**\[DNFSB LETTEHEAD\]**

March 24, 2004

The Honorable Jessie Hill Roberson

Assistant Secretary for Environmental Management

U.S. Department of Energy

1000 Independence Avenue, SW

Washington, DC 20585-0113

Dear Ms. Roberson:

In March 2001, the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board (Board)
issued Recommendation 2001-1, *High-Level Waste Management at the
Savannah River Site*. The focus of this Recommendation was on ensuring
that the high-level waste (HLW) system at the Savannah River Site (SRS)
would remain capable of safely supporting vital waste stabilization and
disposition programs through completion. At that time, it was recognized
that maintaining adequate working space in compliant waste tanks would
be the primary challenge in ensuring that the HLW system would remain
viable to support the site's cleanup activities.

The Department of Energy (DOE) accepted Recommendation 200l-l and
provided the Board with an Implementation Plan with several deliverables
relating to the removal and disposition of salt waste. As part of its
accelerated cleanup plan for SRS, DOE developed a baseline strategy for
salt disposition that allowed decontamination techniques to be tailored
to actual radiological characteristics. Initial estimates of levels of
cesium and actinide contamination indicated that two-thirds of the salt
waste originally slated for processing through the planned Salt Waste
Processing Facility could be disposed of safely and more quickly on site
in near-surface grout monoliths after undergoing more-modest
decontamination processes in existing facilities. This tailored approach
to decontamination is often referred to as the Low-Curie Salt (LCS)
initiative. In a letter dated March 4, 2002, the Board cautioned DOE not
to over-rely on LCS given the large uncertainty associated with the
initial contamination estimates, as well as regulatory issues. Continued
pursuit of full-scale decontamination facilities has been, and continues
to be, encouraged by the Board.

The waste characterization data obtained from sampling performed to date
indicate that the cesium and actinide contamination levels in the salt
waste are higher than originally estimated. Thus, a much larger fraction
of salt waste than predicted may require processing through the Salt
Waste Processing Facility. Further, a July 2003 federal court decision
that eliminated the waste-incidental-to-reprocessing provisions of DOE
Order 435.1, *Radioactive Waste Management*, has invalidated the
administrative process used by DOE to establish its basis for the LCS
initiative. In addition, DOE's budget request to Congress for fiscal
year 2005 includes no funding for salt processing activities at SRS.
These events may seriously impair the salt processing efforts at SRS.

On March 2, 2004, DOE submitted to the Board a key deliverable for
Recommendation 2001-l---a programmatic risk assessment with mitigation
strategies for the salt disposition program. This risk assessment
identified at least seven high risks (i.e., probabilities of occurrence
ranging from likely to very likely and severity of consequences ranging
from significant to crisis). The risk assessment deliverable was
intended to encourage the development of a robust program plan for salt
disposition that was not over-reliant on the success of the LCS program.
However, the identified risks instead illustrate an approach that is
heavily reliant on the success of LCS.

The programmatic risk assessment was performed almost a year ago, in
March 2003, and events since then have created risks in the salt
processing program not considered in DOE's report. Of particular
interest to the Board, the programmatic risk assessment does not
identify insufficient usable tank space as a risk to the salt
disposition program, nor does it discuss mitigation strategies to reduce
or treat tank farm liquid receipts. The risk assessment did conclude
that insufficient funding represented a high risk with significant
schedule impact and economic consequence, but the only mitigation
strategy was to work to obtain funding, as opposed to a plan to minimize
the impact of a perturbation in funding.

There is now less usable space in the SRS HLW system than at the time
Recommendation 2001-l was issued. Without an effective strategy for
dealing with the aforementioned programmatic risks, the tank space
situation will continue to degrade, which will in turn create safety
concerns by increasing operational risk and jeopardizing vital cleanup
activities at the site, including the retrieval and pretreatment of HLW
sludges from old-style tanks, sludge vitrification at the Defense Waste
Processing Facility, and stabilization of nuclear materials at H-Canyon
and HB-Line.

Therefore, pursuant to 42 U.S.C. § 2286b(d), the Board requests a
briefing within 30 days of receipt of this letter addressing the
following topics:

1.  DOE's plan for management, processing, and stabilization of the HLW
    at SRS, given the LCS performance issues discussed above.

2.  DOE's contingency plan for accomplishing HLW stabilization at SRS
    within the funding contained in the DOE budget request to Congress
    for fiscal year 2005.

Sincerely,

***John T. Conway***

***Chairman***

c: Mr. Jeffrey M. Allison

Mr. Mark B. Whitaker, Jr.