Hanford cleanup plant for 53 million gallons of radioactive waste could be faulty

Concerns have been raised that the yet to be completed cleanup facility under construction at the Hanford Nuclear Reservation may not be up to the task. At least 53 million gallons of highly radioactive waste currently stored - and leaking from - aging tanks at the Hanford nuclear complex are yet to be safeguarded. But the facility under construction that is designed to deal with the problem has run into both financial and technical difficulties. Critics say the plant may be dangerous and cause further contamination to the environment and even the government's own tests show equipment might fail or pipes might clog in parts of the facility so radioactive with nuclear waste no human or machine could ever get in and make repairs. More on the challenges at Hanford from the Hanford Challenge website.

Scientist whose work helped get atomic tests banned, dies at 90

Dr. Louise Reiss, who directed a study that examined hundreds of thousands of baby teeth during the cold war and helped persuade the world’s leading powers to ban nuclear testing in the atmosphere, died Jan. 1 at her home in Pinecrest, Fla. She was 90, writes the New York Times. Dr. Reiss and her husband Eric, also a physician, founded the Greater St. Louis Citizens’ Committee for Nuclear Information, and worked with schools of dentistry in St. Louis, MO, to collect and analyze baby teeth for elevated rates of strontium 90. The study showed that radioactive fallout from nuclear testing was getting into the nation’s food supply and ultimately working its way into human bones and teeth. The study ultimately found that children born in St. Louis in 1963 had 50 times as much strontium 90 in their teeth as children born in 1950 — before most of the atomic tests. The U.S. conducted 206 atmospheric tests before a ban on atmospheric tests was agreed between the U.S. and the Soviet Union.