Report Closure for the Seventh Generation | 2017 Edition

Beginning with the Manhattan Project during World War II, the federal government, through the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) and its predecessor agencies, has been responsible for the development, production and testing of nuclear weapons at 16 major facilities and more than 100 additional sites. Once production came to an end, the work of environmental cleanup began and continues at many sites.

The selection of cleanup remedies often results in waste being left in place and a need for ongoing surveillance and maintenance to ensure the effectiveness of the remedies over time. This responsibility falls to DOE’s Office of Legacy Management (DOE-LM). Today, DOE-LM has responsibility for the long-term stewardship (LTS) activities at 92 sites. Other DOE sites remain active with diverse and new missions such as national security and research.

DOE’s LTS responsibilities require actions to continue protecting human health and the environment once a site is cleaned up and transitioned to a closed site or another mission. LTS activities can include protection of natural, cultural and historical resources, facilities management, maintenance of land use controls, data and record-keeping, site access considerations, and other surveillance activities. The involvement of states, Native American tribes and stakeholders does not end at site closure but must continue through stewardship.

The State and Tribal Government Working Group (STGWG), made up of states and Native American tribes, engages directly with DOE on issues related to the cleanup of the nuclear weapons complex. STGWG considers stewardship a priority issue and a key responsibility to future generations. The working group published the original edition of this report —“Closure for the Seventh Generation”—in 1999. DOE has made progress on many fronts related to LTS, most notably the establishment of DOE-LM in 2003.

This 2017 edition summarizes the progress made, including creation of this new office charged with stewardship as a core mission and several policies to protect human health and the environment. STGWG’s LTS Committee, with coordination from the National Conference of State Legislatures, developed the report.

The report shares findings and conclusions from 15 DOE site surveys including successes and shortcomings in selected remedies. The recommendations presented in this report draw on progress and conclusions highlighted in site surveys completed with DOE field offices. The report serves as a framework for further discussions and continued work on these complex issues.

Key topics discussed include:

• DOE’s commitment to fulfill its stewardship responsibilities across DOE offices and programs, especially for sites with new or ongoing missions that will not transition to DOE-LM.
• Involvement of states, tribes and stakeholders in the development of long-term surveillance and maintenance plans prior to transition to LTS status.
• Land use decision-making, including considerations for tribal access for traditional use and input from regulators and other stakeholders.
• Monitoring and effectiveness of land use controls, such as institutional controls (ICs) and engineered controls (ECs), including remedies to address groundwater contamination.
• Public education and awareness about site remedies, monitoring and other stewardship activities.

DOE continues its work to clean up the 16 remaining sites. Some sites may transition to other roles such as research laboratories and national security missions rather than full closure. Lessons learned from long-term stewardship progress can inform activities and decisions across the DOE complex. STGWG places emphasis on the need to develop ways to communicate knowledge and understanding to future generations. Visitor centers at Fernald Preserve and the Weldon Spring Site are good examples of facilitating transmission of knowledge and engaging with the public.

STGWG offers these recommendations for DOE’s consideration to address unresolved issues facing the successful implementation of LTS. Many of the recommendations presented build upon key issues identified in 1999. Others emerged from lessons learned from closed sites and reflect a deeper understanding one generation later. The intent of this report is to provide the basis for ongoing dialogue and cooperative action on LTS among DOE, states, Native American Tribes and stakeholders to protect human health and the environment for future generations.

For more than 45 years, the U.S. Department of Energy and its predecessor agencies developed, produced and tested nuclear weapons. At its peak, 16 major facilities and more than 100 other sites spread across the nation were involved to some degree with America’s nuclear weapons program. 

Four sites—Los Alamos in New Mexico, Oak Ridge in Tennessee, Hanford in Washington, and Mallinckrodt Chemical Works in Missouri—date back to the Manhattan Project in World War II. Most others became involved in the years following the end of the war as the United States greatly expanded its weapons production capability and developed an enormous nuclear arsenal during the Cold War. These sites and their diverse missions ranged from weapons research and design at national laboratories at Los Alamos and Lawrence Livermore in California; plutonium production at Hanford and the Savannah River Site in South Carolina; uranium refinement at Mallinckrodt Chemical Works and Fernald in Ohio; uranium enrichment at Oak Ridge, Portsmouth in Ohio and Paducah in Kentucky; and weapons testing in Nevada.

