What is tank waste cleanup?

The word cleanup may conjure images of waste disappearing. Something dirty, becoming clean. It’s a bit more complicated when it comes to cleaning up Hanford’s tank waste, because they haven’t immobilized any tank waste in glass…yet. In 2024, tank waste cleanup involves: 

  • monitoring tanks for leaks and issues, 

  • moving tank waste around and getting it ready for treatment,

  • protecting workers from exposure to radiation and toxic chemicals, 

  • building all of the facilities that work together to immobilize the high-level and low-activity tank waste in glass,

  • pretreating liquid tank waste so it is ready to go to the Low Activity Waste (LAW) facility, and

  • planning for where the waste will be buried/disposed of some day.

QUICK GEOGRAPHY LESSON

Hanford’s tank farms are located in two parts of Hanford’s Central Plateau, roughly in the middle of the site. The Central Plateau is approximately 75 square miles with two primary waste management areas, 200 East and 200 West. When Hanford was developed during World War II, 200 East and West contained the processing facilities to produce nuclear weapons material. The two areas were separated by several miles and the facilities were also angled oddly to minimize damage from a potential aerial attack.

The tanks in the 200 Areas supported the plutonium production facilities by storing the most dangerous waste from processing nuclear fuel. The tanks are buried under 7 feet of soil and are grouped in “farms” with an assortment of alphabet soup labels. To help you get oriented to this part of the Hanford site, check out the image below and try to find the AX-Farm.

Image courtesy of Hanford contractor, Washington River Protection Solutions

The several mile distance between 200 East and West is a challenge for cleanup—physically moving the waste. The Waste Treatment Plant and its associated infrastructure is located in 200 East and there is currently no capability for moving tank waste from 200 West to 200 East.

Images above and below are courtesy of U.S. Department of Energy

tank waste stats

There are 177 underground high-level waste storage tanks organized in 18 groups called “farms.” The image above shows the color-coded tank farms with single-shell tank farms in green, and double-shell tank farms in blue.

  • There are 149 single-shell tanks (SST), meaning they have one layer of carbon steel surrounded by concrete for containment.

  • 28 double-shell tanks (DST) meaning they have two carbon steel liners surrounded by concrete for containment of leaks. One of the DSTs has leaked and been taken out of service.

  • The tanks are different sizes and have the capacity to hold between 55,000 and 1.2 million gallons of high-level tank waste. Generally, they are approximately 25 feet high by 75 feet in diameter and are buried under 7 feet of soil.

  • There are 56 million gallons of high-level waste in the tanks. 

  • It is important to note that in order to move the tank waste around, liquid (water or liquid waste from another tank) is often required to make the thicker waste easier to move. There is also technology on site that concentrates that liquid waste back down through an evaporation process.

  • Since 1994, efforts have been underway to immobilize Hanford’s high-level tank waste. The treatment plan has changed many times and there have been decades of delays. 

  • Only 3 gallons of tank waste have been treated in a highly-controlled test to use grout (think concrete) to immobilize the waste. 

  • In Nov 2025, the Low-Activity Waste facility is supposed to start making glass with liquid tank waste that has gone through a treatment system to remove cesium.

  • Delays to other parts of the Waste Treatment Plant for treating high-level waste will be announced in 2029 and another batch of tank waste related deadlines around 2038 (18 months after the High-Level Waste facility is up and running) per the proposed 2024 Holistic Settlement Agreement.

The tank waste cleanup work falls into three categories:

  • Managing Tank Waste

  • Getting Ready to Treat Tank Waste

  • Burying or Disposing of Tank Waste

Managing Tank Waste

So how is Hanford’s tank waste managed? The tanks, as you learned above, are in “farms” in two parts of the site that are about 7 miles apart, called 200 West Area and 200 East Area. Managing the waste in the 177 underground storage tanks in 200 West and 200 East involves:

  • MONITORING TANK INTEGRITY: Because the tanks are really old and past their design life, they are prone to leak. It’s important to identify parts of the tank that are falling apart, check for leaks, and to see if there are issues with the concrete domes or covers on top of the tanks. Hanford’s Tank Integrity program's entire purpose is to test the tanks for problems, predict which tanks are at risk of problems before they happen, and come up with solutions. To look for leaks in double-shell tanks, contractors use robots to search the area between inner tank and outer tank – hopefully detecting the leak before there is a big problem. Tank Integrity work also involves taking samples of tank waste to make sure the waste doesn’t contain chemical compositions that would corrode the tanks.

  • TESTING TANK WASTE: Another part of monitoring the tanks is taking samples of the waste. The chemistry of the waste in the tanks varies a lot from one tank to another and we have more information about some tanks than others. Tank Integrity teams need to monitor for chemicals that can corrode tanks as we mention above. Tank waste samples are also needed to prepare for tank waste treatment and make sure the recipe or formula that will be used to glassify the waste will work. There are teams that work together to get samples of waste for analysis. A lot of the information from tank waste sampling is publicly accessible through systems like PHOENIX.

  • EMPTYING TANKS/MOVING WASTE FROM TANK TO TANK:  Emptying “leak-prone” tanks is a big part of cleanup, but for now when tanks are emptied the waste is just concentrated and moved to another tank. Sometimes tank waste liquid, called supernate, is used instead of water to help make the tank waste easier to pump out of the tanks. Mostly this work involves removing waste from single-shell tanks to double-shell tanks. The waste from the leaking double-shell tank, AY-102, was moved to two other double-shell tanks, AW-105 and AP-102.

  • PROTECTING WORKER HEALTH & SAFETY: A critical piece of managing Hanford’s tank waste is protecting worker health and safety. This will also be critical work once tank waste treatment is up and running. Hanford’s tanks contain high-level nuclear waste which has high levels of radioactivity and includes a toxic mix of over 1,800 chemicals. Tank farm workers have to wear protective clothing and radiation exposure monitors. When workers are doing waste disturbing activities in the tanks, they must also wear additional protective equipment, including things like supplied-air respirators to protect themselves from breathing in toxic chemical vapors that vent from the tanks.

Getting Ready to Treat Hanford Tank Waste

This category of work involves getting ready to safely and effectively immobilize tank waste in glass. An old idea that was abandoned and is now resurfacing explores mixing tank waste with grout, which is like cement. We haven’t really treated any Hanford tank waste yet, unless you count a highly-controlled 3 gallon grout test. The bulk of this piece of tank waste cleanup work is getting ready to treat tank waste. So what are your taxpayer dollars paying for right now?

BUILDING THE WASTE TREATMENT PLANT: The Waste Treatment Plant is where the tank waste will be immobilized in glass and involves a complex of giant facilities and infrastructure, like a cross-site transfer line for moving the waste that still needs to be built. The plan for the Waste Treatment Plant has changed many times with endless delays and eye-popping cost overruns. The work right now, in 2024, breaks down into two main pieces:

  • Getting Ready to Make Low-Activity Glassified Tank Waste: Work is underway to get the Low-Activity Waste Facility (LAW) up and running so that it can take liquid, radioactive tank waste that is treated to remove cesium-137 using the “TSCR” system (Tank Side Cesium Removal). There are over 800,000 gallons of waste that have already gone through TSCR and are ready for glassification. As of July 2024, the plan is for the LAW facility to be making glass by November 2025.

  • Getting Ready to Make High-Level Glassified Tank Waste: Work halted on building the facility to make high-level waste glass after brave whistleblowers went public with some showstopping issues with the High-Level Waste facility that showed it wouldn’t work if they didn’t fix the technical issues.

    • Delays for High-Level Waste: In the Holistic Settlement Agreement they are delaying the deadline for getting this building up and running, but we won’t know what that delay will be until 2029, five years from now.

    • Direct-Feed High-Level Waste: The Holistic Settlement Agreement also proposes changing the plan from using a building they stopped building called the Pretreatment Facility (also because of major technical issues whistleblowers raised that showed it wouldn’t work as designed - thank you, whistleblowers!). Instead they are going to use a Direct Feed approach, which will involve washing some of the problematic chemicals off of the waste before it is sent to the high-level waste facility to be mixed with glass. The Direct Feed facilities still need to be designed and built.

TRYING OUT GROUT, AGAIN (WHICH FAILED IN THE PAST): The resurfaced idea that is popular right now, is trying to mix tank waste liquids that have had cesium-137 removed with grout or a cement like formula. All past attempts at using grout for Hanford’s tank waste have failed, but the agencies are trying again anyway. We do not endorse grouting Hanford tank waste and we’ve made a webpage detailing our issues with grout.

  • 2,000 Gallon Test Bed Initiative: This test hasn’t happened yet, but is anticipated to be finished by spring 2025 at the earliest. The test plans to use something called an in-tank pretreatment system that is equipment that goes into tank SY-101 and sucks the waste through a filter to remove cesium-137. That waste gets tested and if it passes the tests, then half of it gets shipped by truck to Waste Control Specialist in Andrews, Texas, and half goes to Clive, Utah.

  • Proposal to Grout Tens of Millions of Gallons of Waste from 200 West Area: In the Holistic Settlement Agreement, there is a proposal to choose 22 tanks from three of the tank farms in 200 West that are particularly far away from the Waste Treatment Plant, remove the waste from those tanks, and pick a place to grout and dispose of that waste offsite.

    • Picking How and When: The Holistic Settlement Agreement sets a deadline of December 2024 to pick the where and how of grouting waste from 200 West Area. We’re asking that this deadline be changed.

    • Grouting Rules: The Holistic Settlement Agreement also sets bounding conditions for grouting tank waste from Hanford, called the “just in time” provision that basically prevents a backlog of grouted tank waste from getting stuck at Hanford, and prohibits grouted tank waste from being disposed of on site.

Burying or Disposing of Tank Waste

Sadly, when tank waste cleanup is “done” the tank waste doesn’t disappear (that would be dreamy!) At Hanford, being “done” with tank waste cleanup just means that the waste is in a form that is less likely to spread through the environment and get in our food, air, and water. Different types of tank waste have different disposal rules, all of which require monitoring for extremely long periods of time. The following list shows where Hanford’s tank waste will end up.

TANK CLOSURE: The plan that the Tri-Party Agencies have agreed to is to empty the underground tanks, fill them with grout, and put a cover over each tank farm. How much tank waste is left in the tanks is a big concern for Hanford Challenge and others. The buried tank farms become a permanent sacrifice zone in this scenario at the center of the Hanford Site, also referred to as the “Inner Zone.” This area will require monitoring and institutional controls to keep people away from the waste essentially forever. The waste that is buried as a part of tank closure includes:

  • Waste in the Tanks that Agencies Plan to Leave in the Tanks: The only tank farm that the agencies have declared fully retrieved is C-Farm. Even after getting as much tank waste out of the tanks as USDOE has said is possible, there are still over 60,000 gallons of high-level waste unevenly distributed in the tanks that the agencies do not plan to remove. Once the tanks are filled with grout there isn’t a viable way to remove any more waste. Hanford Challenge is in favor of delaying tank closure and using updated technology to remove more waste from the tanks in the future.

  • Waste that Has Leaked in the Ground around the Tanks: Over one million gallons of high-level waste has leaked from the tanks into the ground and was purposely dumped into the ground during Hanford’s production years. There is currently no plan to go after this waste.

 

Image courtesy of U.S. DOE

 

ON-SITE DISPOSAL: There are many places on the Hanford site that operate as permanent disposal sites for nuclear waste. There is one shallow lined landfill that is designed for burying glassified low-activity tank waste and some grouted waste from the Waste Treatment Plant, like filters.

  • Integrated Disposal Facility: The Integrated Disposal Facility (IDF) is a large landfill with a liner in the center of the site. There is a system to collect leachate (liquids that collect in the liner) and treat those liquids. Currently there are two large cells in the ground, with a plan to expand the landfill to six large cells over time.

    • LAW Glass: Low Activity Waste that has been vitrified, or immobilized in glass is the primary waste that will be disposed of at IDF. The glass will be placed in a stainless steel canister before being buried at IDF.

    • Grouted Solid Secondary Waste: Treating Hanford’s tank waste to glassify it uses heat. As contaminated steam enters the off gas system it goes through filters, is collected and treated. Those liquids are considered liquid secondary waste. The filters are an example of the solid secondary waste that includes contaminated equipment that is planned to be grouted and added to the IDF landfill. The liquid secondary waste will be dealt with separately.

