Feb. 2, 2010
Huntington Pilot Plant/ Reduction Pilot Plant Buried, Slurry Wall Leaking
Nickel Carbonyl Process Elements Have Exceptionally Long Half Lives; Worker Radiation Exposures Falsified; Sewage Sent to Scioto River
By Tony Rutherford
Huntingtonnews.net Reporter
Huntington, WV (HNN) – Feedstock for producing materials through the nickel carbonyl process which were provided from other atomic plants contained radioactive residue with half lives that our live all of us.
As previously reported the Huntington Pilot Plant /Reduction Pilot Plant had residues which contained such elements as Neptunium-237 and Plutonium-239. Their half lives are 2.14 million years and 24,056 years respectively. In addition, these transuranic elements have “a very long clearance time in the body.” The elements came to Portsmouth from “processed spent reactor fuel or from reuse of cylinders containing transuramic contamination.” At the Portsmouth plant, Plutonium remained in ash filter residues. “Individuals most likely exposed were those changing particulate filters and emptying the ash collectors,” a May 2003 ;Medical] “Needs Assessment – Portsmouth and Puducah GDP (hereinafter NAPP) said.
This report contains further verification of the ineffective radiological monitoring of atomic plant employees was revealed. Jeff Walburn at the DOE Public Meeting, October 30, 1999, revealed, “in 1996 two dosimetry people --- and that is the badge that you wear, the one thing we trusted on the site to tell us if we had an uptake of uranium --- two men came to us to zero your readings because you are going to file suit. He subsequently testified that he later learned badges were routinely changed.
At Portsmouth, “The badges were put in an administrative bucket dose. We’ve got buildings a quarter of a mile long. If someone got in the PW, they would average two other people somewhere down the other end of the building and assign that does to the name. So he did not get his own dose; he got two other people’s does, the average.”
Many workers (or their survivors) be they from Huntington, Piketon, Paducah , and other locations have been DENIED atomic worker compensation based on simulated dose reconstructions combined with occupational safety standards based on an eight hour day and forty hour work week. Unfortunately, the problem with approvals has been attributed to manipulation of data ---- the same devices were used at Portsmouth for providing worker radiation readings that appeared below the normal.
DIARY: Failure of Badges to Operate Properly
The diary / journal of a former RPP worker seemingly verifies some of the same actions described at Portsmouth and Paducah occurred in Huntington. For instance, his records recall the failure of the badges [in Huntington] to properly record the level of exposure on a daily basis. As a result, when the plant was disassembled in 1978-79, many workers refused to work in certain “hot spots” of the building.
HPP/RPP BURIED IN PIKETON; SLURRY WALL LEAKS
The HPP/RPP plant was dismantled in 1978-1979 and taken by truck and rail to Piketon where its remains, machinery, and even the vehicles used to transport the disassembled plant were buried in Piketon.
Eco Perspectives provides a GUIDE TO KEY FACILITIES AND SITES AT THE PORTSMOUTH GASEOUS DIFFUSION PLANT (November, 2000 by Mary Davis, hereinafter PGDP SITE GUIDE).
The X-749A Classified Materials Disposal Facility operated from 1953-1988 at Portsmouth. Waste was disposed there that had been labeled “classified” under the Atomic Energy Act. The disposal met the needs of Portsmouth “and other DOE and non-DOE facilities.”
In addition to waste from the gaseous diffusion process, the waste buried at the site included a dismantled INCO Nickel Plant from Huntington, WV. The INCO plant was contaminated with nickel carbonyl and uranium
The plant had produced nickel in support of DOE’s three enrichment plants. The [disposal site] includes classified records, compressor blades and classified parts.”
This area was closed in 1994 following construction of a multilayer cap and a drainage system to capture surface water runoff. (NAPP)
However, the site still has contamination problems. Vina Colley, a compensated former atomic worker and activist, confirmed to HNN Sunday that “the slurry wall is leaking” where the INCO plant is buried. So far, it has contaminated adjoining lands belonging to former workers in Piketon.
OTHER PORTSMOUTH WASTE ISSUES
The PGDP consists of many structures and areas. For instance, there are three process buildings; the final (or cascade) process is capable of enriching uranium to 97% uranium 235. The building’s two floors encompass 58 acres of floor space.
Emissions from the “cascade” include uranium, fluorine/fluorides, and Freon coolant. Plutonium and neptunium lodged in various machines near feed points until change out.
Technetium left the cascade through venting to the atmosphere, in the product stream, and through change-out of equipment. Nevertheless, the cascade is to this day contaminated with technetium. During the 1998 fire in X-276, "The chemical traps on the process vents became saturated and technetium was emitted to the atmosphere." A Lockheed Martin memo of January 6, 1999, states that an estimated 16.6 pounds of UF6 were released at that time.
As a disclaimer, it should be emphasized that the relied upon emissions document was written in 2000. We thus have generalized incidents as past events. However, since we discuss historical activities, some previously a secret for national security reasons, we briefly detail the mechanism.
At the Feed Manufacturing Building, the receipt of U4 occurred and the “ash” left from uranium daughter products in the process was “left to decay for two to six months,” then blending with incoming UF 4. This process ended in 1962; ashes remaining went to Paducah.
While in operation, leaks and spills of UF4 and ash "presented continuing problems with surface and airborne contamination." The Feed Plant was a major contributor to uranium releases, as it lost an average of 407 kg of uranium (0.22 Ci) per year to the atmosphere from 1959 to 1962. Releases from Portsmouth as a whole dropped sharply in 1963 after the shutdown of the plant.
Waste acid from a water scrubbing system for gaseous effluents was neutralized with lime and then released to the sewer.
RECOVERY FACILITY
The decontamination and recovery facility, known as X-705, handled equipment decontamination (waste water treated before discharge into sanitary sewer system and then to Scioto River), uranium recovery ( “technetium 99 entered the raffinate stream. The raffinate stream also contained uranium daughter products. This stream was "initially discharged to an onsite ditch that flowed to Little Beaver and Big Beaver Creeks, and then to the Scioto River." A settling pond was installed later), and Oxide Conversion Facility ("Very high airborne concentrations of radioactive material were prevalent in the oxide conversion facility" and "could have been vented to the atmosphere through penetrations, ventilation systems, doors, and windows." According to a 1977 report, an unfiltered exhaust system vented air through a roof stack “).
CONTAMINATED DISPOSAL X 749
The landfill received "alumina-trap residue, sodium fluoride, incinerator ash with trace quantities of neptunium and plutonium," among other materials. Between August 1984 and June 1985, approximately 85,000 pounds of metal hydroxide sludge from the X-705 raffinate was buried at this facility, although the sludge could leach cadmium.
The State of Ohio EPA directed that the landfill be closed, because of the inappropriate burial of such RCRA waste. It closed in 1990 . Closure included the installation of a multimedia cap, a slurry wall, and subsurface groundwater drains.
The classified land fill (X-749A) where the HPP/RPP is buried also has a multilayer cap and a drainage system. That’s what has been alleged to be leaking in 2010 by adjacent property owners.
Another PGDP area --- X-744G Bulk Storage Warehouse (now Uranium Management Center) --- contains quantities of transuranic CK EXP metals (but after the March 1999 date so mostly materials from the Universities of Seattle and Nebraska). However, the same facility from 1961-1983 served as a smelter for scrap aluminum , primarily compressor parts.
Materials went through a decontamination process before being melted, but the unit experienced problems with "airborne contamination." Uranium contamination in the feed tended to stay with the melted aluminum. Nevertheless, "aluminum ingots were sold for unrestricted use" as well as used for replacement parts for cascade equipment.
Although this report pertains to the Portsmouth site, remember, that many of the documents and statements gathered indicate that the HPP/RPP received materials from Portsmouth, Paducah, Oak Ridge, and other nuclear facilities. Huntington residents should take notice of the uses of the sanitary and sewer systems at the Portsmouth site when various operations were in progress.