By the late 1980s, as the Soviet Union dissolved and the Cold War ended, various nuclear arms reduction agreements shrank both nation’s nuclear arsenals, and America’s nuclear weapon production facilities shut down. Because the processes used to refine and enrich uranium, produce plutonium and shape the plutonium triggers all created tremendous amounts of radioactive and hazardous wastes, the shutdown of production also prompted the start of environmental cleanup at most of these sites.

In the past nearly 30 years, cleanup has been completed at 104 of the 120 DOE sites. DOE expects cleanup at several of the remaining sites to continue until 2070 or beyond. The 16 sites still undergoing cleanup activities include Hanford, and operating sites with multiple, ongoing missions including national security and research, such as the national laboratories in Idaho Falls, Idaho, Los Alamos, Oak Ridge and Savannah River. The Nevada National Security Site (NNSS), in addition to having an ongoing mission, currently functions as a national low-level waste disposal facility for both on-site and off-site generated defense low-level waste, mixed low-level waste and classified waste. 

In most cases, at least some radioactive and chemical waste remains at these sites—in engineered landfills, buried deep in the soil or in the groundwater. At some sites, extensive amounts of contaminants remain or will remain once the cleanup is completed.

Some cleaned up sites have been turned over to local control for economic development or other purposes. Some sites will remain under DOE control in perpetuity. Regardless, DOE is obligated to ensure that these remaining contaminants do not harm people or the environment now or in the future. This represents DOE’s responsibilities of long-term stewardship. 

Overview of the 2017 Edition

The State and Tribal Government Working Group (STGWG) Stewardship Committee first published “Closure for the Seventh Generation” in 1999. This 2017 edition continues the framework of the original report and assesses progress made by DOE in addressing LTS at sites controlled by DOE that contain radioactive and chemically hazardous waste and contaminants in the soil and water.

This edition summarizes the original report’s findings, conclusions and recommendations and provides updates to each of those sections based on knowledge acquired from work done from 1999 to 2017. This edition includes:

• Progress Since the 1999 Recommendations: This section reiterates the recommendations made by STGWG and summarizes the progress made by DOE to mitigate or address these recommendations.
• Overview of Site Summaries: Fifteen sites were selected to be studied by STGWG for the 2017 edition, including 10 sites from the 1999 report. The site summaries are a survey of how each site’s personnel or responsible party is planning and implementing a stewardship program.
• Findings and Conclusions: STGWG provides findings and policy-oriented conclusions based on the new site surveys and a review of findings and conclusions from 1999.
• Recommendations: STGWG updates several recommendations and offers additional recommendations to mitigate the identified LTS deficiencies.
• Appendices: The report includes a list of acronyms, the survey form and other additional resources such as a chronology of DOE’s national actions related to LTS and an overview of the history of STGWG. Site survey responses are not included in the print version of this report and can be found online.

Terminology

The 1999 report references long-term institutional controls (ICs) as a common remedial element at DOE sites. ICs are administrative or legal mechanisms designed to control future use by limiting development and/or restricting public access to a site where there is residual contamination.

For this edition, STGWG considers land use controls (LUCs) to be those elements needed for a site to remain protective into the future. Consistent with current terminology, LUCs include both engineering controls or ECs (fences, barriers, disposal cover systems, etc.) and ICs (environmental covenants, deed restrictions, federal ownership, etc.). LTS is those actions that survey/monitor and maintain these LUCs and ensure that protection of human health and the environment is accomplished in perpetuity.

National Academy of Sciences Guidance

STGWG has not been alone in its efforts to study the issues of legacy waste and DOE’s cleanup work. The National Academy of Sciences (NAS) produced several reports addressing DOE’s management and stewardship of legacy waste sites and related activities. (See the Appendix B: Resources.) 