INTERIM STORAGE ON SITE: There is currently no identified permanent deep geologic repository for long-term storage of high-level waste in the United States. Until a permanent repository is identified and ready to accept Hanford’s glassified high-level waste, Hanford will store glassified high-level waste on site in interim storage. There are three places currently identified for interim storage of this waste:

  • Strontium and Cesium Capsule Storage Pad: A concrete storage pad will be used as capsules currently stored underwater at the Waste Encapsulation Storage Facility are moved into dry storage using remotely controlled equipment. Once containerized, the capsules will be placed outside on a giant concrete pad until a deep geologic repository is sited and ready to accept this waste. Though this waste is not currently in Hanford’s underground storage tanks, the capsules were generated as cesium and strontium were extracted from the high-level tank waste to remove them as a heat source and reduce the temperature of the waste in the tanks.

  • TSCR Storage Pad: One of the newer facilities at Hanford, called TSCR - the Tank Side Cesium Removal facility, is designed to remove cesium from liquid tank waste to prepare it for the Low Activity Waste facility, where the waste will be vitrified. The waste goes through ion-exchange columns to filter out mostly cesium for the waste to make it less radioactive. The ion-exchange columns, once they are full, will be placed in containers and set on an outdoor concrete storage pad for interim storage until a deep geologic repository is identified and ready to accept this waste.

  • High-Level Waste Interim Storage Facility: Once Hanford is making high-level waste glass it will be stored in an indoor facility designed to keep the waste until a deep geologic repository is identified and ready to accept this waste. This facility hasn’t been built yet.

OFFSITE DISPOSAL OF HIGH-LEVEL WASTE GLASS: There is currently no identified deep geologic repository for high-level waste in the United States. You may be familiar with Yucca Mountain, which was designed as a repository for high-level waste but was shut down in 2010 after over $15 billion was spent building it due to concerns about its suitability and location.

  • Yet-to-be-Selected Deep Geologic Repository: President Obama appointed a Blue Ribbon Commission on America’s Nuclear Future to look at nuclear waste disposal. The Commission issued a report in 2012 with recommendations about high-level waste disposal. We are still at an impasse about where to site deep geological repositories, which would be where nuclear weapons complex high-level waste would be disposed as well as commercial spent nuclear fuel. Until we have a site, this waste is stored at the sites where the waste is generated. There is a lot of controversy about how to keep this waste safe while we’re waiting. Many advocate for something called Hardened Onsite Storage (HOSS) instead of consolidating this dangerous waste in an interim facility, called Consolidated Interim Storage. There is an initiative Congress tasked USDOE to pilot called Consent Based Siting (which has a bunch of issues) that is trying to get buy-in from communities to host disposal sites for spent nuclear fuel.

  • Proposal to Dispose of Grouted Tank Waste Offsite: The newly revived plans to grout Hanford tank waste, if successful, would generate a new cement-like low-activity waste that could be disposed of in shallow-land burial. There are a few sites that could accept this waste form. Currently the two that are planning to accept waste from Hanford include the commercially operated facilities, Waste Control Specialists in Andrews, Texas, and Clive Disposal Site operated by EnergySolutions in Clive, Utah. The grouted waste would be buried in a shallow landfill that would be managed by commercial entities. As we understand it, once the landfills are full, ownership, management, and monitoring would shift to the federal government. The current proposals for grouting waste at Hanford include:

    • 2,000 Gallon Test Bed Initiative: Hanford is preparing to test grout by trying an in-tank treatment system, some call “TSCR on a stick,” where the waste is pumped through a filter in the tank and then put in containers called totes. If the waste meets the criteria for the levels of contaminants that remain, then half of the waste would be shipped by truck to Waste Control Specialists in Andrews, Texas, and half of the waste would be shipped by truck to Clive, Utah. The waste would be grouted at these sites and then disposed of at these sites. Grouted waste is prohibited from being returned to the Hanford site. As of July 2024, the earliest this test would be finished is spring 2025. Read about our issues with grout here.

    • Proposed Holistic Settlement Agreement to Grout Tens of Millions of Gallons of Tank Waste from 200 West Area: The proposed Holistic Settlement Agreement includes new milestones M-062-64 through M-062-66 that propose grouting tens of millions of gallons of tank waste from 22 tanks in the 200 West Area of the Hanford Site. Details about this plan, such as where the waste will be grouted, how the waste will be shipped (truck vs train), what the transportation routes would be, and where the waste will be disposed are yet to be determined. Learn more about our concerns with grout and more about the Proposed Holistic Settlement Agreement here.