Radioactive Waste 28 - Bridgeton and West Lake Landfills
I briefly mentioned radioactive materials and landfills recently in the context of disposal of drill tailings from fracking. There are standards for what levels of radioactivity are acceptable in landfills today. However, there are exemptions for wastes generated by nuclear weapons related operations.
The West Lake Landfill in Bridgeton, Missouri near St. Louis contains over eight thousand tons of nuclear waste. This old waste is left over from Mallinckrodt Chemical Company’s uranium processing operation during the Cold war. The West Lake Landfill is designated as an Environmental Protection Agency Superfund site. The old landfill has none of the modern safety features such as a liner to prevent leakage into the groundwater or a cap to prevent gases from escaping. It is sitting a few miles upstream from a reservoir that supplies drinking water to St. Louis.
The Bridgeport Landfill is located within a thousand feet of the buried nuclear waste. Normally, this should not be a reason for increased concern but, unfortunately, there is a fire burning underground in the landfill. Temperatures underground are way above normal levels. The company that manages the landfill, Republic Services, says that the horrible odor from the burning landfill that is polluting the air miles away, is not a safety hazard. On the other hand, the Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services has detected dangerous levels of benzene and hydrogen sulfide in the air around the landfill. Missouri’s Department of Natural Resources sent out a notice that people with chronic respiratory disease should not remain near the landfill. Republic Services has been sued by the state attorney general for environmental violations.
Some concrete pipes that are allowing the odor to escape are being removed. Holes are being drilled to cope with the situation. Unfortunately, the excavation and drilling will increase the intensity of the current smells for a short time. A one mile area has been designated for evacuating people but some groups are calling for a five mile evacuation zone.
The big worry is that the underground fire at the Bridgeton Landfill will spread to the nuclear waste in the West Lake Landfill. No one knows what will happen if the fire reaches the waste but in a worst case scenario, it would be something like an accidental “dirty bomb.” There would be no nuclear or conventional chemical explosion, but there would be a release of radioactive particles into the atmosphere over Bridgeton area. The particles could reach as far as ten miles away from the West Lake Landfill. This would require the evacuation of all residents in that area and the halt of all economic activity. It would become an abandoned zone. Radioactive particles could be carried further by surface water and threaten a wider area.
Republic Services says that there is no real danger of the fire reaching the nuclear waste. However, they have already been caught lying about the fumes from the f ire and are being sued for environmental violations by the state. The people in the area are not convinced that they can accept the assurances of Republic Services that they are not at risk from the nuclear waste. Activists are calling for a greater governmental involvement in protecting the public in the area from these two problematic landfills.
West Lake Landfill, Bridgeton, Missouri:
