The most hazardous constituent of uranium mill tailings is radium. DOE’s cleanup authority was established by the Uranium Mill Tailings Radiation Control Act of 1978. Mr. Chairman, we now return to the topics discussed in our report: the status and cost of DOE’s surface and groundwater cleanup and the factors that could affect the federal government’s costs in the future. By 1992, however, the Department was estimating that the surface cleanup would be completed in 1998 and that 13 piles of tailings would need to be relocated. In addition, DOE made changes in its cleanup strategies to respond to state and local concerns. Uncertain Future Costs

Once all of the sites have been cleaned up, the federal government’s responsibilities, and the costs associated with them, will continue far into the future. In addition, the final cost of the groundwater cleanup depends on the ability and willingness of the affected states to pay their share of the cleanup costs. DOE has already cleaned up the Grand Junction processing site and over 4,000 nearby properties, at a cost of about $700 million. Additional copies are $2 each.
Why GAO Did This Study

GAO discussed the status and cost of the Department of Energy's (DOE) uranium mill tailings cleanup program and the factors that could affect future costs.

What GAO Found

GAO noted that: (1) surface contamination cleanup has been completed at two-thirds of the identified sites and is underway at most of the others; (2) if DOE completes its surface cleanup program in 1998, it will have cost $2.3 billion, taken 8 years longer than expected, and be $621 million over budget; (3) DOE cleanup costs increased because there were more contaminated sites than originally anticipated, some sites were more contaminated than others, and changes were needed to respond to state and local concerns; (4) the future cost of the uranium mill tailings cleanup will largely depend on the future DOE role in the program, remediation methods used, and the willingness of states to share final cleanup costs; and (5) the Nuclear Regulatory Commission needs to ensure that enough funds are collected from the responsible parties to protect U.S. taxpayers from future cleanup costs.