These reports further examine critical issues also supported by STGWG, including effective long-term institutional management systems, the fallibility and uncertainty of ICs and engineered barriers, and the fact that LTS must be taken into account during each phase of environmental management cleanup activities including early LTS planning processes. A recent report from 2013—“Sustainability for the Nation: Resource Connections and Governance Linkages”—puts forward advice on issues applicable to government processes including LTS. The NAS discusses the development of a decision framework, which focuses on the need for an ongoing process that allows for adaptive management and improved decision-making in the longer term. 

NAS and STGWG agree that DOE should select remedies recognizing that cleanup and LTS are complementary stages in long-term management of hazards that cannot be eliminated completely. Allocating risks and costs over time in ways that will protect human health and the environment over decades and centuries to come keeps focus on the distant goal of implementing LTS in ways that ensure future generations have what they need to carry out stewardship responsibilities at DOE legacy waste sites.

DOE Progress

DOE has relied on physical barriers and ICs to greatly limit public access to sites with radioactive hazards. DOE continues to promote a path toward maintaining ICs and developing land use plans. Many ICs may be required for hundreds to thousands of years, necessitating a significant commitment by the federal government. These long-term ICs are important but not exclusive elements of LTS.

DOE has made significant progress in reducing the “footprint” of real estate contaminated with radioactive and hazardous waste. This footprint has been reduced from 120 sites to the remaining 16 sites with active cleanup missions under the responsibility of the DOE Office of Environmental Management (DOE-EM). Surface acreage requiring cleanup has been reduced by over 90 percent, though extensive groundwater contamination still exists beneath some closed sites. The DOE Office of Legacy Management (DOE-LM) has responsibility for sites which have been cleaned up to meet current safety standards for human health and the environment, and remain in DOE control.

Major cleanup accomplishments and progress since 1999 is summarized in the individual site summaries included in this report. DOE developed a chronology of relevant departmental actions in response to the ongoing dialogue with STGWG members on LTS. The document “1999-2016 Chronology of Department of Energy Long-Term Stewardship Related National Primary Actions" can be found in Appendix C.

A notable organizational change at DOE was the establishment of DOE-LM. The office has LTS responsibility for 92 sites in 28 states and Puerto Rico, including at least eight sites that have transitioned from DOE-EM. Five sites are projected to transition from DOE-EM to DOE-LM between 2025 and 2050. Prominent among LTS sites are Rocky Flats in Colorado, Fernald in Ohio and Weldon Spring in Missouri. Fernald Preserve and the Weldon Spring Site have visitor centers to educate the public about site history as part of LTS activities.

STGWG Role and Vision for LTS

States and tribes have worked together with DOE for over 25 years on nuclear waste cleanup. STGWG provides a forum for enhanced communication at all levels among DOE and states and tribes affected by DOE sites and activities. STGWG representatives provide recommendations to ensure that operation and cleanup activities are in compliance with all applicable federal and state laws and regulations, and tribal rights, including those retained by treaty, conferred by statute, and protected by the federal trust responsibility. Recommendations aim to protect human health and safety and environmental health.

As cleanup has progressed, the focus has shifted. STGWG created a stewardship committee in 1998 due to states and tribal concerns about long-term actions and restrictions at DOE sites. STGWG re-established an LTS Committee in 2016 to continue to be responsive to DOE’s changing priorities and expanding work of DOE-LM. Current STGWG priorities include: LTS; natural resource damage assessment and restoration (NRDAR); and tribal issues related to cleanup and closure. LTS remains a top, enduring priority for STGWG states and tribes.

DOE’s input and action will provide a basis for ongoing dialogue and—more important— cooperative action, so LTS, NRDAR, and tribal considerations are woven into cleanup activities. This approach to cleanup can help DOE fulfill its responsibilities to protect human health and the environment for future generations while also potentially reducing natural resource service losses.

STGWG’s vision for LTS is capable stewardship invested in protection of land and resources affected by DOE sites. LTS activities can include monitoring and maintenance of LUCs, natural resource management, facilities management, cultural resource protection, access control (patrolling), data and records management, and regular surveying.

