1EPA’s Response to the February 2014Release of Radioactive Materialfrom the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP)EPA’s WIPP Air Sampling Data from April 2014June 3, 2014BackgroundIn 1999 the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE)began waste disposal operations at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) in New Mexico.WIPP is a deep geologic repository for permanent disposal of aspecific type of waste—transuranic waste—that is the byproduct of thenation's nuclear defense program. Transuranic waste consists of clothing, tools, rags, residues, debris, soil and other items contaminated withsmall amounts of plutonium and other man-made radioactive elements.On February 14, 2014, an underground continuous air monitor at WIPPmeasured airborne radioactivityclose to the operating locationwhere waste was being placed. The air exhaust switched to a filtered mode of operation. The next day an aboveground exhaust airmonitoron the WIPP site detected very low levels of airborne americium and plutonium. It is believed that a small amount of radioactivity leakedthrough the air exhaust-duct dampers, bypassingthe filtration system. DOE sealed thedampers with high-density expanding foaminsulationand no aboveground radioactivity has been detected since.Members of a U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) environmental monitoring and assessment team spent several weeks at theWIPP site in early April 2014. While at theWIPP facility, EPA reviewed DOE’s air sampling plan for monitoring the area in andaround thefacility, visited DOE’s air samplers to review their operations and placed air samplerson-site near existing DOE samplers to independentlycorroborate DOE’s reported results (see EPA results on page 2). EPA’s review of the datacollected indicatesthat the radiationreleases didnot pose a public health concern.Results SummaryFrom April 7, 2014, to April 29, 2014, EPA’s WIPP assessment and monitoring team operated air samplers near three existing DOEWIPPair sampling sites. After a complete analysis of the air filtersEPA collected from the WIPP site, all the results were considered “non-detect”for americium-241, plutonium-238 and plutonium-239/240; these are the radionuclides of concern with a releaseat the WIPP site.“Non-detect” means that no radioactivity was detected ormeasurable beyond the analytical uncertainty range.EPA will post the EPA/DOE data comparison to EPA’sWIPP website when the analysis is complete.2EPA’s Response to the February 2014Release of Radioactive Materialfrom the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP)EPA WIPP Air Sampling Data from April 2014*Seepage3forDOEairsamplingstationmap**“Non‐detect”meansthatnoradioactivitywasdetectedormeasurablebeyondtheanalyticaluncertaintyrange.LocationNumber*LocationNameCollectionDatesSampleTypeUnitsAmericium‐241Plutonium‐238Plutonium‐239/2401FarField4/7/2014‐4/15/2014AirFilterBq/m3Non‐Detect**Non‐DetectNon‐Detect1(duplicate)FarField4/7/2014‐4/15/2014AirFilterBq/m3Non‐DetectNon‐DetectNon‐Detect1FarField4/15/2014–4/22/2014AirFilterBq/m3Non‐DetectNon‐DetectNon‐Detect1(duplicate)FarField4/15/2014–4/22/2014AirFilterBq/m3Non‐DetectNon‐DetectNon‐Detect1FarField4/22/2014–4/29/2014AirFilterBq/m3Non‐DetectNon‐DetectNon‐Detect1(duplicate)FarField4/22/2014–4/29/2014AirFilterBq/m3Non‐DetectNon‐DetectNon‐Detect2WIPPEast4/7/2014‐4/15/2014AirFilterBq/m3Non‐DetectNon‐DetectNon‐Detect2WIPPEast4/15/2014–4/22/2014AirFilterBq/m3Non‐DetectNon‐DetectNon‐Detect2WIPPEast4/22/2014–4/29/2014AirFilterBq/m3Non‐DetectNon‐DetectNon‐Detect3WIPPSouth4/7/2014‐4/15/2014AirFilterBq/m3Non‐DetectNon‐DetectNon‐Detect3WIPPSouth4/15/2014–4/22/2014AirFilterBq/m3Non‐DetectNon‐DetectNon‐Detect3WIPPSouth4/22/2014–4/29/2014AirFilterBq/m3Non‐DetectNon‐DetectNon‐Detect3