by Arthur Klein
West Valley demonstrates that treating symptoms rarely cures disease.
It all began in 1966, when managers of the nuclear waste demonstration project in West Valley (near Buffalo) theorized it was possible to dissolve nuclear power plant radioactive fuel rods in acid to extract valuable plutonium, the lethal base ingredient of nuclear energy.
This idiocy was halted in1972 when unforeseen conditions threatened to melt down the entire facility, kill everyone near and far, and West Valley’s operators realized current technology and engineering were not adequate to the task.
West Valley is now supervised by a partnership of the federal Department of Energy (DOE) and the New York Energy and Research Development Authority (NYSERDA) and survives on low budgets and slow progress.
Meanwhile, climate change has emerged as the new wild card.
This year the West Valley team assembled a group of climatologists. Their work can be seen here (pdf).
One common conclusion they shared is that the increased intensity of storms wrought by climate change can loose the hounds of Hades and threaten the water supply of 14 million humans on the lower Great Lakes. A downpour similar to the one that flooded Gowanda in 2009 could wash the surface of the West Valley plateau into Cattaraugus Creek and then into Lake Erie.
West Valley signals that, despite robust confidence, our technology still fails to manage radioactive waste.We constantly improve storage methods, but have to hope that the next generation can tame the radioactive monster we have created.
The current site has converted much of the radioactive liquid of underground storage tanks to huge, insanely radioactive glass modules. They stand outside on the plateau, like bowling pins encased in thick jackets that will not last nearly as long as their contents are dangerous.
Intensely radioactive sludge remains in the underground tanks and a couple of huge, unlined burial trenches, where unknown quantities of chemical and radioactive waste were hastily buried to threaten the area for thousands of years.
The burial trenches may be good news compared to the area several acres in size that contains plutonium. During initial attempts at cleanup, acid sludge in the rendering tanks’ material was spilled and now has developed a long plume of plutonium that is contained in open land sloping down east-northeast, toward Cattaraugus Creek. This was where, in 2010, a shoddy concrete slurry wall was poured in an unsuccessful attempt to contain the spread of the plutonium.
Ominously, this area is a permeable (mostly sand and gravel) stratum covering less pervious Lavery Till. During exceptional rain, similar to the one that struck Gowanda, this mass of sandy glacial till can become liquefied and slide, like a slow avalanche, off the slick clayish subsurface, to begin a journey toward Lake Erie.
Another fearsome factor is the underlying Lavery Tills have very low average hydraulic conductivities but contain numerous desiccation cracks that could increase the unit’s permeability. Contaminants present at Love Canal were found to have migrated outward through such desiccation crack routes. Once the radioactive materials fill them, their outward paths of conveyance are unpredictable.
All the water in the world is the only water in the world. If we allow radioactive contamination to pollute significant portions, we lose them and our children lose them.
Art Klein, of the Town of Tonawanda, is a member of the Niagara Group.