Project 2025 calls for massive changes to Hanford nuclear cleanup

https://www.cascadepbs.org/politics/2024/11/project-2025-calls-massive-changes-hanford-nuclear-cleanup

Project 2025 calls for massive changes to Hanford nuclear cleanup
The Heritage Foundation's blueprint proposes reclassifying radioactive waste as something less dangerous so it can be disposed of more cheaply.

by John Stang / November 20, 2024

Will the next presidential administration tinker with the Hanford nuclear reservation’s complicated cleanup of radioactive wastes?

Project 2025, the Heritage Foundation’s conservative blueprint for the future, offers some strong hints that cleanup plans for the nation’s most polluted nuclear site might change with or without the approval of the Washington Department of Ecology.

One Project 2025 idea recommends reclassifying highly radioactive wastes into something less dangerous so cheaper methods can be used to dispose of them. Another proposal is to speed up the cleanup by rerouting money to Hanford from a couple of huge Biden-era appropriations for jobs and infrastructure programs elsewhere. The third Hanford-related idea in Project 2025 posits that the state of Washington and the legally negotiated cleanup deadlines and standards are obstacles to completing the cleanup faster.

Gov. Jay Inslee’s office, the Washington Attorney General’s Office and the state Ecology Department all declined to comment on Project 2025’s plans for Hanford. However, Attorney General and Gov.-elect Bob Ferguson and Attorney General-elect Nick Brown recently held a press conference to announce the AG’s office and have spent months reviewing Project 2025 in preparation for possible litigation with the Trump administration. Ferguson and Brown said the ball is in the Trump administration’s court on whether it will provoke legal battles with Washington.

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(Cheaper methods. Insane.)