Hanford now has a backup trash collector and alternative landfill to use in case Richland permanently stops taking Hanford waste.

Richland has refused to accept any more Hanford garbage until Hanford officials figure out how to deal with small amounts of radioactivity showing up in its trash.

The suspected cause is slightly radioactive insects buzzing around part of the Hanford site.

Pasco-based Basin Disposal Inc., which hauls trash from the Tri-Cities to the regional landfill at Roosevelt, signed a one-year agreement Wednesday to begin hauling Hanford's garbage.

Hanford officials hope to work out an agreement with Richland too so the site has two garbage haulers, but the matter is still unresolved.

"It's going to need more massaging," said Roger Wright, the city's environmental engineer.

Much of Hanford's trash normally is shipped to the Richland landfill. But that trash now is kept and buried in a low-level radioactive waste trench at Hanford until Richland and the Department of Energy resolve the concerns.

Also this week:

While conducting its first random survey of trash at the site Thursday, Hanford workers found a mysterious and slightly radioactive plastic bag of dry granules. It is not known what the granules are.

Two more dead contaminated flies were discovered in an ironworkers' shop in the 200 East Area near B Plant.

Hanford continued to analyze urine samples from 106 people who may have been exposed to the contamination. Results from 95 tests have been returned, and all showed no exposure.

The problem began in late September, when trash routinely sent to the Richland landfill from the B Plant area was found to contain small spots of radioactive contamination.

Officials suspected the contamination was being spread around office and shop buildings by flies and gnats dining on a sugary substance sprayed to prevent the spread of radiation from contaminated areas.

Then, radioactive apple cores and banana peels were found in the landfill among 35 tons of Hanford trash sent there since Sept. 21. However, the most radioactive item at the landfill had low-level contamination, giving off 2.5 millirads an hour. A chest X-ray gives a dose of 10 to 12 millirads.

Still, city officials closed the dump to Hanford garbage until the contamination problems were investigated further.

But until the issue is resolved, it's costing 10 to 50 times as much to bury the waste at Hanford as in a regular landfill, Mecca said.

That's because normal office trash has to be handled and buried like it's low-level radioactive waste. Hanford produces five to six tons of trash a day.

The agreement with Basin Disposal has DOE paying $33 to $35 a ton to take the wastes to a Pasco transfer station and then to a regional landfill in Roosevelt. The fee at Richland's landfill is $43.29 a ton.

The current situation shows that "good business practices" call for having two trash hauling systems at Hanford, said Jim Mecca, DOE's deputy assistant manager for facilities transition. Mecca said Basin Disposal's exact long-term role will be re-evaluated after talks are done with Richland. DynCorp Tri-Cities Services is the subcontractor in charge of Hanford's utilities.

Leonard Dietrich, owner of Basin Disposals, said DOE needs to look at its past practice of hauling trash to Richland's landfill. The Roosevelt facility has extra safeguards, including an underground protective barrier of two plastic liners with a layer of impermeable clay between them - protections that are absent in Richland.

Any leaks leading to environmental cleanup could leave DOE as a potentially liable party, Dietrich said.

Still, Wright said Richland's unlined landfill complies with all the appropriate laws because it is in an arid area with less than 12 inches of annual rainfall.

Meanwhile, Fluor is setting up a system of dividing its trash into four categories to be checked for different levels of contamination. For example, trash from office buildings would be in the least risky category. Trash from the Plutonium Finishing Plant would be in the category of highest risk of being tainted.

The new system includes spreading out random loads of trash in a metal building and checking for contamination, said Bob Shoup, Fluor's vice president for environmental safety and health.