Former West German Chancellor Helmut Kohl won an overwhelming victory on December 2 in the first Germany-wide elections since World War 11. NATO and Warsaw Pact leaders signed the Conventional Forces in Europe Agreement and declared they were no longer enemies. The leaders of Germany, Japan, the United States, the United Kingdom, France, Italy, and Canada met to discuss how best to stabilize the Soviet economy. In July 1992, President Bush announced the United States would no longer produce plutonium or enriched uranium for nuclear warheads. The Hanford Site changed its mission from nuclear materials production to clean up of its facilities.
Most transuranic waste is contaminated rags, protective clothing, laboratory equipment, and tools.
Numerous DOE sites generate transuranic waste, which is temporarily stored on site in metal drums or boxes in shallow trenches covered with soil or on above ground asphalt pads, WIPP, located in the desert near Carlsbad, New Mexico, will contain the transuranic waste 2,150 feet deep in a salt bed. Salt deposits have been proposed for this waste because they occur in areas where there's little earthquake activity and little to no groundwater. EM has cleaned up 11 of 43 sites under its Formerly Utilized Sites Remedial Action Program. Under its Uranium Mill Tailings Remedial Action Program, EM has cleaned up 15 of 24 sites and 4,200 of 5,000 vicinity properties. Secretary O'Leary pledged, among other things, to declassify large amounts of information, reexamine policies regarding Indian nations, and explore funding for public participation.