Tunnel Collapses At Nuclear Facility Once Called 'An Underground Chernobyl Waiting To Happen' (gizmodo.com)

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Gizmodo: Managers at the Hanford Site in Washington State told workers to "take cover" Tuesday morning after a tunnel leading to a massive plutonium finishing plant collapsed. The emergency is especially worrisome, since Hanford is commonly known as "the most toxic place in America," with one former governor calling it "an underground Chernobyl waiting to happen." Worrisome might actually be an understatement. An emergency has been declared. The accident occurred near the 200 East Area, the home of several solid waste sites. More specifically, the tunnel that collapsed was one filled with highly radioactive train cars that once carried spent fuel rods containing deeply dangerous plutonium and uranium from a reactor on the Columbia River to the processing facility. Those reactors once produced plutonium for America's nuclear arsenal, though production ended in 1980. The cleanup process that followed has gone on for nearly 30 years. Back to the poor workers, though. They've been instructed to stay indoors, and one manager reportedly sent out a message telling workers to "secure ventilation in your building" and "refrain from eating or drinking." When you can't even have a glass of water, you know the nuclear emergency is bad. The U.S. Department of Energy sent out a press release around 1pm EST that said "facility personnel have been evacuated," while workers at nearby sites have been instructed to stay indoors. A spokesperson also told the press that "there was no evidence to suggest that radioactive materials had been released and that all of the workers in the area were accounted for."

Comments

Re:Here's an idea

[klingens]

This is no nuclear facility you can "improve", which you can make better in any way: it's a waste dump of highly toxic, highly volatile materials. These exist and transmutation of them is a bullshit theory of people too stupid for physics (meaning it is damn expensive in research and then energy to transmute, so expensive it's a pipedream one stop below a perpetuum mobile).

This is one of many waste dumps around Hanford that you have to watch over for a few tens of thousands of years. Now think what happens in 12.000 AD: does anyone then even know that there might be a radioactive waste dump in the area when such a hole opens?

Re:EPAAAWWWWWWHHHHH

[Required Snark]

The EPA is directly involved with the Hanford cleanup operation. The work is being done under the direct management of the DOE, but their results are reviewed by the EPA.

CERCLA 121(c) requires five-year reviews on remedial actions when hazardous substances, pollutants, or contaminants will remain on site above levels that allow for “unlimited use and unrestricted exposure”. A general overview of the review process can be found in this presentation. The first Five-Year Review was completed in 2001 by EPA staff. The Department of Energy (DOE) chose to conduct the second Five-Year Review which had draft 0 completed in 2006. When DOE performs the review, as in 2006, EPA is still required to review the report and provide comments/concurrence in a letter of review.

Given how poorly the Hanford cleanup has gone under the leadership of the DOE, more involvment by the EPA might lead to a better result. If you carefully read the preceding paragraph, you will note that the DOE took over the review process from the EPA after the first report. Having a department review it'sown work is not exactly the best way to insure that they are doing a good job. After this latest failure, it is obvious that the DOE is not doing a very good job.

There is a cosmic irony in the juxtaposition of this problem at Hanford and the shutdown of scientific advisory panels at the EPA and the Department of the Interior. Inevitably some of these efforts involve the Hanford site. It is a stark reminder that ignoring science is always a bad idea.

By the way, why are you picking on the EPA in the first place? I detect the stench of a right wing troll.