Moab uranium cleanup accelerates

Beginning the week of Feb. 4, the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Moab Uranium Mill Tailings Remedial Action (UMTRA) Project increased mill tailing shipments from the UMTRA Site in Moab to a permanent disposal site in Crescent Junction. The project’s goal is to double weekly train shipments from two to four, shipping Monday through Thursday, enabling accelerated cleanup.

Project contractors hired 23 new employees to support the increase in production.

“The increased shipments are part of DOE’s mission, under the Office of Environmental

Management, to safely clean up contaminated facilities leftover from the nation’s Cold War

environmental legacy,” federal cleanup director Russell McCallister said. “Increasing

shipments is part of the project’s goal to safely remove tailings as quickly as possible.”

Each train can transport up to 144 containers and can carry approximately 4,700 tons of mill

tailings. Mill tailings are a sand-like material that remain from processing uranium ore. The

tailings are transported by rail in sealed metal containers, away from the Colorado River and the

Moab site, to the Crescent Junction site, located about 30 miles north.

The tailings are placed in a

DOE-constructed, U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission-approved disposal cell. The Moab UMTRA Project began shipping activities in 2009 and is more than half way to completing its

mission of relocating 16 million tons of tailings.

23 new employees hired for energy remedial project