Big part of nuclear reactor heads to Utah landfill

SALT LAKE CITY — A huge piece of a dismantled nuclear reactor is headed toward a Tooele County landfill where it will be buried.

That a 225,000-pound nuclear reactor pressure vessel head is being shipped by train from Illinois to Utah in a first-of-its-kind effort.

EnergySolutions has taken ownership of the nuclear plant and will dismantle the reactors and decommission the site.

Several tons of low-level radioactive waste, such as the reactor head, will wind up in Utah over the next decade in a cleanup project that is expected to cost nearly $1 billion.

EnergySolutions officials say the company’s landfill in Tooele County is equipped to handle mildly contaminated waste.