Hanford Nuclear tunnel collapases.

There is also the cleanup of hexavalent chromium in the reactor areas.

a reply to: roadgravel

Challenging cleanup to say the least.

The most toxic and voluminous nuclear waste in the U.S.—208 million liters —sits in decaying underground tanks at the Hanford Site (a nuclear reservation) in southeastern Washington State. It accumulated there from the middle of World War II, when the Manhattan Project invented the first nuclear weapon, to 1987, when the last reactor shut down. The federal government’s current attempt at a permanent solution for safely storing that waste for centuries—the Waste Treatment and Immobilization Plant here—has hit a major snag in the form of potential chain reactions, hydrogen explosions and leaks from metal corrosion. And the revelation last February that six more of the storage tanks are currently leaking has further ramped up the pressure for resolution.
After decades of research, experimentation and political inertia, the U.S. Department of Energy (DoE) started building the “Vit Plant” at Hanford in 2000. It’s intended to sequester the waste in stainless steel–encased glass logs, a process known as vitrification (hence “Vit”), so it cannot escape into the environment, barring natural disasters like earthquakes or catastrophic fires. But progress on the plant slowed to a crawl last August, when numerous interested parties acknowledged that the plant’s design might present serious safety risks. In response, then-Energy Secretary Steven Chu appointed an expert panel to find a way forward. Because 60 of the 177 underground tanks have already leaked and all are at increasing risk to do so, solving the problem is urgent.

Link

a reply to: D8Tee

Damn. I was not aware that the costs were really that high. And you cited the sources and everything. It's incredible how much money are being spend of these sort of things...

originally posted by: andrewjerol91
a reply to: D8Tee

Damn. I was not aware that the costs were really that high. And you cited the sources and everything. It's incredible how much money are being spend of these sort of things...

I'm wondering that this cost maybe fake, and is really a scam to glean the money from the taxpayer. Notice that we no longer here anything about this Golden Goose!
Somebody's (Soros, Rockefeller, Buffet?) golden egg was about to be cracked and the contamination has been swept under the rug again!

originally posted by: Violater1
The below photograph shows how close The Columbia River is the this area.

How sad, how very very sad.

Who were the geniuses that decided to put a nuclear waste station that close to a major river?

a reply to: wickd_waze

And in an earthquake zone...

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission last week denied a petition filed by Oregon/Washington Physicians for Social Responsibility and other groups asking for a shutdown of Washington’s Columbia reactor until it demonstrates it can meet seismic standards.

The petition was based on a study that found that earthquake risks for the reactor have been greatly underestimated, as reported here in March. The NRC’s denial asserted that PSR had provided no new information and that the agency is already re-examining earthquake and flooding risks at the nation’s reactors, including Columbia. Flooding is a related issue at the site since it sits downstream from a major dam that could be affected by an earthquake and perhaps even without one—a major crack has been revealed in the dam.

It’s not only Columbia that is at risk here, however. It’s the entire sprawling Hanford nuclear reservation, home of leaking barrels of liquid high-level radioactive waste, a mélange of nuclear weapons production facilities and a clean-up effort currently projected by the DOE to take until 2090 to complete.

Link

a reply to: wickd_waze
The area was started back in 1943, way before we understood the perils of pulling on the nuclear tiger.
However, it is not an excuse for it's continuation past the 1980's (plus or minus 15 years).

a reply to: D8Tee

Thats even crazier. Just like Fukashima.

Yeah, but I'm sure scientists knew the waste was radioactive and not safe back then, right around the same time when nuclear energy was progressing.

Also not just nuclear waste being that close, but any waste disposal area like sewer, landfills or toxic substances like nuclear waste. That's a nice looking river with nice surroundings and its all gutted up ruining it that way too.

originally posted by: wickd_waze
Yeah, but I'm sure scientists knew the waste was radioactive and not safe back then, right around the same time when nuclear energy was progressing.

Also not just nuclear waste being that close, but any waste disposal area like sewer, landfills or toxic substances like nuclear waste. That's a nice looking river with nice surroundings and its all gutted up ruining it that way too.

It actually had nuclear reactors that were cooled from the river.

and contaminated air and cooling water which was dumped back into the river, to the tune of 685,000 curies of radioactive iodine-131 between 1944 and 1947.

As of 2008, 1,000,000 US gallons of radioactive waste is traveling through the groundwater toward the Columbia River. This waste is expected to reach the river in 12 to 50 years if cleanup does not proceed on schedule.

a reply to: Violater1

Oh I see thanks for clearing that up. I must have not read one of the links that contained that information.

originally posted by: wickd_waze
a reply to: Violater1

Oh I see thanks for clearing that up. I must have not read one of the links that contained that information.

no problemo.
The B Reactor at the Hanford Site, near Richland, Washington, was the first large-scale nuclear reactor ever built.
en.wikipedia.org...

a reply to: roadgravel

Radioactive iodine (I 131) has very short half life - only 8 days so would not be around after few weeks

Even longer lived isotopes, strontium 90 and cesium 137, with half lives of 28 and 30 years respectively
would have decayed to fraction of original activity after 70 odd years ( 2 1/2 half lives)

Stuff like plutonium will be around for thousand of years though......

originally posted by: firerescue
a reply to: roadgravel

Radioactive iodine (I 131) has very short half life - only 8 days so would not be around after few weeks

Even longer lived isotopes, strontium 90 and cesium 137, with half lives of 28 and 30 years respectively
would have decayed to fraction of original activity after 70 odd years ( 2 1/2 half lives)

Stuff like plutonium will be around for thousand of years though......

However the biggest problem was with the PUREX (Plutonium Uranium EXtraction) plant.
Pu-239 has a half-life of 24,100 years.
The half-life of uranium-238 is about 4.5 billion years, uranium-235 about 700 million years, and uranium-234 about 25 thousand years.

Well, goody. All Fixed! They filled the hole with "strategically carefully placed fill"

TLDR..."Put some dirt on it." Literally.

The D.O.E's solution is the same as my High School Football coaches solutions to an open wound: "Rub some dirt on it and get back out there"

Trust me when I say that the attention the impending disaster that is Hanford has recently gotten will once again go to sleep and nothing will happen.

However, unlike the Yellowstone Caldera or California's "Big One", the coming Hanford catastrophe can and should be avoided. All it would take is political will and taxpayer dollars...

Actually, nevermind...those two things never go together.

originally posted by: wickd_waze
Who were the geniuses that decided to put a nuclear waste station that close to a major river?

It's done intentionally, a readily accessible permanent source of water is one of the ways you avoid all hell breaking loose when things go bad. It creates environmental problems, but those problems are less than you would have if the water wasn't there.

a reply to: Aazadan

Yeah I'll admit I didnt really think about that. It makes sense though risking being by a river for better chances at damage control.

originally posted by: wickd_waze
a reply to: Aazadan

Yeah I'll admit I didnt really think about that. It makes sense though risking being by a river for better chances at damage control.

It would make sense to place by a consistent source of water. Indeed cooling the reactor would be a safety priority.
But a nuclear waste dump by a large river?

originally posted by: Violater1

originally posted by: wickd_waze
a reply to: Aazadan

Yeah I'll admit I didnt really think about that. It makes sense though risking being by a river for better chances at damage control.

It would make sense to place by a consistent source of water. Indeed cooling the reactor would be a safety priority.
But a nuclear waste dump by a large river?

Didn't it have an operational plant at one point?

Also, just off the top of my head... what about river transport of waste to the site?