From Deseret News archives:
Nuclear waste back on desert burner
Envirocare of Utah has been asked by a government contractor to submit proposals for taking two batches of waste from a former Fernald, Ohio, uranium processing plant.
Fluor Fernald, the Department of Energy contractor handling the cleanup of the former atomic bomb fuel plant, is seeking proposals from Envirocare for taking some of the radium-bearing waste stored in three silos on site.
It was a year ago that a divisive debate on how involved Utah should get in the storage of another state's "hot waste" forced the company to back off the pursuit of accepting uranium tailings.
This time, while the waste is well within what Envirocare is permitted to accept, concerns remain.
"We are concerned about the level of heavy metals," said Jason Groenewold, director of the Healthy Environment Alliance of Utah.
"The interesting issue is that Fernald has a dump site on site, but it has decided not to dispose of its waste there, which raises the concern about why the federal government wants to send it here."
Envirocare's senior vice president Tim Barney said the contractor asked for a proposal to take waste from all three silos, but stressed the company is only interested in silo 3, which has material well below the radioactive limits Envirocare is licensed to accept.
"We kind of lost the battle for public opinion on (the other silos) last year, so we're not interested in bringing it to Utah," Barney said.
At one point, the Department of Energy was pursuing shipping 8,890 cubic yards of waste from Ohio to Envirocare. Because the waste was "hotter" than the company's license would allow, a number of options were discussed to overcome the barrier.
A controversial proposal by Rep. Rob Bishop, R-Utah, to reclassify the waste as "commercial," opened the avenue for Envirocare to pursue the disposal contract.
That led the Alliance for Unity, a group of Salt Lake business, civic and religious leaders, to announce its opposition to the plan. A legislative task force also wanted to pursue a ban on accepting the Fernald waste without approval from Utah lawmakers and the governor.
Barney said if Envirocare is successful on this bid, it would entail accepting 5,000 cubic yards of material — in the form of a powdery dirt — that would be buried with 6 feet of clay and covered with 2 feet of rock.
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