The Nation - News from Aug. 10, 1989

The Energy Department delayed efforts to stop radioactive wastes from contaminating ground water near its Hanford, Wash., nuclear weapons plant so that production could continue, a congressional study found. The report from the General Accounting Office, the investigative arm of Congress, disputed Energy Department assertions that the leakage of an estimated 750,000 gallons of toxic wastes from the plant’s underground storage tanks would have little impact on the nearby Columbia River. The GAO said although it was learned in 1956 that some single-walled tanks at Hanford might be leaking, those tanks were still being used in 1980. DOE officials said that liquids were kept below the leaky spots.