Officials Recognize West Valley Project Achievements and Announce "Way Ahead"
September 18, 2007

U.S. Department of Energy Assistant Secretary for Environmental Management Jim Rispoli and U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (US EPA) Region 2 Administrator Alan Steinberg were at the West Valley Demonstration Project (WVDP) September 18, 2007 to recognize and celebrate with partnering federal and state agencies the success of a major radioactive waste shipping campaign and the recent focused, cooperative effort of federal and state agencies to define a path forward for cleanup at the WVDP site.

Messrs. Rispoli and Steinberg toured the Project site, hosting partnering officials from the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority, and New York State Departments of Health and Environmental Conservation. They then joined site contractor President Al Konetzni and Project Director Bryan Bower in addressing over 200 Project employees, elected officials, and community members.

Assistant Secretary Rispoli recognized the success of the recent shipping campaign that removed approximately 20,000 drums of cemented low-level waste from the site to a disposal facility, with a small number of remaining drums planned for shipment within the month. The Assistant Secretary also highlighted the teamwork among the DOE, its site contractor and state and federal partners in assisting DOE to meet remaining challenges. Mr. Rispoli also announced DOE’s goals in the next four years to accelerate liquid waste and facility removals in radioactive underground storage tanks, to be completed prior to WVDP’s longer-term end state goals.


Mr. Steinberg emphasized the progress DOE has made in the last year in working with the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority, the New York State Departments of Environmental Conversation and Health, the U.S. EPA, and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) to define a plan for moving forward with cleanup (the “Way Ahead”) at the West Valley site. In June 2006, US EPA proposed an end-state vision to move the cleanup forward. In response, DOE invited involved state and federal agencies to form a “core team” of key New York State and Federal agency representatives to meet and focus on resolving the technical issues that were impeding progress on the Environmental Impact Statement.

Since initiated in November 2006, the core team has developed an approach to moving forward with cleanup and maintenance work over the next several years that includes accelerating removal of unneeded structures and eliminating residual liquid wastes in the underground radioactive waste storage tanks. In addition, a preferred alternative for longer term site management is being developed for evaluation in the ongoing Decommissioning Environmental Impact Statement.

The WVDP is a DOE-managed, contractor-operated, environmental cleanup project located on the site of the Western New York Nuclear Service Center, owned by the state of New York and administered by the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority. Located on approximately 200 acres about 40 miles south of Buffalo, the WVDP occupies the site of the only commercial used nuclear fuel reprocessing facility to have operated in the United States.

Click here for more photos of the celebration and the Drum Cell tour.