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Government scientists have not been able to replicate a chemical reaction suspected of causing a radiation leak at a U.S. nuclear waste dump in New Mexico, complicating efforts to understand what went wrong, a U.S. Energy Department official said Friday. The Waste Isolation Pilot Plant, where drums of radioactive refuse from nuclear weapons sites and laboratories are buried in salt caverns 2,100 feet (640 meters) underground, has been shut down since Feb. 14 when at least one drum ruptured. The facility is the nation’s only underground repository for so-called transuranic waste. Investigators have said a chemical reaction between nitrate salts and organic kitty litter used as an absorbent generated sufficient heat to melt seals on at least one drum of contaminated sludge, which had originally come from the Los Alamos National Laboratory near Santa Fe.
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