EPA Approves Nuclear Waste Burial Site

ALBUQUERQUE — The federal government’s plan to bury nuclear waste in the salt beds of southeastern New Mexico received a preliminary go-ahead Thursday from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

After two decades of heated debate, the decision sets the stage for the $1.8-billion Waste Isolation Pilot Plant to open sometime after next May east of Carlsbad.

The repository, completed in 1988, would bury plutonium-contaminated waste from the nation’s defense industry 2,150 feet underground. The waste generally consists of drums of contaminated protective clothing, tools, equipment, sludge and soil.

The project is considered a cornerstone in the Energy Department’s strategy for cleaning up government nuclear waste sites.

The public has four months to comment before the final decision.

The EPA said the final ruling is subject to conditions related to just what radioactive elements and hazardous chemicals the waste contains, how it would be sealed inside the repository and how the site would be marked so future generations wouldn’t accidentally drill into it.

The repository would get about 37,700 waste shipments over its estimated 35-year life. They largely would come from federal sites in 10 states, including California.

Environmentalists, a state watchdog agency and others have raised questions about pockets of brine below the repository, concerns over mining and drilling in the area, the instability of the excavated storage rooms in the salt and the safety of hauling radioactive waste hundreds of miles.