For tribes, natural and cultural resources are often one and the same. Tribes advocate for a vision of LTS with the key underpinning being the ability to ensure safe access and use of all available tribal resources, including those rights reserved under treaties, the U.S. Constitution, laws and court decisions defining the federal trust responsibility, and executive orders. The health of tribal populations is more susceptible because of site proximity to their lands and resources, which they rely on. A number of tribes and pueblos— including CTUIR, Pueblo de San Ildefonso, Jemez Pueblo and Yakama Nation—have developed their own exposure scenarios based on subsistence lifestyles to fully account for the potential health risks to tribal members from accessing and using resources at or near remediated sites.

STGWG member tribes have worked with DOE for decades and continue to seek a deeper understanding and awareness of the unique tribal and cultural issues faced at the sites. DOE reaffirmed its American Indian and Alaska Native Tribal Government Policy and issued DOE Order 144.1 and framework for implementation in 2009. The policy and related documents lay out DOE’s responsibilities and commitment in its interactions with tribes at headquarters and field offices. DOE has a responsibility to ensure that tribes have a seat at the table when actions that affect tribal resources are taken or when decisions are made. This fostered ability to participate in resource management and decision-making is an aspect of both the trust relationship between the United States and Native American tribes as well as tribal self-determination.

States work with DOE in regulatory and other oversight roles, which were strengthened by the Federal Facilities Compliance Act in 1992. Some states have adopted the Uniform Environmental Covenants Act (UECA) or other regulations and policies related to LUCs.5 Various legal documents— such as consent orders and federal facilities agreements—outline states’ roles and interactions with DOE regarding cleanup decisions. In addition to sites where active cleanup is underway, Missouri and Ohio—where the Weldon Spring Site, Mound Site and Fernald Preserve have transitioned to LTS status—remain involved with STGWG and provide insight into LTS implementation.

DOE needs to develop and maintain a robust LTS program to minimize risks to human health and the environment which future generations may experience from the presence of radioactive and chemical waste within the scope of the DOE complex. DOE should recognize the limits of the current LTS program and strive for a reduction in the need for LTS throughout the complex. Investments in LTS activities (including additional remedial cleanups) can minimize those risks for future generations. More consideration must be given to the fact that all engineered solutions eventually fail. LTS activities must be proactive and vigorous enough to identify potential failures before they happen and actual events as they occur.

The states and tribes of STGWG, together with DOE, share perspectives with the common goal of maximizing the ability of future generations to better understand and maintain sites in LTS status. STGWG urges DOE to address the findings and conclusions and implement the recommendations of this report by working with STGWG. STGWG looks forward to the continued strides in cleanup and stewardship activities with positive impacts for the seventh generation—and beyond.

DOE SITES BY THE NUMBERS

8
Number of DOE-LM sites that have transitioned from EM

83
Number of DOE-LM sites that have transitioned from other entities

5
Number of DOE-EM sites projected to transition to       DOE-LM (2025-2050)

7
Number of EM sites that will transition all or portions to other entities (i.e., NNSA, Science, NE) for ongoing or new missions

For the first edition of this report, the STGWG Stewardship Committee, with support from the National Conference of State Legislatures (NCSL) and other working group member states and tribes, surveyed personnel from various sites and facilities with a role in nuclear weapons production and research.

STGWG developed survey questions to determine if remedies, including long-term ICs are effective and how each site’s personnel or responsible party is planning and implementing a stewardship program.

In 1999, personnel from 12 sites shared written responses to the survey. The surveys solicited information about the types of contaminants at the site, the extent of the contamination, the types of cleanup decisions being made, and steps toward defining and implementing ICs.

For this edition, 15 sites were selected, including 10 from the 1999 report. The LTS Committee collaborated with DOE to ensure a diverse sampling of sites—closed sites and sites with ongoing missions and multiple DOE offices. Survey questions were updated to reflect progress and lessons learned and understand the various waste streams and site disposal options. DOE officials provided initial data and responses to the survey questions. STGWG states and tribes were responsible for reviewing, providing comments and edits, and finalizing surveys. Most site survey responses were completed and reviewed between October 2016 and February 2017.

The site survey forms can be found in Appendix E and provide basic information for the reader who may not be familiar with each site.

