The Hanford Advisory Board recommended that the Department of Energy request a Hanford budget of about $2.8 billion in fiscal 2012 as the panel wrapped up a two-day meeting in Richland on Friday.
That's up from budgets of about $2.1 billion this year and in the proposed fiscal 2011 budget now before Congress. However, in 2010 and 2011 Hanford also is spending most of the $1.96 billion it received in federal economic stimulus money.
The $2.8 billion is about $500 million more than DOE had planned when it made its latest five-year budget plan that covered 2012.
By fiscal 2012, almost all the economic stimulus money will be spent and DOE will need a significant increase in its annual budget to meet legal deadlines for environmental cleanup in the Tri-Party Agreement "rather than seeking additional deferments and delays in these schedules," the board said in advice sent to DOE.
The board is recommending DOE ask for funding to cover a list developed by Hanford DOE offices of prioritized projects that are needed to keep cleanup work moving forward as scheduled. That would require about $1.2 billion for the DOE Hanford Office of River Protection and about $1.6 billion for the DOE Hanford Richland Operations Office, it said.
The board also recommended, as it has in the past, that money for security at Hanford not come out of environmental cleanup dollars. It questioned why the cost of security is projected to increase from $69 million in fiscal 2011 to $74 million in fiscal 2012 under DOE plans, even though weapons-grade plutonium has been sent off Hanford. About $83 million was budgeted this year.
DOE officials previously have pointed out the site still has unprocessed reactor fuel that was irradiated to produce plutonium. That fuel was expected to be sent to the Yucca Mountain national repository that the Obama administration has moved to terminate.
The board also focused on Hanford debris contaminated with plutonium that was disposed of before 1970.
In 1970, Congress ordered that such waste -- called transuranic waste -- be sent to a national repository. Starting that year, Hanford's transuranic waste was temporarily buried and now is being retrieved and sent to a national repository, the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico.
The advisory board remains concerned about plans for pre-'70s transuranic waste, saying that DOE needs to request funding to determine what's buried and to remove and treat it as needed. DOE needs to start that work and remember that extensively sampling, or characterizing the waste, may cost more than just retrieving some or all of it up.
The board also is concerned that for initial planning purposes DOE has assumed pre-'70s transuranic waste sites may just be covered with a protective cap to prevent water from infiltrating and driving radioactive or chemical waste deeper in the soil. Budget projections do not cover the costs of retrieving the waste, the board said.
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Hanford regulators will postpone some cleanup deadlines
Hanford regulators will postpone some cleanup deadlines
Hanford regulators have agreed to let some interim environmental cleanup deadlines slide at the nuclear reservation to focus on the highest priority work, given the realities of the federal budget.
The changes are expected to allow work to continue to demolish the Plutonium Finishing Plant, which the Department of Energy heard during public comments should be a priority.
The new plan also retains the focus on completing cleanup along the Columbia River by 2015 and cleaning up contaminated ground water beneath Hanford.
New cost for Hanford cleanup projected at $112 billion
New cost for Hanford cleanup projected at $112 billion
The new price tag for completing the remainder of Hanford nuclear reservation cleanup, plus some post-cleanup oversight, is $112 billion.
That is down $3 billion from last year, according to projections in the annual Hanford Lifecycle Scope, Schedule and Cost Report.
The drop primarily is because of work accomplished last year using Department of Energy annual budget money and the final year's spending of Hanford's federal economic stimulus money.
$115 billion not enough to finish work at Hanford, board says
$115 billion not enough to finish work at Hanford, board says
Do not expect that the $115 billion estimated to be needed to complete environmental cleanup work at Hanford will be adequate to finish the job, according to the Hanford Advisory Board.
The board sent a letter to the Department of Energy and its regulators Friday saying that the estimate does not include cleanup work the board expects may be needed and also does not include fully developed cost estimates for some work.
The $115 billion estimate was the conclusion of the 2011 Hanford Lifecycle Scope, Schedule and Cost Report -- a new requirement of the legally binding Tri-Party Agreement, after DOE negotiated with Washington state and the Environmental Protection Agency to extend some environmental cleanup deadlines.
Vit plant budget doubted in review
Vit plant budget doubted in review
The Department of Energy may not be able to complete the Hanford vitrification plant for the projected $12.2 billion, according to an internal DOE document.
The $12.2 billion figure is at risk due to uncertainties in congressional funding for the project, increased cost growth outpacing savings and delays in resolving technical waste mixing issues, according to a briefing document by the Construction Project Review team.
However, a "refined approach to treating the small fraction" of the most difficult waste, which includes plutonium, could help curb cost growth, the document indicated. That could mean finishing the design of the plant to treat the majority of the waste and then continuing to work on studies for treating the most difficult waste.
$115 billion needed to finish Hanford cleanup
$115 billion needed to finish Hanford cleanup
The Department of Energy has taken a look at all the environmental cleanup yet to be completed at the Hanford nuclear reservation and come up with a big price tag: $115 billion.
That's what it projects will be required to finish environmental cleanup in about 2060 and then prevent any intrusion into areas, such as landfills holding radioactive waste, until 2090.
There has never been an exact figure on remaining cleanup costs, although estimates a few years ago put the cost at more than $100 billion, said Ron Skinnarland, the section manager of waste management for the Washington State Department of Ecology, a Hanford regulator.
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