The Downside of Green

In February of this year, a 55-gallon drum of radioactive waste burst open at the nations only nuclear dump in New Mexico.

Investigation into the cause of the accident points to a pet store purchase that went bad.

"It was the wrong kitty litter," says James Conca, a geochemist in Richland, Wash who while not part of the investigation is an expert on nuclear west management. It turns out there's more to cat litter than you think. It can soak up urine, but it's just as good at absorbing radioactive material.

It actually works well both in the home litter box as well as the laboratory or industrial incident. The waste management industry has been using kitty litter for years to soak up liquid waste, dump it into a drum of sludge and it will stabilize volatile radioactive chemicals. The kitty litter acts by preventing the waste from reacting with the environment.

And this is what contractors at Los Alamos National Laboratory were doing as they packed Cold War-era waste for shipment to the dump. But at some point, they decided to make a switch, from clay litter to organic. That might sound nice, you're trying to be green, but the organic kitty litters are, as it says on the label, organic, Organic litter, is made of plant material, which can also be full of chemical compounds that can react with the nuclear waste. Investigators now believe the litter and waste caused the drum to slowly heat up sort of like a slow burn charcoal fire heats up.

Only one drum out of a shipment of about 500 drums overheated, but the threat has required authorities to seal all the remaining drums in larger, pressure proof containers. The road to living green can really be hard at times!