I have written several blogs about the Hanford Nuclear Reservation. Aside from the fact that I live in Western Washington, the main reason I have focused on Hanford is that it contains a huge quantity of toxic radioactive waste that has proven very difficult to clean up. Leakages at Hanford threaten the Columbia River and the communities that depend on it for drinking water, industry and irrigation.
For the past year, there have been serious problems with a double walled tank at Hanford containing high levels of strontium-90. The tank has the designation AY-102. The double walled tanks are replacing the older single walled tanks because of all the leaks from the single walled tanks. Aside from the specific issues with AY-102, the idea that the double walled tanks are also leaking is very serious. KING TV in Seattle, Washington has been doing a lot of investigation of the AY-102 tank and a number of new details have come to light.
When the alarm for that tank went off on October 9, 2011, the shift manager followed protocol and tried to find the specific Alarm Response Procedure (ARP) that would tell him what to do. I think that it is very obvious that in a complex system such as a nuclear power plant control room, having written procedures for dealing with all foreseeable problems is critical. The shift manager was unable to find the ARP for that alarm.
The next day, the company that manages the underground tanks, Washington River Protection Solutions (WRPS), sent an experienced instrumentation technician out to double check the instrumentation on the AY-102 tank. He found that everything was working correctly and that it was not a false alarm. However, he also could find no ARP that would tell him what to do in the event of the alarm sounding.
WRPS decided that it was rainwater leaking in between the walls of the tank that trigger the alarm. They said that there was no evidence of increase radioactivity around the tank. After more than a year and additional indicators of problems with tank AY-10, WRPS finally admitted that the inner wall of the tank had cracked and radioactive sludge had leaked out.
WRPS insisted for months that a detailed response plan for that particular alarm did exist when the first alarm sounded in October of 2011. Despite exhaustive research, KING TV could not find any trace of such a plan. When KING TV told WRPS about a report it was going to air, a WRPS representative “clarified” the WRPS position with respect to the missing response plan. WRPS said that there were sections of general leak response procedures that covered the alarm for AY-102 but further investigation showed that the two sections of response procedures mentioned by WRPS were written and inserted into the leak response manuals eight months after the alarm first sounded. And, despite the claims that the new sections covered the problem in AY-102, detailed procedures of how to respond to a leak in the AY-102 inner wall still don’t exist.
AY-102 contains more strontium-90 than any other tank at Hanford. It has been known for over fifty years that strontium-90 settles to the bottom of a tank and the heat it generates causes liquids in the tanks to boil and weaken the tank walls enough to crack them. Once the radioactive sludge has leaked through the inner wall, the secondary wall of a double walled tank could be corroded and the waste could leak out into the environment. This is an old, serious and well known problem. The lack of specific detailed instructions about what to do when an alarm signals a leak in such a situation is more than incompetent.
I have repeatedly said that I think that all nuclear power generation in the world should be shut down as quickly as possible. It won’t be cheap or easy but neither will disposing of all the nuclear waste and cleaning up after more serious accidents that will happen the longer we use nuclear energy to generate electricity. The situation with tank AY-102 at Hanford is a perfect example of why I fear nuclear power. There was highly radioactive waste that was known to be a threat to the integrity of the tanks. There was no specific procedure in place to deal with such leaks although the potential for a leak was known for decades. When a leak occurred, the company responsible for the tanks would not admit there was a leak for a year. They claimed that there was a response procedure that did not exist and tried to cover their tracks by changing of manuals and additional lies after the fact. Hanford is one of the most radioactively contaminated places on the whole planet. How can we trust the competence and integrity of companies that handle nuclear waste in light of the behavior of Washington River Protection Solutions at Hanford?
Area between the walls of tank AY-102:
