[ RadSafe ] 60 Minutes feature on Hanford last night

[Dukelow, James S Jr]

John Jacobus wrote:
-----Original Message-----
From: radsafe-bounces at radlab.nl [mailto:radsafe-bounces at radlab.nl] On
Behalf Of John Jacobus
Sent: Tuesday, May 02, 2006 12:44 PM
To: radsafe at radlab.nl
Subject: RE: [ RadSafe ] 60 Minutes feature on Hanford last night

Jim,
I would say it is hard to convince people that we know how to handle
nuclear waste when we have DOE on our side.

==================

What John says about the public might be true, but only because the
public has been taught to react in a knee-jerk fashion, responding to
the "conventional wisdom" on radiation issues and DOE.  I am puzzled to
be found defending DOE, which has been deservedly criticized for a
number of sins of omission and commission over the years, but, if you
look at the Hanford cleanup, for instance, a number of worthwhile
cleanup milestones are being met -- in some cases, ahead of schedule and
under budget.  To a certain extent they have been picking the
low-hanging fruit and the rest of the cleanup -- clean out of K-Basins,
completing the Vit Plant, processing tank waste through the Vit Plant,
and processing Cs and Sr capsule waste through the Vit Plant -- will be
significantly more difficult.  The general approach, however, strikes me
as reasonable.

John, can you suggest a significant form of societal waste that has been
better sequestered and has had LESS public health and environmental
impact than radioactive waste -- outside the Soviet Union, at least,
which had a horrendous radwaste accident several decades ago?

Best regards.

Jim Dukelow
Pacific Northwest National Laboratory
Richland, WA
Jim.dukelow at pnl.gov

These comments are mine and have not been reviewed and/or approved by my
management or by the U.S. Department of Energy.