DOE/ORO/2327 Oak Ridge Reservation Annual Site Environmental ...

Oak Ridge Reservation
protect future industrial workers and the underlying groundwater from contamination in soil, slabs, and
subsurface structures. Development of the final Site-Wide ROD for groundwater, surface water, sediment,
and ecological soil risk is in progress.
In 2009, the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) provided funds to the Oak Ridge
office of the Department of Energy. Much of these funds (approximately $755 million) were allocated to
speeding up environmental restoration and remediation activities. In addition to the creation of new jobs
and the preservation of existing ones, it is hoped that by accelerating these activities, long term costs will
be lower and remediation goals will be reached sooner than had been planned before the ARRA funds
became available.
One of the major ongoing operations at the ETTP site is dismantling the west wing of the K-25
Building and preparing the east wing of the K-25 Building for demolition. It is one of the largest D&D
projects in the entire DOE complex. The three-story, U-shaped K-25 building, built during the Manhattan
Project, covers 1.64 million ft 2 (approximately 18 ha) and contains 3,018 stages of gaseous diffusion
process equipment and associated auxiliary systems, including approximately 400 miles of piping. Each
stage consists of a converter, two compressors, two compressor motors, and associated piping. Removal
of the high-risk equipment components was completed in the west wing in 2008 and is expected to be
completed in the east wing in 2010. By the end of FY 2009, approximately 5,500 loads of demolition
debris, 1,300 compressors, and 700 converters had been removed and shipped to the Environmental
Management Waste Management Facility (EMWMF) for disposal. Demolition of the west wing was
completed in December 2009, although removal of the debris continues and is expected to be completed
in 2010.
Activities under way to prepare the east wing for demolition include the removal of 104 of the 343
high-risk equipment items; vent, purge, drain, and inspection activities; asbestos removal; and draining of
lubricants and oils from process systems.
There were several buildings inside of the K-25 Building footprint. Two of the buildings, K-1101 and
K-1201, which had housed support facilities for the K-25 Building, were prepared for demolition in 2009.
Preparations included removal of approximately eight million pounds of scrap metal. This metal had been
slated to be shipped to landfills, but it was determined that the metal could be recycled instead. The
recycling will therefore provide metal resources as well as saving valuable landfill space.
The K-1035 maintenance and instrument shop was demolished in 2009. Demolition debris was
disposed of at EMWMF.
Preparations for the demolition of the K-27 Building included installation of much of the construction
power supply and the removal of most of the combustible materials from the vault and cell levels.
In FY 2009, four predominantly uncontaminated and eleven low risk/low complexity facilities were
demolished. In addition, three high risk buildings in the Poplar Creek area (K-1231, K-1233, and K-413)
were demolished.
In 2007, surveillance data indicated that the levels of chromium in Mitchell Branch had exhibited a
marked increase. Subsequent analyses showed that the chromium was almost entirely in the hexavalent
state. Since hexavalent chromium has not been used at ETTP for many years, it is believed that the source
is groundwater contaminated with legacy material, and not a result of current operational issues. A
chromium collection system consisting of an aquitard with two extraction wells and pumps was installed
to pump water from the vicinity of outfall 170 for treatment at the CNF and discharge through the CNF
NPDES outfall. In January 2009, the original pumps were changed to electric pumps to both increase
pumping capacity and reduce maintenance costs. Since the installation of this system and subsequent
modifications to increase pumping rates, the levels of chromium in Mitchell Branch have been reduced to
levels well below the water quality criteria of 11 µg/L, and near or below the detection levels of 1 to
3 µg/L.
Largemouth bass from the K-1007-P1 Pond were known to accumulate high concentrations of PCBs
in their muscle tissue. As a result of multiple studies of the pond, the major source of PCB contamination
was thought to be contaminated sediments, which are easily suspended by bottom-feeding fish like carp
and shad, especially in this system where grass carp totally decimated pond plants that historically served
to stabilize the sediments. High nutrient loads in the pond from a large goose population were thought to
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