Air Monitoring Leads to Discovery of New Contamination at Radioactive Waste Disposal Site (Area G) at LANL
Air monitoring at Area G, the low-level radioactive waste disposal area at Los Alamos National Laboratory, revealed increased air concentrations of {sup 239}Pu and {sup 241}Am at one location along the north boundary. This air monitoring location is a couple of meters north of a dirt road used to access the easternmost part of Area G. Air concentrations of {sup 238}Pu were essentially unaffected, which was puzzling because the {sup 238}Pu and {sup 239}Pu are present in the local, slightly contaminated soils. Air concentrations of these radionuclides increased about a factor of ten in early 1995 and remained at those levels until the first quarter of 1996. During the spring of 1996 air concentrations again increased by a factor of about ten. No other radionuclides were elevated and no other Area G stations showed elevations of these radionuclides. After several formal meetings didn't provide an adequate cause for the elevations, a gamma survey was performed and showed a small area of significant contamination just south of the monitor location. We found in February, 1995, a trench for a water line had been dug within a meter of so of the air stations. Then, during early 1996, the dirt road was rerouted such that its new path was directly over the unknown contamination. It appears that the trenching brought contaminated material to the surface and caused the first rise in air concentrations and then the rerouting of the road over the contamination caused the second rise, during 1996. We also found that during 1976 and 1977 contaminated soils from the clean-up of an old processing facility had been spread over the filled pits in the vicinity of the air monitors. These soils were very low in 238Pu which explains why we saw very little {sup 238}Pu in the increased air concentrations. A layer of gravel and sand was spread over the contaminated area. Although air concentrations of {sup 239}Pu and {sup 241}Am dropped considerably, the y have not returned to pre-1995 levels.
- Research Organization:
- Los Alamos National Lab. (LANL), Los Alamos, NM (United States)
- Sponsoring Organization:
- USDOE Office of Environmental Management (EM) (US)
- DOE Contract Number:
- W-7405-ENG-36
- OSTI ID:
- 762869
- Report Number(s):
- LA-UR-98-4703; TRN: US0100137
- Resource Relation:
- Conference: 7th International Low Level Measurements of Actinides and Long Lived Radionuclides in Biological and Environmental Samples, Conference location not provided, Conference dates not provided; Other Information: PBD: 8 Jun 1999
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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