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The Department of Energy has notified Hanford regulators that 23 legal deadlines for cleanup are at risk and may be missed because of the budget for fiscal 2009.
All of the deadlines are for cleanup work in central Hanford as DOE focuses on finishing most of the cleanup along the Columbia River by 2015.
DOE asked Hanford regulators, the Environmental Protection Agency and the Washington State Department of Ecology for extensions in a letter sent Wed-nesday.
"This is a disappointing reminder of the Bush administration's legacy of shortchanging Hanford cleanup efforts," Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., said in a statement. "Year after year, this administration introduced budgets that failed to live up to the critical milestones set forth by the Tri-Party Agreement and it's now clear that they will leave office with significant work left undone."
In 2007 Hanford's DOE Richland Operations Office had requested $1.4 billion for Hanford cleanup in fiscal 2009, which began Oct. 1, saying that was the amount needed to meet Tri-Party Agreement deadlines. The Richland Operations Office is responsible for cleanup along the river and in central Hanford and for overall site operations, with the separate DOE Hanford Office of River Protection responsible for the tank farms holding radioactive waste underground and the vitrification plant under construction.
Instead of $1.4 billion, the Richland Operations Office will be operating under a budget of $983 million, plus some likely supplemental funding. The Bush administration had proposed an even lower amount, but Congress approved a resolution to continue DOE funding at fiscal 2008 levels after failing to pass a detailed DOE budget by the start of the fiscal year.
The deadlines in central Hanford that are at risk are for work required to be completed from the end of 2009 through June 2012, with delays in 2009 expected to stall work in ensuing years.
"We are using funding available this year on priorities we believe are the consensus of the Tri-Parties," which include DOE, the state and EPA, said DOE spokesman Geoff Tyree. "If EPA or Ecology feel differently about these priorities, we're open to suggestion."
The Richland Operations Office focus will be on work along the Columbia River and preventing contaminated ground water from leaving central Hanford, he said. Although work will slow in central Hanford, important projects are planned there, such as expanding a ground water treatment system, shipping weapons-grade plutonium off site and cleaning out and demolishing more of the Plutonium Finishing Plant.
"We've all known this was coming, but that doesn't make the situation any better," said Rep. Doc Hastings, R-Wash., in a statement. "There needs to be a focus on the river corridor to shrink the size of the site and eliminate risks to the Columbia River, but having to choose which TPA milestones to uphold is not where we need to be."
EPA is looking at the letter from DOE as "a starting point for fruitful discussions," said Dennis Faulk, EPA environmental scientist.
"Important work on the Central Plateau will continue," he said. "But it's obvious a few tough priority decisions need to be made."
"The state is very concerned about the number of milestones and the overall impact on cleanup," said Ron Skinnarland, the Department of Ecology manager of the waste management section.
If studies needed to make cleanup plans and decisions are not finished as required in 2010 and 2011, that will delay the start of cleanup once money becomes available, he said.
Although some low-risk work with solid waste will be deferred to do higher risk work elsewhere, that still will mean increased costs, he said, as Hanford workers have to keep maintaining and checking waste. That includes a delay in near-term deadlines, such as a requirement that a backlog some solid waste be treated by the end of 2009.
"They were making good progress on activities, so it is too bad," he said.
EPA and the state each plan to make formal responses to DOE after discussions with DOE in the next few weeks.
A dozen of the 23 deadlines are at risk because work with solid waste in central Hanford will slow as money is shifted to cleanup work near the Columbia River.
The deadlines include work to retrieve temporarily buried transuranic waste, which typically is debris contaminated with plutonium, and treatment and preparation of the waste for shipment to New Mexico. The waste was buried until the nation had a repository in New Mexico for transuranic waste.
Hanford does not have facilities for treating some solid waste that is so radioactively hot it must be handled with remotely operated equipment and less radioactive transuranic waste in large boxes. Deadlines to build those facilities and begin treating that waste are among the solid waste deadlines at risk, along with deadlines for more routine work to treat low-level radioactive waste mixed with hazardous chemicals.
The remaining 11 deadlines at risk are for studies required by law to come up with plans to clean up contaminated soil and ground water in central Hanford. The contamination is left from the release of radioactive material into the ground after the processing of irradiated fuel rods to obtain plutonium for the nation's nuclear weapons program.
Work also may be suspended on six related central Hanford soil and ground water projects that are further along but which are not tied to specific deadlines.
In addition to the 23 deadlines at risk because of funding problems, some other Tri-Party Agreement deadlines are expected to be missed for technical reasons related to difficulties with the K Basin's radioactive sludge.
Murray said she will be working with President-elect Barack Obama to "make smart investments in Hanford that will help get cleanup back on track."
If more money is available from Congress for Hanford cleanup this spring when the continuing resolution for fiscal 2009 expires, DOE will ask Hanford regulators for input on how to reallocate money.
DOE's letter with the list of at-risk deadlines will be posted at www.tricityherald.com.
