Now Six – Not One – Hanford Tanks Leaking Radioactive Waste

ANGLO AMERICA, ENERGY, ENVIRONMENT, 4 Mar 2013

Craig Brown – Common Dreams

Governor: “This is disturbing news.”

Six aging, single-walled underground storage tanks are leaking radioactive waste, threatening groundwater below the Hanford nuclear site, Washington state Governor Jay Inslee announced on Friday [22 Feb, 2013] afternoon.

The newly disclosed leaking tanks were revealed by Inslee just a week after the U.S. Energy Department disclosed that radioactive waste was found to be escaping from only one tank at the Hanford Nuclear Reservation.

“This is disturbing news for all Washingtonians,” Inslee said in a statement released by his office. “This certainly raises serious questions about the integrity of all 149 single-shell tanks with radioactive liquid and sludge at Hanford… We received very disturbing news today.  I think that we are going to have a course of new action and that will be vigorously pursued in the next several weeks.”

The Energy Department issued a brief statement acknowledging that six waste tanks were found to be leaking and adding that there was no “immediate” public health risk.

The Energy Department said a week ago that declining liquid levels in just one tank at Hanford showed it was leaking at a rate of 150 to 300 gallons per year.

The US government built Hanford during World War II as part of the Manhattan Project to build the nuclear bomb. The site produced plutonium for the bomb dropped on the Japanese city Nagasaki and continued producing plutonium for the US nuclear arsenal for years.

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 License

Go to Original – commondreams.org

Share this article: email mastodon facebook 🔗 copy link

DISCLAIMER: The statements, views and opinions expressed in pieces republished here are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of TMS. In accordance with title 17 U.S.C. section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. TMS has no affiliation whatsoever with the originator of this article nor is TMS endorsed or sponsored by the originator. “GO TO ORIGINAL” links are provided as a convenience to our readers and allow for verification of authenticity. However, as originating pages are often updated by their originating host sites, the versions posted may not match the versions our readers view when clicking the “GO TO ORIGINAL” links. This site contains copyrighted material the use of which has not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. We are making such material available in our efforts to advance understanding of environmental, political, human rights, economic, democracy, scientific, and social justice issues, etc. We believe this constitutes a ‘fair use’ of any such copyrighted material as provided for in section 107 of the US Copyright Law. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, the material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. For more information go to: http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond ‘fair use’, you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.

Comments are closed.