Underground WIPP lab will formally open

By Kyle Marksteiner
Current-Argus Staff Writer

Article Launched: 10/14/2008 09:49:10 PM MDT

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CARLSBAD — The Waste Isolation Pilot Plant’s efforts toward solving the secrets of the universe will be acknowledged next week.
The WIPP site’s Enriched Xenon Observatory Project will hold a ribbon cutting Wednesday at the WIPP underground. Sen. Pete Domenici, R-N.M., will be the VIP guest at the invite-only kickoff. Domenici will also appear in Carlsbad this week at a CARC Inc. event.
The project, a particle physics collaboration led by Stanford University, has developed what’s called an EXO-200 detector. The device is being set up within WIPP’s underground because of the low background radiation levels at the underground nuclear waste repository. Those invited to next week’s event will get a chance to see the equipment up close.
The detector, according to information provided by the Department of Energy, will be used by scientists to try to unlock secrets about the origins of matter and anti-matter by measuring the mass of a subatomic particle, the neutrino. The machine is working, but is not yet being used to collect official data.

“It’s built,” said Roger Nelson, chief scientist for the Department of Energy’s Carlsbad Field office. “Right now they are basically fine tuning the instrument. It’s a very complex piece of equipment.”
Nelson said a team of scientists from Stanford, the University of Alabama, the University of Colorado and other institutions visit the lab daily to work on the project.
The labs are in the north part of the mine; nuclear waste is stored in the south part of the mine.
“It’s where we did original experiments to determine the properties of salt,” Nelson said. “We had some rooms left over. We just opened them up.”
Nelson said one reason for next week’s ribbon cutting is to thank Domenici for his efforts in obtaining earmarks to fund the project. Domenici leaves office at the end of this year.
“He recognized that WIPP is an ideal location for this experiment,” Nelson said.
Such an experiment would have to be conducted underground, Nelson said, but only in certain places.
“If you tried to do this in a mine, you couldn’t do it,” he said.
Nelson estimated that the experiment will begin in January.
“They are going to look and listen for at least five years,” he said.

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