Tests show DOE waste meets state standards

By Judy Fahys The Salt Lake Tribune/619 words/5 April 2010/The Salt Lake Tribune
SLTR/English
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Samples of the depleted uranium waste from a government cleanup in South Carolina show that it meets a key safety limit, said the Utah Department of Environmental Quality.
State regulators heard about the test results Monday from a Tennessee laboratory, which sampled 171 of the 5,400 drums sent most recently to Utah from the Savannah River Project cleanup for technetium-99, a waste product of reprocessing.

Gov. Gary Herbert requested the tests after the Healthy Environment Alliance of Utah and a scientist at the Institute for Energy and Environmental Research challenged whether the Savannah River DU has too much technetium-99 for EnergySolutions Inc.'s low- level radioactive waste landfill in Tooele County.
In its initial assessment years ago, the U.S. Department of Energy had checked samples from just 33 of about 15,000 drums. And, because of the way the waste was generated, there was a potential for an excess of contaminants that are only permitted in Utah at trace levels, the environmental groups said.
"We took a much more conservative and thorough approach to sampling," said DEQ Director Amanda Smith. "We believe that given questions raised about the nature of this waste, the state should do its due diligence and perform additional tests."
EnergySolutions, which won a federal stimulus contract for disposal of the Savannah River DU, welcomed the news about the results from Eberline Services, Inc., of Oak Ridge, Tenn.
"We welcomed the governor's request for additional sampling and tests of the contents of the depleted uranium containers," said company president and CEO Val Christensen, "because we were confident that the independent laboratory findings would validate our original testing and documentation."
HEAL Director Vanessa Pierce indicated her group had yet to review the results.
"We have requested the technetium-99 lab data and look forward to consulting further with radiation experts when we see the details of the 171 samples in front of us," she said.
"But at the end of the day, we are most concerned about the depleted uranium itself -- which has never been adequately studied for disposal at a site like EnergySolutions, and is the subject of new federal and state regulations."
The results appear to eliminate one hurdle for the remainder of the Savannah River waste to come to Utah. The Energy Department has agreed to hold off on two more shipments until the state can complete an assessment of the Utah disposal site for the long-term suitability of shallow sites for large quantities of DU, which gets more hazardous over time. The state Radiation Control Board is now considering the requirements of this site performance assessment.
Dane Finerfrock, director of the Utah Division of Radiation Control, said samples of the Savannah River waste had been split, with half going to EnergySolutions for analysis and half going to Eberline under contract with the state. He said it was worthwhile for the state to do its own analysis."Very rarely does the state sample the shipments," Finerfrock said. "EnergySolutions is required to do it, and then they share the results with us."
The Radiation Control Board is expected to discuss the results at its April 13 meeting.
fahys@sltrib.com

Clean bill of health
An independent lab confirmed waste from a South Carolina cleanup does not contain excessive amounts of Technetium-99. This product of reprocessing is a dense, silver-gray metal primarily found in the radioactive wastes from atomic-weapons production and nuclear reactors, according to the Environmental Protection Agency. Exposure to it, as with exposure to other forms of radioactivity, increases the chance of cancer and other harmful health affects.