Eye Openers: Summary of Reading # 24: Managing the Environmental Legacy of U.S. Nuclear-Weapons Production

From the start I found my article very interesting. It deals with nuclear weapons which all of us should know has a great deal of impact on our environment due to the radioactive material needed for production. Now don't get confused, its not talking about the USE of nuclear weapons but about the excess material lying around from production of these weapons and how are we going to manage the situation. There are six sections to my article that help in defining the situation of managing the environmental legacy of U.S. nuclear-weapons production.

Nuclear-Weapons Production

During the Cold War arms race with the Soviet Union engineering began on creating facilities that would either serve as two purposes, to recover uranium (a radioactive element used for nuclear production) from mined ore and the other for assembly, maintenance and testing. There are over 5,000 facilities constructed for those two reasons. However, the largest facilities built for the material productions and processing of radioactive elements are Hanford also known as the Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Laboratory (INEEL), Oak Ridge and Savannah River in South Carolina. Those three facilities are ones mainly discussed throughout this article. Scientists at those facilities used uranium, plutonium (a transuranic (element with greater atomic number than uranium) radioactive element) and tritium to develop these weapons. They have estimated that around the 45 years of nuclear-materials production in the U.S. there has been about 103 metric tons of weapon-grade plutonium obtained from Hanford and Savannah River. On top of that, 994 metric tons of uranium were obtained from Oak Ridge and two other small facilities. To put those numbers into perspective, one metric ton weighs 2,205 pounds. So we have a total of 2,418,885 pounds of surplus and highly hazardous nuclear weapons material that somehow has to be dealt with. Looking at a number that large of harmful material it makes me wonder how the government didn't think about only mining the amount need for production of a weapon. They plan on using some of that surplus into fuel for nuclear power plants and the rest will be disposed of in a geological repository, an underground storage unit for nuclear waste. Storing this stuff underground does not seem to be an environmentally safe solution if were looking into protecting the environment.

Environmental Consequences

2,418,885 pounds of surplus nuclear material. That of course has to have consequences on the environment. A lot of this excess material is being stored in special underground tanks at various storage sites. It has been reported that many tanks have leaked some of the material contained within. The DOE (Department of Energy) which governs the nuclear production facilities have reported that at the Oak Ridge facility which works in separating the lithium from tritium to be used for mercury (a heavy silver metal) has leaked about 110 metric tons into the Clinch River-Watts Bar Reservoir system. This reservoir happens to be used for recreation and municipal water supply. When dealing with elements used for nuclear weapons I don't see how they should make this type of mistake. The leak jeopardized a water supply and worse off it puts many people at risk of getting mercury poisoning from eat the fish. Waste material leakage isn't the only problem that has to be dealt with. Nuclear production generates waste that is directly released to the environment in the for of gases. Volatile which is vaporized gas produced during chemical processing is vented straight to our atmosphere not always being filtered. Much of the waste liquid produced from these sites is simply discharged into large surface ponds or into subsurface soil and groundwater. It is incredible how no guidelines were set up as to where or how these gases or waste liquids should be disposed of after the chemical process. Simply dispersing it into our environment does not help manage the environment. It is clear that the production of nuclear weapons exceeded the thought of waste management.

From Production to Clean-up

This section basically talks about the progression that has been made since the late 1980's and early 90's once the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty was enacted and the Soviet Union broke up. The one that started this cleanup process is John Harrington, the energy secretary during that time. He shut down the nuclear reactor at the Hanford facility because the simply stated that the U.S. had no need for it being that the country was already "awash in plutonium." He then went onto creating the Office of Environmental Restoration and Waste Management that would establish its main mission: environmental cleanup. Although this program would not seem to accomplish milestones as quickly as hoped for. The DOE has had some successful cleanup points. A geological repository located in Carlsbad, New Mexico will help to dispose of 175,000 cubic meters of transuranic waste from nuclear weapons sites. These repository's are located 300 meters underground within a salt dome or bedrock and are said to be the home for much of the nuclear waste. It may not seem like too bad of an idea to store it in these repository's if it is going to keep the environment from being contaminated.

