A retired USGS geologist shares his experience of working on the publicly misunderstood nuclear waste repository and its geology.
WIPP begins placing TRU waste in Panel 8
Employees have begun emplacing defense-related transuranic (TRU) waste in Panel 8 of the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) in New Mexico, the Department of Energy’s Office of Environmental...
Nuclear waste disposal—What choice do we really have?
Nuclear waste disposal presents a frustrating problem far beyond its actual danger. No one has ever been harmed by commercial nuclear waste, and no one is likely to ever be harmed.But we do...
Two reports agree: Diverse advanced reactor fuel cycles can succeed
Advanced reactors and small modular reactors with strikingly different coolants and sizes offer an array of different benefits, but when it comes to fuel cycle issues, including spent fuel and...
SRS workers meet Pu downblending goals ahead of schedule
Contractor employees at the Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site in South Carolina recently exceeded their plutonium downblending goal for 2022 ahead of schedule as part of the ongoing...
“Abnormal condition” pauses Hanford melter heat-up
Heating of the first waste vitrification melter at the Department of Energy’s Hanford Site was paused after operators identified an “abnormal condition with the startup heater power...
Heat-up of Hanford’s first vit melter begins
Crews at the Department of Energy’s Hanford Site, near Richland, Wash., have begun heating up the first of two 300-ton melters that will be used to vitrify mixed low-level radioactive and...
DOE releases 5-year Hanford cleanup plan
By fiscal year 2027, Hanford’s Waste Treatment and Immobilization Plant (WTP) will ramp up toward producing 21 metric tons of low-level radioactive glass a day, according to the Department...
Teardown commences on West Valley’s Main Plant
The Department of Energy’s Office of Environmental Management (EM) said it has met one of its cleanup priorities for 2022 by beginning demolition of the Main Plant Process Building (MPPB) at...
DOE releases plan to guide cleanup mission, accelerate progress
The Department of Energy’s Office of Environmental Management (EM) released its EM Program Plan 2022, outlining a decision roadmap the cleanup program will use as a guide over the next two...
DOE incentivizes interim storage with $16 million funding opportunity
The Department of Energy has announced that it will make $16 million in funding available to communities interested in learning more about “consent-based siting, management of spent nuclear...