Company fires scientist who warned of Hanford waste site problems [View all]

[n2doc]

By Ralph Vartabedian
October 3, 2013, 9:30 p.m.
When senior scientist Walter Tamosaitis warned in 2011 about fundamental design flaws at the nation's largest facility to treat radioactive waste in Hanford, Wash., he was assigned to work in a basement room without office furniture or a telephone.

On Wednesday, Tamosaitis, an employee of San Francisco-based URS Corp., was laid off from his job after 44 years with the company.

The concerns that Tamosaitis raised two years ago about the design of the waste treatment plant, a $12.3-billion industrial complex that would turn highly radioactive sludge into glass, were validated by federal investigators. Construction of the plant was halted and the Energy Department is trying to address a wide range of problems with the design.

The Hanford site is the nation's most contaminated property, holding 56 million gallons of highly radioactive sludge in underground tanks, some of which are leaking. The complex sits on a plateau above the Columbia River, which could be threatened if the cleanup fails to contain the tank waste.

more

http://www.latimes.com/nation/la-na-hanford-layoff-20131004,0,1311785.story