations.
The Energy Department’s fiscal 2018 funding request supports continued progress toward closing the tank farm, including commissioning the IWTU for treatment of sodium-bearing waste, a process that has taken years longer than initially planned. Much progress has been made in resolving startup issues the system, and the next simulated run of the facility is set for this spring, Zimmerman said.
If the planned tests go well, it could provide DOE with the confidence to start treating actual liquid waste by the end of this calendar year, Zimmerman was quoted as saying.
A 1995 settlement between the Department of Energy, Idaho, and the U.S. Navy had required DOE to complete treatment of the 851,800 gallons of high-level sodium-bearing liquid waste in the INTEC Tank Farm Facility by the end of 2012. When DOE missed the deadline, the state prohibited further shipments of spent fuel to the Idaho National Laboratory.
“Attorney [Lawrence] General Wasden won’t comment right now on the specifics of INL operations, but I can tell you he is optimistic about the momentum around IWTU and recent discussions with various INL stakeholders,” Wasden spokesman Scott Graff said in a recent email.
As of September 2017, DOE had piled up $2.37 million in fines for failing to start operating the Integrated Waste Treatment Unit, and the fines continue to accrue at the rate of $6,000 per day, said Natalie Creed, hazardous waste management and remediation division chief for the Idaho Department of Environmental Quality.
