Demolition begins on Hanford Plutonium Finishing Plant in Washington

Demolition has begun on the Hanford Plutonium Finishing Plant near Richland, Washington, a report by the Seattle Times says. The demolition comes after 20 years of cleaning the highly contaminated plant that contained almost two-thirds of the plutonium for the U.S.’ nuclear weapons program during the Cold War.

Called one of the most hazardous buildings at the Hanford site by state regulators, the U.S. Department of Energy has also called the plant the largest and most complex plutonium facility in the nation, the report says.

Preparation for demolition began with stabilizing the plutonium left in the plant to a liquid solution. The more recent work, the report says, includes cleaning and dismantling the contaminated equipment. Demolition will start with the Plutonium Reclamation facility, a 22,000-square-foot annex where plutonium was recovered from the plant’s waste material.

Contractor CH2M Hill Plateau Remediation, Richland, Washington, expects to move onto the smaller building, around the size of a double-car garage, known as the Americium Recovery Facility between the Plutonium Reclamation Facility and Plutonium Finishing Plant’s main section, the report says.

Following that, demolition will temporarily stop to review what has been learned so far and to complete final cleaning of the plant’s main area, the report says, which covers 200,000 square feet and is three stories tall.

The final step in this demolition project is an explosion of the ventilation stack. Demolition is scheduled to be completed by July 2017.