Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory

A $100-million-plus project to dramatically increase the computing power available for the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory’s simulated nuclear weapons tests has cleared its final environmental hurdle, the Department of Energy said Tuesday. In a regulatory document called a supplement analysis, the agency’s National Nuclear Security Administration said “no further NEPA [National Environmental Protection Act] documentation is required” […]

A $100-million-plus project to dramatically increase the computing power available for the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory’s simulated nuclear weapons tests has cleared its final environmental hurdle, the Department of Energy said Tuesday. In a regulatory document called a supplement analysis, the agency’s National Nuclear Security Administration said “no further NEPA [National Environmental Protection Act] documentation […]

The prime contractor for the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California did not properly document more than $1 million worth of work it did in 2015 under a number of interagency agreements, the Department of Energy’s inspector general reported just before the new year. The roughly $1.26 million in costs the Inspector General’s Office tagged were […]

Peggy McCullough, who Bechtel announced Friday would be leaving her post as project director at the Waste Treatment and Immobilization Plant at the Hanford Site in Washington state, will be replacing John Howanitz as head of the company’s Nuclear Security, and Operations business based in Virginia. Bechtel said Friday that Brian Reilly, who like McCullough […]

BWX Technologies said Thursday that it has selected Kenneth Camplin as the new president of the company’s Nuclear Services Group, a role Camplin has filled on an acting basis since last December. Camplin, previously chief business development officer for BWXT, assumed the helm of the Nuclear Service Group after Bill Fox left BWXT to pursue […]

The National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) wants to perform larger explosive tests to support nuclear arms-maintenance and counterrorism research at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, according to a Nov. 3 regulatory filing. The 65-year-old nuclear weapons research facility in Livermore, Calif., wants to increase the size of the non-nuclear explosive tests it is allowed to […]

The National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) wants to perform larger explosive tests to support nuclear arms-maintenance and counterrorism research at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, according to a Nov. 3 regulatory filing. The 65-year-old nuclear weapons research facility in Livermore, Calif., wants to increase the size of the non-nuclear explosive tests it is allowed to […]

General Atomics appeared a lock to once again win a contract, potentially worth more than $125 million over five years, to help the Energy Department’s National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) simulate conditions of a nuclear explosion. The San Diego-based company is the incumbent on the work under a nearly $150-million cost-plus-fixed-fee contract awarded in 2012 […]

General Atomics appeared a lock to once again win a contract, potentially worth more than $125 million over five years, to help the Energy Department’s National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) simulate conditions of a nuclear explosion. The San Diego-based company is the incumbent on the work under a nearly $150-million cost-plus-fixed-fee contract awarded in 2012 […]

There was another criticality safety scare at the Los Alamos National Laboratory over the summer, the federal government’s independent defense-nuclear watchdog disclosed in a recent report. On Aug. 18, personnel at the Los Alamos National Laboratory’s (LANL) Plutonium Facility moved a shell into an area that already contained plutonium, according to a report uploaded to the […]

Ellen Tauscher will replace Norman Pattiz as the chair of the University of California Board of Regents’ national laboratories subcommittee, the board said Thursday. Tauscher is a former California congresswoman who later served as undersecretary of state for arms control and international security affairs during the Obama administration. Pattiz is the founder of radio giant […]

The National Academies will, over the next year, evaluate technology development activities within the Energy Department’s Office of Environmental Management (EM). The study, led by the Nuclear and Radiation Studies Board of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, is being conducted at the request of DOE EM. It has two primary purposes: reviewing […]

Kim Davis Lebak, manager of the National Nuclear Security Administration’s Los Alamos Field Office, will retire after nearly 30 years at the Energy Department. Davis, who has managed the Los Alamos Field Office for the past three years or so, will leave the agency in “early October,” a spokesperson for the semiautonomous Department of Energy agency said Monday. […]

Ellen Tauscher will replace Norman Pattiz as the chair of the University of California Board of Regents’ national laboratories subcommittee, the board said Thursday. Tauscher is a former California congresswoman. Pattiz is the founder of radio giant Westwood One. California Gov. Jerry Brown (D) appointed Tauscher to the board in June. Pattiz was originally appointed […]

Amid fiery and furious fact-checking and blame-chucking in the general press over the credit President Donald Trump appeared to take for modernizing the U.S. nuclear deterrent, the National Nuclear Security Administration recently observed the 22nd anniversary of the White House prohibition on explosive nuclear-weapons testing. The steward of the national nuclear deterrent marked the milestone in […]

