Nye County finds no tritium in groundwater for 11th straight year

Nye County’s 2025 groundwater checks again found no detectable tritium at 20 sampling locations, extending the county’s 11-year streak of non-detects in water downgradient of the Nevada National Security Site. The latest round covered private wells, an Early Warning Drilling Program well and other monitoring points in the Lathrop Wells, Amargosa Valley and Beatty areas.

The county’s Tritium Sampling and Monitoring Program was launched in 2015 with U.S. Department of Energy support and now samples 20 locations each year, divided between 10 core sites and 10 rotating sites. The water is analyzed by a Nevada-certified laboratory using EPA-approved methods with a minimum detection concentration of about 300 picocuries per liter, far below the Environmental Protection Agency’s Safe Drinking Water Act limit of 20,000 picocuries per liter for tritium.

John Klenke, Nye County’s geoscientist, said the program is meant to confirm through independent methods that tritium is not moving off the site. Tritium is the primary contaminant of concern because it moves quickly through groundwater and can signal migration from past nuclear testing. In 2020, DOE said the program had already sampled 50 separate locations since it began, including 42 wells and eight springs.

President Harry S. Truman authorized the 680-square-mile tract on Dec. 18, 1950, under the name Nevada Proving Grounds. The first atmospheric nuclear test was detonated there on Jan. 27, 1951. Between 1951 and 1992, the United States carried out 100 atmospheric tests and 828 underground tests at the site, ending with the underground test Divider on Sept. 23, 1992. The site later took the Nevada National Security Site name.