Remember the SRS Watch report from November 2015: “H-Canyon Folly, Plutonium Failure?” (linked here) The Trump Administration budget request for DOE confirms we were correct in our assessment that SRS is falling far short of goals for plutonium oxide production in the aging H-Canyon reprocessing plant
In our report, we outlined how production of plutonium oxide in the HB-Line (perched atop the aging H-Canyon reprocessing plant) was miserably failing in its mission to produce 3.7 metric tons of plutonium oxide for the failed MOX project or another plutonium disposition method.
The DOE’s budget report to Congress, released on May 23, confirms our findings. The request states that only 7.62 kilograms of plutonium oxide were produced in Fiscal Year 2016 and that the goal of 100 kg was not met. In Fiscal Years 2014 and 2015, it appears that only 9.6 kg were produced – as reported in H-Canyon Folly, Plutonium Failure – thus bringing total production to under 20 kg out of the goal of 3.7 metric tons.
The DOE budget request maintains that “By the end of FY 2023, complete operations for 3.7 MT of plutonium converted to oxide at Savannah River Site.” No production goals are listed and no explanation is given as to how the troubles facing operation of the HB-Line will be corrected and how a massive ramp up in oxide production can take place. (See page 502 in the budget request, volume 1, linked here.) As HB-Line has failed in its plutonium oxide production mission has this effort turned into some kind of inefficient jobs program (liek MOX) or is operation is continuing just to make a weak claim that SRS is producing oxide for plutonium disposition purposes?
Conclusion: The DOE budget request confirms that it’s time to ditch the HB-Line/H-Canyon for plutonium oxide production. Other cost-effective effective non-aqueous alternatives, such as via new furnaces at SRS – in the soon-to-be-mothballed MOX plant? – must be considered.
And, Savannah River Nuclear Solutions managers and SRS nuclear officials need to explain why the mission is failing and what happens next with this troubled project or alternatives to it.
See posting to the right under “In the News” – Los Alamos National Lab reveals no plutonium oxide shipments from Los Alamos to SRS, for plutonium disposition.