Notice of Modifications to the Preferred Alternatives for Tank Waste Treatment and Disposal of Off Site Waste in the Draft Tank Closure and Waste Management Environmental Impact Statement for the Hanford Site, Richland, WA

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The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) is modifying its preferred alternatives for tank waste treatment and also for disposal of off-site waste in the Draft Tank Closure and Waste Management Environmental Impact Statement for the Hanford Site, Richland, Washington (Draft EIS, DOE/EIS-00391), made available for public comment on October 30, 2009 (74 FR 56194). This Draft EIS has been prepared in accordance with the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) and its implementing regulations. The public comment period for the Draft EIS extends to March 19, 2010. In this Draft EIS, DOE analyzed, as a reasonable alternative, treating and sending waste from specific tanks to the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP), in Carlsbad, New Mexico, as mixed transuranic (TRU) waste. DOE is now expressing its preference that no Hanford tank wastes would be shipped to WIPP. These wastes would be retrieved and treated in the Waste Treatment Plant (WTP) being constructed at Hanford. The State of Washington Department of Ecology (Ecology), a cooperating agency on the EIS, has revised its Foreword to the Draft EIS in response to this modification to the preferred alternative for tank waste. That revision can