Reducing and Managing Risk

Described in this section of the article are the milestones that cleanup program hopes to accomplish while keeping the contamination at a minimum and employment rate constant at these facilities. However they have hit a roadblock in their attempts due to a major problem, the lack of technology to reach these milestones. In addition, the milestones hoped to be reached are not focused around protecting human and environmental health. How do you set up milestones that deal with the disposal of nuclear waste and don't focus a majority of the attention around public safety and environmental health. They are simply just laying down these milestones so that progress in the cleanup system can be measured. I think these milestones are a waste of time if the health or people and the environment are not taking into perspective.

Long-Term Stewardness

This final section simply stated that the environmental legacy of nuclear-weapons production will not be eliminated but more on the lines of being controlled. Of course it won't be able to completely be taken care of because we don't have a plan that can make the nuclear material disappear. If anything it is going to be underground, surveillanced, and maintenanced once in a while due to an occasional leak. The cleanup program is planned to continue for several decades even though there are many optimistic views. Once the right technology is developed then hopefully there will be great positive future outlooks for the environment.

My Thoughts

I found the article very interesting but a little lengthy. It was easy to understand that the author is trying to show how we have been cleaning up what has been left behind from the arms race era but yet even after a decade or more not much has been done. I think as of right now the problem is the lack of technology. Your dealing with radioactive, highly acidic and harmful material that you can not have many options in a way to dispose of the nuclear waste. The best bet would to use what you can for nuclear energy and then simply store the rest so that the total amount will drop. I wouldn't like it to be used for nuclear energy because that's just leading to more pollution but storing it underground in specialized tanks that eventually erode and leak would seem to pose more of a threat to our environment if it were to leak into a underground water bed. Overall I learned a lot from reading this article and hope that our new Secretary of Energy Stephen Chu will bring better ideas to the table.

Discussion:

Due to the little progress with the cleanup program and continuous holding of the nuclear waste at facilities , is it possible that the U.S. doesn't exactly want to conduct a full cleanup thinking that it could lead to an increased risk of a terrorist attack?

Online Sources

Yucca Nuclear Waste Site Proposal: A Bad Idea For Future Generations
By: Brooke Neuman

I found one article that talked about the plans of disposing the nuclear waste material into the Yucca Mountains in Nevada. Brooke Neuman the author of the source finds the idea of disposing the material embedded underground as simply foolish. We are simply just leaving it behind for the future generations to deal with. He states that if the proposal does pass and activation for the Yucca Mountains begins in 2010 it would still take 50 to 100 years in transporting the material. It seems that no matter what the outcome may be it is inevitable that we will be leaving the waste behind for future generations to handle.

Nuclear Waste Storage Plan Will Be Safe, Minister Says
By: Shawn McCarthy

This article contradicts what Brooke Neuman was saying about storing waste underground. The Natural Resources Minister Gary Lunn of Canada states that nuclear power repository plans are clean and safe and is the best way to handle the problem. You joking! Everything kept in those repository's is not close to being clean and safe. I'm going to have to go with Brooke Neuman on this subject being that Gary Lunn thinks storing nuclear waste in a location underground will directly be safe and clean with no negative outlook on the future at all...not even for our future generations.

Definitions

Radioactive- emitting or relating to the emission of ionizing radiation or particles

Repository- a place where things are or may be stored

Mercury- chemical element of atomic number 80, a heavy silvery white metal that is liquid at ordinary temperatures

Plutonium- a transuranic element with a fissile isotope of mass number 239 (plutonium 239) that can be produced from non-fissile uranium

Uranium- a chemical element of atomic number 92, used as a fuel in nuclear reactors

Volatile- a substance easily evaporated at normal temperatures

Methylmercury- any of several extremely toxic organometallic compounds, Hg(CH₃)₂, formed from metallic mercury by the action of microorganisms and capable of entering the food chain: used as seed disinfectants.

Transuranic- Having an atomic number greater than 92.

(Definitions from Dictionary.com and Mac widget dictionary)

Additional Resources

Yucca Mountain Repository
http://www.ocrwm.doe.gov/ym_repository/index.shtml

Is Everything We Use In Everyday Life Radioactive?
http://www.hps.org/publicinformation/ate/faqs/consumerproducts.html