The findings and conclusions reflect DOE’s progress on LTS. They also highlight the need for continued progress to address deficiencies in DOE’s current efforts to ensure adequate long-term protection of human health, the environment and cultural resources. Because LTS will likely be needed at many DOE sites, STGWG has updated several recommendations and identified others to mitigate the identified deficiencies.

Any accepted LTS program and LUCs must ensure long-term protection of the environment, human health, and traditional tribal resources and cultural resources, including those protected by treaty and federal law.

Tribal members are disproportionately at risk because of the unique tribal uses of traditional resources (e.g. plants, animals) and the proximity of some tribal lands to DOE sites.

STGWG acknowledges the following recommendations may fall under the responsibilities of multiple DOE programmatic offices. Understanding that entire sites or portions of a site may not transition to DOE-LM, effective planning and consistency among DOE offices are essential.

Recommendations are organized into five general categories: Planning Process; Implementation; Funding and Budget Process; Tribal Issues and Engagement; and Public Education and Awareness. 

Long-Term Stewardship Planning Process

Stewardship programs require careful thought and planning.

DOE should:

• Specify surveillance and maintenance needed in LTS plan to ensure the integrity of each remedy remains intact.

• Provide further detail on how NNSA, DOE-NE, DOE Office of Science and other offices plan for LTS.
  • Departmental guidance should outline how states and tribes can participate in the planning processes.

• Begin the process of developing LTS plans and other oversight mechanisms at operating and cleanup sites before completion of cleanup at any site area or parcel.
  • Consider how LTS applies to the entire site or specific site areas and the associated timelines of LTS planning and implementation.
  • Ensure that sites with ongoing missions follow the 10 elements for transition of land into LTS (as shown on page 10).
  • Ensure that LTS plans maintain flexibility while protecting human health and the environment by accounting for future changes to risk scenarios as site uses change.

• Include LTS obligations in both its five-year planning and lifecycle cost planning as soon as possible in the process.
  • Set up a funding mechanism for state and tribal governments using approaches such as site-specific advisory boards and technical assistance grants.

• Continue to regularly review and improve the LTS program overseen by DOE-LM. States and tribes must be consulted by DOE in the development and review of these plans.

• Create or adjust LTS plans to be robust and include modeling for extreme weather events. These plans must anticipate failure and specify actions needed if and when failure occurs.

Long-Term Stewardship Implementation

Consistency in applying stewardship principles across the DOE weapons complex is necessary.

DOE should:

• Re-evaluate sites and portions of sites where active cleanup is complete for opportunities to define and document LTS activities.

• Improve justifications for decisions to select long-term remedies that may include ICs and demonstrate how federal trustee responsibilities to tribes—including those for treaty rights and resources—are incorporated into LTS plans and activities.

• Continue to establish and implement consistent policy and guidance for stewardship across all departmental programs with input from tribes, states and site stakeholders.

• Specify how tribes, states and other stakeholders will be involved in LTS plans at each site, including operating sites. Frequency of LTS program review is site specific and should be determined with input from states, tribes and stakeholders.

• Ensure a long-term monitoring program is in place when groundwater treatment systems are decommissioned to evaluate potential contaminant “rebound” and specify response actions.

• Consider tribal treaty rights and fulfill DOE trust responsibility and related access rights for tribes prior to transfer of land ownership or management authority. Assure, through either legislation or policy, that such rights and resources are restored or maintained with changes in land status.

Funding and Budget Process

DOE should:

• Determine if the current selection process of long-term remedies for its sites includes calculations for all costs related to LTS and results in truly cost-effective outcomes.
  • DOE-LM should evaluate the information and develop a report of actual cost as compared to the predicted cost of LTS.

• Annually remind decision-makers that a more comprehensive cleanup will result in less need for LTS activities and expenditures. Annually remind decision-makers to reduce DOE’s NRDAR claims exposure by removing more contamination at or below ground surface and reducing the number of hazardous waste sites/burial grounds.

• Actively engage with regulators and tribal governments to provide funding to ensure that remedies remain safe and for public assurance that sites remain secure.

