Nuclear leak in New Mexico raises questions about cleanup

In this Feb. 24, 2014 photo, a member of the community speaks of the Feb. 14, 2014 radiation leak during a community meeting in Carlsbad, N.M. New Mexico Sen. Tom Udall says he will ask the Environmental Protection Agency to send air monitors to southeastern New Mexico following a radiation release from the federal government's underground nuclear waste dump near Carlsbad. Udall says he will send a letter Thursday requesting the portable monitors. Udall says the health and safety of the community and workers at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant are his top priority. The EPA has regulatory authority over the site and any airborne radiation releases. (AP Photo/Jeri Clausing) less In this Feb. 24, 2014 photo, a member of the community speaks of the Feb. 14, 2014 radiation leak during a community meeting in Carlsbad, N.M. New Mexico Sen. Tom Udall says he will ask the Environmental ... more Photo: Jeri Clausing, Associated Press Photo: Jeri Clausing, Associated Press Image 1 of / 3 Caption Close Nuclear leak in New Mexico raises questions about cleanup 1 / 3 Back to Gallery

Carlsbad, N.M. -- For 15 years the trucks have barreled past southeastern New Mexico's potash mines and seemingly endless fields of oil rigs, hauling decades worth of plutonium-contaminated waste to what is supposed to be a safe and final resting place a half mile underground in the salt beds of the Permian Basin.

But back-to-back accidents and a never-supposed-to-happen aboveground radiation release that exposed at least 13 workers have shuttered the federal government's only deep underground nuclear waste dump indefinitely. They have also raised questions about a cornerstone of the Department of Energy's $5 billion-a-year program for cleaning up legacy waste scattered across the country from decades of nuclear bomb making.

The problems also highlight a lack of alternatives for disposing of tainted materials like tools, gloves, glasses and protective suits from national labs in Idaho, Illinois, South Carolina and New Mexico.

With operations at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant on hold, so are all shipments, including the last of nearly 4,000 barrels of toxic waste that Los Alamos National Laboratories has been ordered to remove from its campus by the end of June. The presence of that waste, some of which was dug up from decades-old, unsealed dumps in the northern New Mexico mountains and is now stored outside with little protection, came to the public's attention three years ago as a huge wildfire lapped at the edges of the sprawling lab property.

U.S. Sen. Tom Udall, D-N.M., says getting the rest of the waste off the mesa before wildfire season begins is "paramount" but that it is too soon to know whether a temporary alternative site for storing the waste needs to be found.

Also on hold are tests to see if the dump can expand its mission to take more than so-called lower-level transuranic waste from the nation's research facilities, including hopes by DOE that it can ship hotter, liquid waste from leaking tanks at Washington state's Hanford nuclear waste site.

Government officials, politicians, the contractors that run the mine, and local officials all say it is too soon to speculate on what the short- or long-term impacts of the shutdown might be, or where else the toxic waste would go. And they emphasize that all the safety systems designed to react to worst-case scenarios like a ceiling collapse worked.

Still, no one yet knows what caused the first-known radiation release from the enormous rooms dug out of the 2,000-foot thick ancient Permian Sea bed. Eventually, they will be covered in concrete, with the intent of safely sealing the casks of mostly solid waste 2,150 feet underground.

But watchdog Don Hancock of the Southwest Research and Information Center says the pilot plant has now failed in its long-stated mission "to start clean, stay clean."

On Feb. 5, the mine was shut and six workers sent to the hospital for treatment of smoke inhalation after a truck hauling salt caught fire. Nine days later, a radiation alert activated in the area where newly arrived waste was being stored. Preliminary tests show 13 workers suffered some radiation exposure, and monitors as far as half a mile away have since detected elevated levels of plutonium and americium in the air. Ground and water samples are being analyzed.

Officials said they're confident the incidents are unrelated. And while they emphasize that the levels detected off-site are no more harmful than a dental X-ray, they have not been able to go underground, and have not directly answered questions about how contaminated the tunnels might be.