Stephen Kadenacy on June 30 formally ended his nearly two-year tenure as president and chief operating officer of global engineering firm AECOM, one of the major contractors at Department of Energy nuclear sites around the country. Kadenacy has been with AECOM for nearly a decade, starting as senior vice president for finance in 2008 and […]

The National Nuclear Security Administration on Tuesday issued a presolicitation notice for the next management and operations contract for its Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico. The notice comes just days after the semiautonomous Department of Energy agency said it is investigating the improper shipment of nuclear material from the laboratory to sister sites […]

New Mexico Democratic Sens. Martin Heinrich and Tom Udall on Tuesday introduced a resolution that calls on the secretary of the Navy to name the next nuclear submarine the “USS Los Alamos” in honor of the Los Alamos National Laboratory’s contributions to the service. The senators’ press release noted that 2018 will be the 75th anniversary […]

The Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory is soliciting statements of interest from parties that would like to join the facility in a potential bid to support the development of a radiological/nuclear detonation response plan for the state of California, according to a notice posted last week. The notice said the California Emergency Management Agency released a request […]

The Department of Energy’s Los Alamos and Lawrence Livermore national laboratories on Wednesday were named to Reuters Top 25 Global Innovators list, a ranking of “publicly funded institutions doing the most to advance science and technology,” according to the global news organization. Los Alamos, in New Mexico, landed at No. 24, while California-based Livermore rounded […]

The National Nuclear Security Administration’s cybersecurity program is stable, improving, and has not faced any major incidents in recent years, the agency’s chief information officer told NS&D Monitor this week. The cyber program is “very strong,” both at the agency’s headquarters in Washington, D.C., and at each of its sites around the country, Wayne Jones, […]

The Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California recently broke ground on a $9.4 million, 13,000-square-foot facility that will support the National Nuclear Security Administration’s nuclear stockpile maintenance operations. The Advanced Manufacturing Facility is due to be finished by this summer, according to an NNSA press release. It will house two laboratories, each 5,000-square-feet in size: […]

Sandia Corp. has received the highest marks among the National Nuclear Security Administration’s (NNSA) nuclear weapons labs in the agency’s newly released fiscal 2016 performance evaluations. Each national laboratory contractor was rated in six performance areas, each carrying a different weight, which were used to determine the award fees the contractor would receive for the […]

The National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) in December hosted a preproposal conference for interested bidders for the protective force services contract at the Nevada National Security Site. Contract incumbent Centerra Group was among several companies that sent representatives to the meeting at the NNSA’s Nevada Field Office and site visit on Dec. 12 and 13. The others participants were ADC, […]

The Department of Energy (DOE) might not have enough heavy water to meet its long-term nuclear weapons and non-weapons activity needs, according to a newly released audit report from the DOE Inspector General’s Office. Heavy water for the National Nuclear Security Administration’s (NNSA) weapons activities is stored primarily at the Y-12 National Security Complex in Tennessee […]

National Security Technologies (NSTec) and Honeywell Federal Manufacturing & Technology (FM&T) have received the highest marks across the nuclear complex in newly released National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) contractor performance evaluations for fiscal 2016. Each contractor was rated in six performance areas, each carrying a different weight, which were used to determine the award fees […]

The Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) in California should enhance its communications and information management processes to enhance emergency management, the Department of Energy’s Office of Enterprise Assessments (EA) found in a newly released report. EA assessed the lab’s program with test scenarios for personnel of LLNL managing contractor Lawrence Livermore National Security (LLNS). One […]

A onetime scientist at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California was sentenced Tuesday to 18 months in prison for submitting false data and reports to the U.S. government to defraud it out of quantum computing research funding, the Justice Department said this week. S. Darin Kinion, 44, was sentenced in U.S. District Court for […]

A onetime scientist at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California was sentenced Tuesday to 18 months in prison for submitting false data and reports to the U.S. government to defraud it out of quantum computing research funding, the Justice Department said this week. S. Darin Kinion, 44, was sentenced in U.S. District Court for […]

A senior National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) official said Monday that fostering nuclear security relationships between U.S. and Russian technical experts, as was done in the 1990s, would play a significant role in restoring otherwise chilly relations between the two countries. “There is a quality to science-to-science relationships that transcends a lot of the political […]