54 dump trucks of nuclear waste left Los Alamos in fiscal year 2026

Eighty-nine shipments of radioactive material left Los Alamos National Laboratory this year.

Brad Smith, president and general manager of Newport News Nuclear BWXT-Los Alamos, testified Thursday before the Legislature’s Radioactive and Hazardous Materials Committee. He reported that these deliveries totaled 403 cubic meters of transuranic waste. That volume is equivalent to 54 standard-sized dump trucks. The material traveled to the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in Carlsbad, the only underground repository for such waste in the country.

Smith noted that shipments of legacy transuranic waste, including tools and clothing contaminated by radiation, rose by 107 percent compared to the previous year. More than 90 percent of the above-ground transuranic waste inventory at the laboratory has already been shipped to WIPP. Smith stated that his team’s safety record is better than the industry average. He described the operation as safe and productive.

The committee also examined a separate environmental issue. From 1956 to 1972, workers at a gas-fired power plant at the laboratory flushed hexavalent chromium-contaminated water into Sandia Canyon. An underground plume of this pollutant has since migrated to San Ildefonso Pueblo. Radioactive and hazardous waste has lingered in and around the lab since the 1940s, when the atomic bomb was developed there. Federal officials say the chromium plume does not currently pose a danger to public health.

Sen. Jeff Steinborn, D-Las Cruces, chairs the committee. He stated that the U.S. government, the New Mexico Environment Department, and San Ildefonso Pueblo reached a settlement agreement on the plume’s cleanup nine weeks ago. Steinborn said the agreement has not yet been signed. Stanley Pyram, acting manager of the U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Environmental Management’s Los Alamos Field Office, testified that federal officials will sign off on it. Pyram added that a technical solution is still required to fix the issue once the document is finalized.

Steinborn said he is considering a bill that would mandate a specific timeframe for the U.S. to clean up the plume if a settlement is not reached. He described the exposure to counties and the Rio Grande as substantial. Steinborn urged Pyram to push federal personnel to finalize the deal. He asked them to act as hard as possible to get the agreement signed.

Steinborn criticized President Donald Trump’s administration at the end of the hearing. He labeled it anti-safety, anti-environment, and anti-protection. He stated that the committee members are not happy campers. Pyram responded by telling his contractors that an unsafe site cannot complete its work. He noted that an unsafe site will eventually be shut down. Steinborn countered by pointing to several fires inside Los Alamos facilities over the past year. He warned that a catastrophe is in the making.

The committee heard these accounts during a Thursday session. The legislative panel continues its oversight of radioactive and hazardous materials in New Mexico.