Oregon Public Broadcasting

A power outage is expected to keep 1400 workers off the job for the next few days at Hanford's massive vitrification plant.

The “Vit Plant” as it's called -- is the federal government's largest capital project in the nation.

The plant is designed to turn radioactive liquid sludge into more stable glass logs for long-term storage.

Suzanne Heaston is the spokeswoman for the construction company in charge of building the plant. She says power outages won't be a problem once the plant is online.

Suzanne Heaston: “The vit plant will have diesel backup generators for all important to safety processes and mechanisms out there. We don't have that for the construction site because basically everything out there is for construction.”

Heaston says the lost days shouldn't push the project's timeline back any further. It's already 12 years behind schedule.

The cause of the outage is still unknown.