Bombs to beams: US to turn nuclear plutonium site into 1 GW solar farm | Wind energy is not being considered since a nearby observatory searches for gravitational waves.

From the article: The Department of Energy (DOE) has agreed to turn a former nuclear weapons development site in Washington state into a one gigawatt (GW) solar farm. Once a top-secret site producing weapons-grade plutonium, the Hanford site will soon generate clean energy as part of the DOE’s Cleanup to Clean Energy initiative.

The US is making major strides in reducing its dependence on fossil fuels and deploying more solar and wind power plants. Estimates suggest that as much as 90 GW of solar energy capacity has been added to the grid in recent years, powering 13 million American homes.

As coal—and gas-fired power plants shut down, renewable energy companies are stepping up to repurpose the major facilities and ensure the continuity of jobs for those working in the industry.

The DOE is using a similar approach to repurpose lands that it owns and were previously used in the US nuclear program. Launched in July 2023, the program has been dubbed Cleanup to Clean Energy since the DOE is keen to use these land parcels for clean energy generation alone.

At the Hanford site in Washington state, the DOE is working to build one of its biggest solar and battery energy storage projects.

Located in Eastern Washington, the Hanford site is an 8,000-acre federal holding that was a top-secret location during the Second World War. Back then, the sprawling campus was a production factory for plutonium-239 and has continued to be so for the following four decades.

During this period, the site provided two-thirds of the plutonium needed for the US nuclear weapons program. After the production activities ceased, the DOE initiated a site cleanup program that employs about 11,000 people.