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Huntington Pilot Plant/ Reduction Pilot Plant Buried, Slurry Wall Leaking
Nickel Carbonyl Process Elements Have Exceptionally Long Half Lives; Worker Radiation Exposures Falsified; Sewage Sent to Scioto River
By Tony Rutherford
Huntingtonnews.net Reporter
Huntington, WV (HNN) – Feedstock for producing materials through the nickel carbonyl process which were provided from other atomic plants contained radioactive residue with half lives that our live all of us.
As previously reported the Huntington Pilot Plant /Reduction Pilot Plant had residues which contained such elements as Neptunium-237 and Plutonium-239. Their half lives are 2.14 million years and 24,056 years respectively. In addition, these transuranic elements have “a very long clearance time in the body.” The elements came to Portsmouth from “processed spent reactor fuel or from reuse of cylinders containing transuramic contamination.” At the Portsmouth plant, Plutonium remained in ash filter residues. “Individuals most likely exposed were those changing particulate filters and emptying the ash collectors,” a May 2003 ;Medical] “Needs Assessment – Portsmouth and Puducah GDP (hereinafter NAPP) said.
This report contains further verification of the ineffective radiological monitoring of atomic plant employees was revealed. Jeff Walburn at the DOE Public Meeting, October 30, 1999, revealed, “in 1996 two dosimetry people --- and that is the badge that you wear, the one thing we trusted on the site to tell us if we had an uptake of uranium --- two men came to us to zero your readings because you are going to file suit. He subsequently testified that he later learned badges were routinely changed.
At Portsmouth, “The badges were put in an administrative bucket dose. We’ve got buildings a quarter of a mile long. If someone got in the PW, they would average two other people somewhere down the other end of the building and assign that does to the name. So he did not get his own dose; he got two other people’s does, the average.”
Many workers (or their survivors) be they from Huntington, Piketon, Paducah , and other locations have been DENIED atomic worker compensation based on simulated dose reconstructions combined with occupational safety standards based on an eight hour day and forty hour work week. Unfortunately, the problem with approvals has been attributed to manipulation of data ---- the same devices were used at Portsmouth for providing worker radiation readings that appeared below the normal.
DIARY: Failure of Badges to Operate Properly
The diary / journal of a former RPP worker seemingly verifies some of the same actions described at Portsmouth and Paducah occurred in Huntington. For instance, his records recall the failure of the badges [in Huntington] to properly record the level of exposure on a daily basis. As a result, when the plant was disassembled in 1978-79, many workers refused to work in certain “hot spots” of the building.
HPP/RPP BURIED IN PIKETON; SLURRY WALL LEAKS
The HPP/RPP plant was dismantled in 1978-1979 and taken by truck and rail to Piketon where its remains, machinery, and even the vehicles used to transport the disassembled plant were buried in Piketon.
Eco Perspectives provides a GUIDE TO KEY FACILITIES AND SITES AT THE PORTSMOUTH GASEOUS DIFFUSION PLANT (November, 2000 by Mary Davis, hereinafter PGDP SITE GUIDE).
The X-749A Classified Materials Disposal Facility operated from 1953-1988 at Portsmouth. Waste was disposed there that had been labeled “classified” under the Atomic Energy Act. The disposal met the needs of Portsmouth “and other DOE and non-DOE facilities.”
In addition to waste from the gaseous diffusion process, the waste buried at the site included a dismantled INCO Nickel Plant from Huntington, WV. The INCO plant was contaminated with nickel carbonyl and uranium
The plant had produced nickel in support of DOE’s three enrichment plants. The [disposal site] includes classified records, compressor blades and classified parts.”
This area was closed in 1994 following construction of a multilayer cap and a drainage system to capture surface water runoff. (NAPP)
However, the site still has contamination problems. Vina Colley, a compensated former atomic worker and activist, confirmed to HNN Sunday that “the slurry wall is leaking” where the INCO plant is buried. So far, it has contaminated adjoining lands belonging to former workers in Piketon.