• Continue to fund tribal programs activities related to in nuclear waste cleanup oversight, NRDAR processes, and environmental surveillance and monitoring, and provide additional funding to incorporate a cultural resource management role in LTS programs.

Tribal Issues and Engagement

DOE should:

• Emphasize protection of cultural resources as part of DOE’s mission.
  • Consider cultural resources a relevant term associated with the “environment” and integrate its importance into processes, programming and decision-making.
  • Work with STGWG to offer continued education to DOE officials and contractors on cultural resources and the federal government’s trust responsibility to tribes.

• Expand Tribal access to DOE sites for cultural, subsistence, religious or ceremonial purposes for all areas not undergoing cleanup or not directly affected by ongoing operations.

• Improve outreach and determine historical or traditional connections for sites not currently engaged with tribes.
  • Consult the state historic preservation office to determine which tribes once lived in or near each site or could have distant ties to the land for sites not directly affecting tribes.
  • Consult the U.S. Department of Interior-Indian Affairs for current location and contact information for federally recognized descendants of those ancestors.
  • Approach tribal leadership and tribal historic preservation offices requesting consultation for description of tribal occupancy for DOE-LM closure public information records.

Public Education and Awareness

DOE should:

• Ensure information about contaminated areas within sites is preserved, communicated and made accessible for states, tribes and future site users.
  • Seek improvements in accessibility of site LTS data/documents and continuity in data collection and storage for states and tribes using the information.

• With stewardship required at more than 100 DOE sites because of residual waste and contamination, DOE should fulfill its previous commitment to work with states and tribes affected by sites for generations to come.

• Continue to support existing visitor centers and consider the development of additional visitor centers, as appropriate, and other methods of providing information to the public on the history and cleanup actions at a site.

• Continue to establish separate systems for LTS data collection and preservation at operating and cleanup sites (e.g., NNSA, NE, Science) or combine with the DOE-LM system for electronic collection, storage, and retrieval of site data and documents.

Concluding Remarks

The contents of the 2017 “Closure for the Seventh Generation” continue to build a foundation for more thought and action by DOE, states, tribes and stakeholders relating to LTS. DOE will continue to make decisions impacting cleanup and LTS. It is the responsibility of DOE and all of us together as stewards of the planet and its resources to sustain them for the benefit of future generations. Our decisions and actions, or lack thereof, affect generations to come.

DOE, states, tribes and potential stakeholders should continue to come together to support and implement the LTS recommendations and policy options offered.

STGWG bases these fact-based policy-oriented observations on the site surveys and the LTS progress and decisions made by DOE. STGWG’s findings in 1999 focused on three general topics:

• DOE’s activities resulted in widespread, long-lived contamination that is difficult to remediate.
• The sites were increasingly relying on ICs.
• Long-term funding of ICs and other stewardship responsibilities was not guaranteed and therefore was a concern.

STGWG concluded in 1999 that long-term protection of human health, the environment and cultural resources was not only the greatest challenge for DOE but should be the No. 1 goal. Other conclusions that emerged include cases that determined:

• True long-term costs of ICs were not always accurately presented.
• Future land use of those sites may be less certain than DOE asserts.
• Future use restrictions are relatively untested, leave waste in place and grow the use of ICs rather than cleanup, which places a burden on future generations.

Nearly two decades later, these findings and conclusions remain valid. DOE frequently continues to rely on ICs and strategies such as monitored natural attenuation (MNA) in lieu of active remedies. These alternatives are often chosen because upfront costs are considerably less, though long-term costs may not be fully considered. Leaving waste also limits future land use. Long-term adequate funding remains a challenge and subject to appropriation by Congress.

STGWG offers the following findings and conclusions based on the site surveys. 

