A huge piece of Hanford history took a slow ride Friday to Hanford's landfill for low-level radioactive and chemical waste.

From 1963 to 1987, the 160-ton Loewy extrusion press made fuel for Hanford's N Reactor. The fuel it produced could withstand the higher temperatures needed to economically produce steam for electricity atN Reactor's adjacent steam plant and to make plutonium for the nation's nuclear weapons program.

"It's a very historic piece of equipment," said Michele Gerber, a Richland historian. "It was the press that made all of the N Reactor fuel."

It will be the heaviest object to be disposed of so far in the Environmental Restoration Disposal Facility in central Hanford. To haul it the 24 miles from the Hanford 300 Area just north of Richland to the landfill required an oversize trailer with eight axles and 64 tires. It's the same type of trailer used to transport decommissioned nu-clear submarine reactor vessels across Hanford.

The press was housed in the 333 Building torn down earlier by Washington Closure Hanford, which is cleaning up the Columbia River corridor of the Hanford nuclear reservation. Just the press was left, bolted onto a base inside a pit, said Donna Yasek, Washington Closure 300 Area project engineer for demolition and related work.

Kaiser Aluminum of Richland wanted to purchase the press, but the Department of Energy was concerned about contamination after decades of use. That included radioactive contamination from uranium fuel and potential contamination with the metal beryllium, which can cause an incurable lung disease and was detected in the 333 Building.

The fuel produced by the extrusion press was more sophisticated than that used by eight reactors built earlier at Hanford to produce plutonium.

The N Reactor used tube-in-tube fuel rods created by joining zirconium alloy cladding and a uranium billet interior into a superior bond by pushing them through the extrusion press, according to information compiled by Gerber.

The zirconium lasted longer than the aluminum cladding used in fuel at other Hanford reactors.

The assembled fuel billets were loaded into the extrusion press, which could press them through a mold with up to 2,750 tons of force.

The original disposal plan for the press called for cutting it into pieces, but Washington Closure decided to transport it in one piece in the interest of worker safety, said Mike Swartz, project manager for Washington Closure 300 Area demolition and related work.

To prepare the press for the landfill, workers cut the bolts holding it in place, decontaminated its surface with water, then surveyed it for radiation contamination. They also laid down a layer of gravel to prevent cranes from coming into contact with radioactive contamination embedded in the concrete pad of the 333 Building.

Two Lampson International cranes with a combined lifting capacity of 450 tons slowly hoisted the crane off its base earlier this week, then settled it onto a Lampson trailer lined with plastic.

The next step was to "burrito it," or wrap it, and seal it in plastic for its trip on the public highway out to Hanford and its disposal at the landfill, said Megan Proctor, the Washington Closure environmental project leader for demolition and related work.

It was a routine pick-up for Lampson because Hanford ironworkers trained for radiological and chemical hazards did the hands-on work, said Mike Douglas, a Washington Closure engineer.

Washington Closure earlier removed a press about half the size from the 306 Building. And a larger press, which was set up in Building 313 in the early 1980s, is being used by Kaiser Aluminum. That press was intended to serve as a backup for the press producing N Reactor fuel, but was used only to extrude nonradioactive materials before N Reactor was shut down.

The removal of the press meets a legally binding Tri-Party Agreement requirement that a group of three key buildings in the 300 Area be reduced to slab on grade and the rubble loaded out by June 30. The milestone had been extended to allow some additional time to remove the press.