OTHER PORTSMOUTH WASTE ISSUES
The PGDP consists of many structures and areas. For instance, there are three process buildings; the final (or cascade) process is capable of enriching uranium to 97% uranium 235. The building’s two floors encompass 58 acres of floor space.
Emissions from the “cascade” include uranium, fluorine/fluorides, and Freon coolant. Plutonium and neptunium lodged in various machines near feed points until change out.
Technetium left the cascade through venting to the atmosphere, in the product stream, and through change-out of equipment. Nevertheless, the cascade is to this day contaminated with technetium. During the 1998 fire in X-276, "The chemical traps on the process vents became saturated and technetium was emitted to the atmosphere." A Lockheed Martin memo of January 6, 1999, states that an estimated 16.6 pounds of UF6 were released at that time.
As a disclaimer, it should be emphasized that the relied upon emissions document was written in 2000. We thus have generalized incidents as past events. However, since we discuss historical activities, some previously a secret for national security reasons, we briefly detail the mechanism.
At the Feed Manufacturing Building, the receipt of U4 occurred and the “ash” left from uranium daughter products in the process was “left to decay for two to six months,” then blending with incoming UF 4. This process ended in 1962; ashes remaining went to Paducah.
While in operation, leaks and spills of UF4 and ash "presented continuing problems with surface and airborne contamination." The Feed Plant was a major contributor to uranium releases, as it lost an average of 407 kg of uranium (0.22 Ci) per year to the atmosphere from 1959 to 1962. Releases from Portsmouth as a whole dropped sharply in 1963 after the shutdown of the plant.
Waste acid from a water scrubbing system for gaseous effluents was neutralized with lime and then released to the sewer.
RECOVERY FACILITY
The decontamination and recovery facility, known as X-705, handled equipment decontamination (waste water treated before discharge into sanitary sewer system and then to Scioto River), uranium recovery ( “technetium 99 entered the raffinate stream. The raffinate stream also contained uranium daughter products. This stream was "initially discharged to an onsite ditch that flowed to Little Beaver and Big Beaver Creeks, and then to the Scioto River." A settling pond was installed later), and Oxide Conversion Facility ("Very high airborne concentrations of radioactive material were prevalent in the oxide conversion facility" and "could have been vented to the atmosphere through penetrations, ventilation systems, doors, and windows." According to a 1977 report, an unfiltered exhaust system vented air through a roof stack “).
CONTAMINATED DISPOSAL X 749
The landfill received "alumina-trap residue, sodium fluoride, incinerator ash with trace quantities of neptunium and plutonium," among other materials. Between August 1984 and June 1985, approximately 85,000 pounds of metal hydroxide sludge from the X-705 raffinate was buried at this facility, although the sludge could leach cadmium.
The State of Ohio EPA directed that the landfill be closed, because of the inappropriate burial of such RCRA waste. It closed in 1990 . Closure included the installation of a multimedia cap, a slurry wall, and subsurface groundwater drains.
The classified land fill (X-749A) where the HPP/RPP is buried also has a multilayer cap and a drainage system. That’s what has been alleged to be leaking in 2010 by adjacent property owners.
Another PGDP area --- X-744G Bulk Storage Warehouse (now Uranium Management Center) --- contains quantities of transuranic CK EXP metals (but after the March 1999 date so mostly materials from the Universities of Seattle and Nebraska). However, the same facility from 1961-1983 served as a smelter for scrap aluminum , primarily compressor parts.
Materials went through a decontamination process before being melted, but the unit experienced problems with "airborne contamination." Uranium contamination in the feed tended to stay with the melted aluminum. Nevertheless, "aluminum ingots were sold for unrestricted use" as well as used for replacement parts for cascade equipment.
Although this report pertains to the Portsmouth site, remember, that many of the documents and statements gathered indicate that the HPP/RPP received materials from Portsmouth, Paducah, Oak Ridge, and other nuclear facilities. Huntington residents should take notice of the uses of the sanitary and sewer systems at the Portsmouth site when various operations were in progress.
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