Appendix B
Statement of Task
The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine will review the analysis carried out by the U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Environmental Management (DOE-EM)-selected Federally Funded Research and Development Center (FFRDC) on approaches for supplemental treatment of low-activity waste at the Hanford Nuclear Reservation. The review will evaluate the technical quality and completeness of the following:
- Methods used to conduct the risk, cost-benefit, schedule, and regulatory compliance assessments and their implementation;
- Waste conditioning and supplemental treatment approaches considered in the assessments, including any approaches not identified by DOE-EM;
- Other key information and data used in the assessments; and
- Results of the assessments, including the formulation and presentation of conclusions and the characterization and treatment of uncertainties.
The review will be carried out concurrently with the FFRDC’s analysis with opportunities for input from the Washington State Department of Ecology, other principal Hanford stakeholders, and members of the public. The study will produce up to four review reports with findings and recommendations. The first report will focus on study charges 1-3; the second report will focus on study charge 4; the third report will provide the committee’s overall assessment; and the fourth report will provide a summary of public comments on the third committee report and the committee’s views, if any, on these comments and whether they change any of the findings or recommendations in that report.
