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Department of Ecology News Release - Oct. 24, 2003
03-208
OLYMPIA - An agreement was reached today that resolves major portions of two Hanford cleanup orders issued last spring by the state Department of Ecology (Ecology).
"Fourteen years after the Tri-Party Agreement was first signed, we finally have cleanup milestones for the largest remaining block of waste at Hanford," said Ecology Interim Director Linda Hoffman. "This is a tremendous win for Hanford and the people of Washington,"
The agreement separates the technical and jurisdictional issues associated with a March 10 directive calling on the federal Department of Energy (USDOE) to construct storage and treatment facilities for transuranic and transuranic mixed wastes, and an April 30 order directing USDOE to properly manage radioactive chemical wastes buried and "retrievably stored" in unlined trenches or otherwise generated at Hanford.
USDOE appealed both actions, and Ecology issued a series of stays for a portion of the order pending the outcome of settlement negotiations.
Early on, the two agencies acknowledged that their dispute about the scope of the state's regulatory authority over mixed transuranic waste would have to be resolved in court. But the technical issues involving what the schedule should be for retrieving and characterizing the buried waste, and treating non-transuranic waste, probably could be resolved through negotiation.
The agreement reached today establishes the following key milestones:
The agreement also specifies annual volume requirements to assure that adequate progress is being made on retrieval, characterization and treatment of the waste. Subject to public comment, the milestones will be added to the Tri-Party Agreement (TPA) that governs the Hanford cleanup effort. The comment period for the proposed amendment will be announced soon.
Milestones for addressing the mixed transuranic waste will be included in the TPA amendment, but will not go into effect until the scope of the state's authority over transuranic mixed waste is determined in the pending litigation. Depending on the outcome of the court case, the milestones will either go into effect or be deleted from the TPA.
As part of today's agreement, the appeals of the state's March 30 and April 10 orders will be dismissed, and the scope of state authority over mixed transuranic waste will be addressed through the lawsuit the state filed in March to block shipments of more transuranic waste to Hanford.
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Media contact: Sheryl Hutchison, Communication Director, 360-407-7004
Web links
Cleanup agreement: http://www.ecy.wa.gov/programs/nwp/pdf/agreement.pdf (2.9 MB)
Legal settlement: http://www.ecy.wa.gov/programs/nwp/pdf/settlement.pdf (0.6 MB)
Ecology's Nuclear Waste Web site: http://www.ecy.wa.gov/programs/nwp/index.html
Copyright © Washington State Department of Ecology. See http://www.ecy.wa.gov/copyright.html.
