The Government Accountability Office was asked Wednesday to take a look at how aging contaminated facilities at the Hanford nuclear reservation are being monitored and maintained until they can be cleaned up.
The request by seven bipartisan members of Congress came after the partial collapse May 9 of a tunnel that has stored highly radioactive waste since the 1960s with no plans made yet for permanent disposal of the waste.
“We are concerned that future events could put the safety of workers, the public and the environment at risk,” said the request. “The event was another harsh reminder of the radioactive and toxic hazards that remain at the Hanford Site, as well as the importance of ensuring the site has the resources necessary to expeditiously achieve its cleanup mission.”
Sen. Maria Cantwell, D-Wash., the ranking member of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, took the lead on the request.
She was joined by Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash.; Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore.; Rep. Dan Newhouse, R-Wash.; Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers, R-Wash.; Rep Greg Walden, R-Ore., and Rep. Frank Pallone, D-N.J. Walden is chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee and Pallone is ranking member of the committee.
The request came a day after the administration of President Donald Trump submitted a proposed budget to Congress that calls for a cut of nearly $124 million to the budget of the Hanford Richland Operations Office, dropping it to $716 million.
The office is responsible for all Hanford cleanup except for the site’s underground waste tanks and the plant being built to treat the waste. Its responsibilities are the contaminated equipment, facilities, waste sites, groundwater and soil that are the focus of the request.
In recent years, much of the Richland Operations Office’s work has been focused on cleanup of contaminated buildings and waste sites closest to the Columbia River. The plan has been to next turn to central Hanford, which has more than 1,000 waste sites and about 500 facilities, many of them highly contaminated with radioactive and toxic chemical waste, plus contaminated soil and groundwater.
The request to the GAO asks the agency to look at the monitoring done at the collapsed tunnel and related PUREX plant facilities and also take a broader look at other aging facilities.
