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Department of Energy - Paducah Gaseous Diffusion Plant
The 1350-acre Paducah Gaseous Diffusion Plant (PGDP) is a uranium-enrichment facility owned by the Department of Energy (DOE) and operated by the United States Enrichment Corporation. The site is located approximately 3 miles south of the Ohio River and 14 miles west of Paducah, Kentucky.
Extensive support facilities are required to maintain the enrichment process including a steam plant, four major electrical switch yards, four sets of cooling towers, a building for chemical cleaning and decontamination, a water treatment plant, and maintenance and laboratory facilities. Approximately 740 acres of the plant are fenced industrial operations which is surrounded by another fence forming a smaller area of uninhabited buffer zone. The PGDP started uranium-enrichment operations in 1952. Plant operations have generated hazardous, non-hazardous, and radioactive wastes, including polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), volatile organic compounds (VOCs), technetium-99 (Tc-99), and multiple isotopes of uranium. In 1988, the DOE found Tc-99 in a private residence drinking water well located north of the site. VOCs were subsequently found in other private wells and in onsite monitoring wells north of the facility. Approximately 100 residences and businesses are presently receiving municipal drinking water due to groundwater contamination from the site.
The DOE has detected PCBs in the sediments leading from the facility in both Big Bayou Creek and Little Bayou Creek. These creeks are part of the adjacent 2,100-acre West Kentucky Wildlife Management Area. In 1989, the Commonwealth of Kentucky's Division of Water issued a warning against eating fish caught in the Little Bayou Creek due to PCB contamination. The Big Bayou Creek, however, is still used for fishing.
- Paducah Gas Diffusion Plant NPL Site Narrative
- University
of Kentucky Paducah Gas Diffusion Plant Site
- Paducah Gas Diffusion Plant CERCLIS Hazardous Waste Sites
- Department of Energy Office
of Environmental Management
- Paducah Gaseous Diffusion
Plant Environmental Restoration Site Summary
- Consortium
for Risk Evaluation with Stakeholder Participation (CRESP)
(Aerial Photo, Plume Maps, Geologic Cross Section, and Narrative)
(Actions, Aliases, Financial Transactions, Operable Units and RODs)