Large amounts of nuclear waste stored at Hanford, Washington that have been leaking for years, may be impossible to contain or clean up, threatening the Columbia River and surrounding environment.
The federal government’s current attempt at a permanent solution for storing nuclear waste for centuries—the Waste Treatment and Immobilization Plant —has hit a major snag in the form of potential chain reactions, hydrogen explosions and leaks from metal corrosion.
The waste is also physically hot as well as laced with numerous toxic and corrosive chemicals and heavy metals that threaten the integrity of the pipes and tanks carrying the waste, risking leakage.
The current project attempting to vitrificate some of the waste has hit a snag. There’s a chance that enough plutonium could congregate to trigger a nuclear chain reaction, or criticality—the self-sustaining cascade of atomic fission that releases massive amounts of energy. That would be a serious event even if an explosion did not breach the concrete containment building. Hot slurry could surge backward through the piping, spreading the problem to other parts of the system.
A second explosive risk could arise because both heat and radiation can disassemble water into oxygen and hydrogen. If there are not places along the piping and in the vessels for hydrogen to exit the flow of waste, enough could build up to explode.
Time may be limited. The 177 tanks, built between 1943 and 1986, and most intended for only about a 20-year life span, are decaying; at last count, six are leaking.
Read more: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/05/09/hanford-nuclear-cleanup-too-dangerous_n_3246263.html?utm_hp_ref=green
Hat tip: ENENEWS
Danger of explosion of nuclear waste at Hanford: http://ottersandsciencenews.blogspot.ca/2013/04/radiation-news-hanford-nuclear-waste.html
Hanford radioactive leaks may be 1000 gallons a year
http://ottersandsciencenews.blogspot.ca/2013/02/nuclear-news-hanford-radioactive-leaks.html
Physicians for Social Responsibility: Hanford is the most contaminated site in the Western World. - http://www.psr.org/chapters/washington/hanford/hanford-history.html
Radioactive contamination of the Columbia River - http://toxipedia.org/display/wanmec/Radioactive+Contamination+of+the+Columbia+River
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