The Department of Energy’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant near Carlsbad, N.M., received 29 shipments of defense-related transuranic waste during October, according to figures posted on the facility’s public website.
There were 24 shipments from the Idaho National Laboratory, four from the Savannah River Site in South Carolina and one from the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico. That is below the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant’s (WIPP) total for October 2023 when the salt mine took in 36 shipments.
Shipments are recorded on the public website about two weeks after the fact.
During the first 10 months of 2024, WIPP has received 405 shipments, according to the DOE website. That is slightly below the 2023 pace when WIPP received 411 shipments.
The top managers for DOE and its WIPP prime said recently the rate of shipments is leveling off some as much of the remaining defense-related transuranic waste still needs to be dug up, packaged or certified before it can be disposed of at the underground salt mine.
