"Dandy location for a bunch of nuclear power plants, eh?"
Not to mention Hanford
When I lived in Kansas, there was a brief attempt to use salt mines near Hutchinson to relieve the pressure on Hanford. But salt in mines is a fluid! A slow fluid, but we need 30-40,000 year stability.
   Then they decided Yucca Mt. in Nevada(read about THA!) was a better choice. Short story...Yucca Mt. is defunded.

The nuclear waste? Let's just leave it at Hanford, near that Cascadia subduction fault....and let's build MORE nuclear plants.