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外文会议>Annual Waste Management Symposium
>COORDINATION BETWEEN THE U. S. DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY AND CONTRACTORS TO DEPLOY INNOVATIVE TECHNOLOGY FOR REMEDIATION NOVEMBER 2000
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COORDINATION BETWEEN THE U. S. DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY AND CONTRACTORS TO DEPLOY INNOVATIVE TECHNOLOGY FOR REMEDIATION NOVEMBER 2000
Integration of government and private industry resources resulted in a successful remediation of five inactive liquid low-level waste (LLLW) tanks at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL), a U. S. Department of Energy (DOE) facility in Oak Ridge, Tennessee. A Project Team consisting of personnel representing DOE, DOE contractors, and private industry worked together to develop a method to remove approximately 200,000 L of radioactive, highly contaminated liquid and sludge from the five inactive LLLW tanks. To successfully complete the task, the team deployed equipment developed by DOE’s Office of Science and Technology that would remotely mobilize the sludge. This equipment was a modification of technology originally developed by private industry for use in downhole mining operations. The five inactive underground LLLW tanks were up to 40 years old and were beyond their intended service life for storage of LLLW. The inventory of radioactive material in the tanks was approximately 30,000 curies. Because of the age of the tanks, uncertainty regarding their structural integrity, and a lack of secondary containment, the potential for an uncontrolled release of the tanks’ contents posed an unacceptable risk to the environment. Therefore, DOE and the regulatory community decided the tanks’ contents had to be removed as a non-time critical removal action. Because of the radioactivity of the sludge in the tanks, the task of safely removing the tanks’ contents required careful planning and development of a remotely operated system to protect the workers and environment. After evaluating commercial tank-cleaning methods and equipment, the Project Team selected the use of a single point sluicer for the remedial action. Waterjet Technologies, Inc. (under a contract to Pacific Northwest National Laboratory) modified a Borehole Miner, an extendable-nozzle sluicer used in commercial mining. After modification, the Borehole Miner was integrated into a sluicing and pumping system designed and fabricated by CDM Federal Programs Corporation. Cold testing of the system was performed to ensure proper function, develop operational procedures, and train personnel. In summer 1998, the tanks’ contents were successfully removed and transferred to safe storage. This paper presents how the challenges of designing, building, testing, and implementing a complex mechanical and electronic system were overcome to successfully remediate the tanks, despite the complicated logistics of coordinating the numerous entities involved and having the design and fabrication performed at private industry facilities across the country. The successful modification and implementation of private sector technology demonstrates the feasibility of applying off-the-shelf technology and utilizing diverse resources within private industry for expertise and equipment to perform remedial actions at radioactively contaminated DOE facilities.
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