Framatome (formerly AREVA NP Inc.) is a French-owned company that operates a plant in Richland. The company makes nuclear fuel assemblies for commercial nuclear reactors located all over the world. The plant, in operation since 1972, employs about 600 people and is operated under a license from the
Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
In 1996, Ecology entered into a Consent Decree with the facility’s former owner to resolve compliance issues related to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's determination that the facility lost interim status to operate its surface impoundment system under the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act.
The Consent Decree required the surface impoundment system to be closed pursuant to interim status clean closure standards. Ecology accepted the facility’s certification of closure for the surface impoundment system in 2006.
In February 2019, Ecology accepted the facility’s certification of clean closure for the Dangerous Waste Storage Facility, which is the facility’s only remaining dangerous waste management unit. Since groundwater contamination associated with historical releases at the facility remains above regulatory levels, Ecology subsequently identified Framatome as a "Potentially Liable Person" under the Model Toxics Control Act.
Framatome and Ecology are currently negotiating an agreed order under the Model Toxics Control Act to address the uranium and fluoride groundwater contamination.
The Columbia Generating Station is located on land leased at the Hanford site and is the Northwest’s only nuclear energy facility. The plant consists of a boiling water reactor and uses nuclear fission to heat water into high-pressure steam.
The facility is owned and operated by Energy Northwest, an agency that develops, owns, and operates power facilities in Washington. We work with the Energy Facility Site Evaluation Council (EFSEC), a Washington state agency led by a chair appointed by theGovernor, to oversee the nuclear power plant. (Photo courtesy Energy Northwest)
Perma-Fix Northwest is a waste storage and treatment facility specializing in treating low-level and mixed low-level waste. We regulate the mixed waste stored and treated at the facility, consisting of waste from Hanford and other in-state or out-of-state mixed waste generators.
We oversee the permit for storage of dangerous and mixed waste at the U.S. Navy's Puget Sound Naval Shipyard in Bremerton, Washington. The shipyard is a home port for both active and inactive vessels, and is used to maintain, overhaul, decommission, and dismantle vessels in service of the United States Navy.
Dangerous and mixed waste is generated during laboratory analysis, on-site demolition, and from production work including removal and installation of components on vessels, on-vessel and off-vessel repair of components, and the decommissioning and dismantling of vessels. (Photo courtesy Puget Sound Naval Shipyard)