The nuclear industry hasn’t solved the long-term problem of what to do with nuclear waste, which presents a uniquely dangerous environmental threat. That danger is now highlighted by leakage at one of the oldest nuclear sites in the world, Washington State’s Hanford facility, writes Gina Mason.

Living with radiation sickness is not on my bucket list, and I would hazard that it isn’t on yours either. Nor is it what I have in mind for my children’s future. Yet our government continues to manufacture nuclear materials and unsafely store radioactive waste in clear violation of the public trust.

Nowhere is this more visible than at Washington State’s Hanford Nuclear Reservation, the most radioactively contaminated site in the western hemisphere, where we now know radioactive sludge is leaking badly from at least six underground tanks. The management of this catastrophe is vitally important to the Pacific Northwest and the rest of the nation - indeed, the biosphere. Unfortunately, environmental disasters do not stop at city, state or national borders.

Workers at the Hanford Nuclear Reservation work to transfer highly radioactive material into storage containers to be moved out of a facility near the the Columbia River. (Photo credit: hanford.gov)

The Hanford Nuclear Reservation is located […]