IDAHO FALLS, Idaho - U.S. Department of Energy Office of Environmental Management crews recently demolished another steel-framed, fabric-covered building at the Radioactive Waste Management Complex's Subsurface Disposal Area at the Idaho National Laboratory Site. Just three buildings remain on the 97-acre Cold War-era landfill, following removal of this former waste storage building.

Accelerated Retrieval Project (ARP) VIII will be the next to come down this summer, followed by ARP IX and VII in late summer through fall, respectively. The ARP enclosures, nine in all, were used to exhume targeted buried wastes from a combined area of the landfill of 5.69 acres. Following their demolition, debris from each building is covered with gravel and left in place.

The final cleanup remedy for the Cold War-era landfill is construction of an earthen cover, which will protect the underlying Snake River Plain Aquifer, the second largest aquifer in the U.S.

-Contributor: Erik Simpson