LTS Planning Process

• Establishing DOE-LM in December 2003 was a positive step. The office provides a mechanism and responsible program to help ensure a consistent approach across the DOE complex of safely maintaining legacy wastes well into the future. Among DOE-LM’s responsibilities are environmental protection, land management and records retention at sites where DOE’s mission has ended and active environmental cleanup has been completed. Since inception, DOE-LM’s responsibilities have grown from 33 to 92 sites.
• The role of DOE-LM will continue to grow in importance as additional sites are added to its purview of responsibilities, as LUCs begin to age, and as funding would be needed for LTS at an increasing number of site.   
• It is not always clear how allocation of responsibilities for LTS will specifically be accomplished or implemented. Some DOE operating sites have not clearly defined the LTS program, thus responsibilities, such as operations and maintenance of LUCs, are not yet clarified.
• Where DOE-EM has completed cleanup activities, LTS is not formally addressed at parts of some DOE operating sites. Following approval by regulators, lands are returned to DOE landlord responsibility while still retaining residual materials of concern.
• Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) has an ongoing mission. The site includes more than 1,000 areas where cleanup is considered complete and approved by regulators. There is currently no descriptive LTS plans with implementation goals for such areas.

LTS Implementation

• LUCs, which includes ECs and ICs, have thus far generally provided adequate protection to the public and the environment, but they have not been infallible.
  • Heavy rains in Colorado in September 2013 resulted in localized flooding at the former Rocky Flats site, damaging a landfill cover.
  • The Weldon Spring Site disposal cell has experienced vandalism that required increased surveillance and repairs to ensure LUC compliance.

• Engineered barriers, such as fencing, gates, signage and locks, remain important LUCs, along with access and zoning restrictions.

• Capping of radioactive hazardous waste disposal areas is an EC more widely used at some sites.

• Recognition of anticipated failures of ICs and ECs, and the impacts of those future failures, per EPA guidance, have not been given significant consideration in the remedy choices for those sites that require hundreds of years of ICs and ECs, such as at the Hanford Site.

• Groundwater treatment continues at numerous DOE-LM sites including, the Fernald Preserve and Rocky Flats site. To date, no groundwater treatment systems have achieved remediation goals and been decommissioned, though that may occur at some point in the future.

• In some cases, groundwater sampling frequency has been reduced due to decreasing contaminant concentrations in the groundwater.

• Reliance on MNA continues to expand.

• At many sites, disposal facilities/waste burial grounds will remain near significant population centers. Residential/commercial/industrial development adjacent to DOE-LM sites will likely continue to encroach closer to disposal facilities/burial grounds.

• Contamination remaining at most DOE sites prohibits unlimited use and unrestricted exposure.

• Future land use varies widely across the DOE complex, with some sites expected to remain, all or in large part, in DOE control in perpetuity, and other sites expected to be released for public, private or tribal use.

• Future land use decisions continue to be made at some sites based on documentation that did not necessarily receive widespread buy-in from stakeholders (e.g., the Comprehensive Land Use Plan at Hanford).

• Final decisions by DOE with input from states, tribes and other stakeholders for many waste sites or cleanup projects remain to be made.

• LUC failures will likely occur, though these failures may or may not negatively impact human health or the environment.

• Additional DOE land will likely be released for development and other private, public or tribal use.

Tribal Issues Engagement and Public Education and Awareness

• Access for tribal cultural, religious or ceremonial purposes and the exercising of treaty reserved rights continues to be greatly affected at DOE sites such as Idaho, Hanford and Los Alamos, in conflict with federal laws, executive orders, treaties and federal trust responsibilities.

• DOE supports tribal review of its surveillance and maintenance work.

• At several sites—Maxey Flats, Mound, Rocky Flats, Weldon Spring Site—if there was not a federally recognized tribe in the state or near the site, it appears DOE did not pursue to the fullest extent possible efforts to determine whether any other tribe had historical interest or rights at the site.

• DOE has worked with tribes to some extent in development of management plans for access to traditional cultural properties (TCPs) and other cultural resources at DOE sites.

• The passage of time challenges DOE-LM’s ability to ensure information about contaminated sites is preserved and communicated for future site users and the public.

• It will be important for site officials to assure the public, tribes and other stakeholders that a remedy is working.

• DOE’s investment in tribal involvement for environmental monitoring and analysis, consultation with tribes early in remedy selection, and increased cultural resource access arises from federal trust responsibilities and improves protection of human health and the environment, particularly for tribes.

• Visitor centers at some sites (Fernald Preserve; Weldon Spring Site) have been popular and strengthened the public’s understanding of the history and cleanup actions at the sites.