nuclear-news

USA Energy Dept keen to reopen New Mexico Nuclear waste Station: others not so sure

New Mexico Presses Ahead on Nuclear-Waste Plant Reopening Burial site’s closure caused by 2014 accident left waste piling up across the country, WSJ  By JOHN R. EMSHWILLER Feb. 28, 2016

Despite a nine-month delay in the planned reopening of an underground nuclear-waste repository in New Mexico damaged by a radiation accident, progress is being made in resuming operations, said a top state official overseeing the effort.

In January, the Energy Department said it had pushed the reopening date of the federal facility near Carlsbad, N.M., to December from March. The closure caused by the February 2014 accident has left nuclear waste destined for the repository piling up at sites around the country……

Among the issues still being addressed, he said, are residual contamination from the accident and ensuring adequate and safe air flows in the complex.

While officials want to see WIPP reopen as soon as possible, “we have to make sure it is done right,” said Mr. Flynn, whose agency must give its approval before the site can accept waste again. He said he thinks December is a reasonable target date.

Not everyone is as sanguine. Given the remaining challenges, “I think it’s very unlikely the December date will be met,” said Don Hancock, director of the nuclear-waste safety program at the Southwest Research and Information Center, an Albuquerque, N.M., environmental group.

Earlier this month, U.S. Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz said he expects resumption of full operations at the repository to take a few years……..

The Energy Department has said it would cost about $240 million to bring WIPP back into operation and tens of millions of dollars more in additional capital costs, including revisions to the ventilation system.

WIPP, which began operations about 17 years ago, was designed to dispose of a specific type of nuclear waste from the atomic-weapons program. More than 171,000 waste containers are buried there………http://www.wsj.com/articles/new-mexico-presses-ahead-on-nuclear-waste-plant-reopening-1456655406

February 29, 2016 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | USA, wastes