The Energy Department’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) near Carlsbad, N.M., emplaced 40 shipments of transuranic waste during the first three months of 2020, according to data from its public website.
That is down significantly from 59 shipments in the first three months of 2019.
The Waste Isolation Pilot Plant completed a three-week maintenance outage on March 16. Eleven days later, the facility started reducing operations to help curb the spread of the novel coronavirus 2019; by March 31 work was limited to essential operations, such as roof bolting in the underground salt mine, and measures to protect health and safety. The disposal site is still accepting perhaps five shipments per week, roughly half as much as it might generally receive on a good week.
In addition, a DOE spokesperson said Tuesday by email that poor weather during January also slowed the rate of shipments.
During the first quarter, WIPP received 24 shipments from the Idaho National Laboratory, eight from the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico, and eight from the Savannah River Site in South Carolina.
Fluor Idaho is still packaging waste and making shipments to WIPP as part of its essential operations, according to a regular monthly staff report by the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board.
The Waste Isolation Pilot Plant is operated for DOE by Nuclear Waste Partnership, a joint venture comprised of Amentum, BWX Technologies, and major subcontractor Orano.