Flour Fernald, the contractor cleaning the former Fernald uranium production plant site, said it had completed its contract with the Department of Energy as of Sunday.
Once a final punch list of tasks is concluded before the new year, the $4.4 billion cleanup will have ended and the 1,050-acre site will be ready for new life as a public nature preserve, Flour spokesman Jeff Wagner said Monday.
It will remain under DOE management.
The Fernald Preserve in Hamilton County northwest of Cincinnati could be unveiled by summer and will be open to birders and wildlife observers, students who want to learn about the history of the nation's atomic bomb industry, and those who simply want to enjoy a natural landscape, Wagner said. A visitors center will house history exhibits and a community meeting room.
With soil cleanup that included excavating and shipping 1 million tons of waste from six waste pits and the dismantling of 325 buildings, the site now consists of 400 acres of woodlots, 327 acres of prairie, 33 acres of savannah and 140 acres of open water and wetlands. There won't be any sports fields or all terrain vehicle traffic allowed at the site, Wagner said. "It would be a destination for students or folks working on master's degrees to learn about what Fernald did during the Cold War," he said.
Pumping operations to clean uranium contamination from the Great Miami Aquifer will continue at least 10 years until drinking water standards are met, Wagner said.
Lisa Crawford, 50, president of watchdog group FRESH for the past 22 years, lives within a mile of the site. She said she felt "excited, emotional, but great" about the cleanup's imminent closure. "It's just huge."
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