Corrosion Management of the Hanford High-Level Nuclear Waste Tanks

Abstract

The Hanford site is located in southeastern Washington State and stores more than 200,000 m3 (55 million gallons) of high-level radioactive waste resulting from the production and processing of plutonium. The waste is stored in large carbon steel tanks that were constructed between 1943 and 1986. The leak and structurally integrity of the more recently constructed double-shell tanks must be maintained until the waste can be removed from the tanks and encapsulated in glass logs for final disposal in a repository. There are a number of corrosion-related threats to the waste tanks, including stress–corrosion cracking, pitting corrosion, and corrosion at the liquid–air interface and in the vapor space. This article summarizes the corrosion management program at Hanford to mitigate these threats.