A gigantic nuclear waste treatment plant in eastern Washington is largely completed.
After 18 years of construction, the plant will soon be ready to start processing radioactive wastes left over from decades of making plutonium at the Hanford Nuclear Reservation.
The $17 billion plant is designed to treat the bulk of the 56 million gallons of radioactive waste stored in underground tanks.
Even when the plant is fully operational, the Department of Energy has estimated it will cost tens of billions of dollars and decades of work to treat all of the waste at Hanford.