One day into a federal government shutdown, state officials announced all necessary permits and approvals from state agencies to operate the Hanford site’s vit plant are complete. They are now waiting on federal officials to start processing waste. 

The state Department of Health recently issued a radioactive air emissions license to the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) for the vit plant, more formally known as the Direct-Feed Low-Activity Waste Facility. That license allows DOE to operate the facility’s melter that will turn the hundreds of tanks worth of waste at the site into a glass form, a process known as vitrification. 

“With this approval, we are now just days away from transforming nuclear waste into glass,” said Ecology Director Casey Sixkiller in a statement. “Pulling dangerous waste out of aging underground tanks and turning it into glass for safe, permanent disposal is what we’ve been working toward for decades. We will continue to support the U.S. Department of Energy as it begins operations.”  

DOE has an Oct. 15 deadline to begin operating the facility, which has been three decades and billions of dollars in the making.  

Officials at the federal agency signed off on starting operations in mid-September after lawmakers and other stakeholders expressed concerns over reports that Energy Secretary Chris Wright was working to take the site cleanup “in a different direction.” Wright has denied that there was any change to the agency’s plans. 

It was not immediately clear if the federal government shutdown would impact the start of operations. Requests to DOE officials locally and in Washington, D.C., for comment on the status of processing the waste were not immediately returned. 

But state leaders indicate they expect to see the facility running by the Oct. 15 deadline. 

“Our state has done our part to start up the Waste Treatment Plant,” said Gov. Bob Ferguson in a statement. “Now the federal government needs to live up to its responsibilities and clean up what they left behind.”