ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP) — The operator of the nation's troubled nuclear waste dump in southeastern New Mexico wants to temporarily store waste from Los Alamos National Laboratory in rural West Texas until it reopens.
Waste storage at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant near Carlsbad is halted because of a Feb. 5 truck fire and a Feb. 14 radiation leak that contaminated 17 workers.
Nuclear Waste Partnership says it and the Department of Energy propose to ship Los Alamos waste to a Waste Control Specialists site in Texas' Andrews County.
The partnership says the waste would go to the New Mexico plant for final disposal once it reopens.
Los Alamos has promised the state it will get the last of thousands of barrels of plutonium-contaminated clothing, tools, rags and other debris off its campus by June.