New Mexico seeks public input on Los Alamos Lab cleanup progress

Los Alamos County residents have until Monday, June 8, to comment on cleanup progress at Los Alamos National Laboratory, where New Mexico is pressing the U.S. Department of Energy over the pace and scope of remediation tied to contamination left across former lab sites, canyons, landfills and groundwater.

The review sits inside a legal framework that has been in place since the 2016 Compliance Order on Consent was signed on June 24, 2016 under federal hazardous-waste law and the New Mexico Hazardous Waste Act. After the New Mexico Environment Department sued DOE in 2021 for failing to make enough progress on cleanup, the two sides executed a new settlement agreement and revised consent order on Aug. 30, 2024. State officials said that revised order added stronger public participation, a faster dispute-resolution process and broader deadline enforcement.

Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham described the 2024 deal as a major step toward holding the federal government accountable for radioactive waste tied to the Manhattan Project and later weapons work. Environment Secretary James Kenney said the revised order was meant to tighten deadlines and speed up disputes. DOE says LANL was established in 1943 as Site Y of the Manhattan Project, and the lab’s legacy cleanup mission now stretches from soil and groundwater remediation to contaminated soil removal and the decontamination and demolition of contaminated buildings.

DOE says more than 2,100 contaminated sites were originally identified at LANL and about 1,100 have been closed. At the Jan. 14 annual public meeting, DOE and NMED said all 11 fiscal-year 2025 consent-order milestones were completed on or ahead of schedule, and both sides agreed to 10 milestones for fiscal-year 2026. Those include work on soil remediation, the hexavalent chromium plume and material disposal areas, issues that remain central in Mortandad Canyon and other parts of the lab footprint.

The pressure on DOE has continued this year. NMED issued administrative compliance orders to LANL on Feb. 11, 2026, and also moved to modify the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant permit to push DOE to prioritize disposal of LANL legacy waste there. DOE’s environmental management office also hosted a forum in April on the chromium campaign, underscoring that one of the lab’s longest-running cleanup disputes is still active. N3B says it manages a 10-year, $2.1 billion Los Alamos Legacy Cleanup Contract, while DOE is also pursuing a new Legacy Cleanup Contract II procurement covering transuranic waste, mixed low-level and low-level waste, decontamination and demolition, soil and groundwater remediation and environmental monitoring.