Office of Environmental Management (EM)

Centrus Energy, Bethesda, Md., on Wednesday posted net income of about $41.5 million, or $2.95 a share for the 2021 third quarter, up from a loss of $7 million or 83 cents a share, in the year-ago period.  Quarterly revenue was about $91 million, up from more than $57.5 million a year ago, mostly due […]

A United Steelworkers local president at the Department of Energy’s Portsmouth Site in Ohio expects about 100 of his members employed by cleanup contractor Fluor-BWXT Portsmouth will be sent home in the coming week, with firings coming a few weeks afterward, for refusal to be vaccinated against COVID-19. The workers who for various reasons don’t […]

Before it even started, the Department of Energy this week cancelled a competition for a Savannah River Site management and operations contract worth billions, citing an increase of National Nuclear Security Administration nuclear weapons work at the site. “The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) is indefinitely delaying the Final Request for Proposal (RFP) for the […]

Ninety people suing the contractor over a COVID-19 vaccine mandate lack valid legal arguments or safety concerns and “simply do not want to do what is being asked,” the manager of the Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site in South Carolina said in a legal filing this week. That is the thrust of Fluor-led Savannah […]

The Department of Energy’s nuclear-weapons remediation contractor at the Los Alamos National Lab will resume normal operations at the lab’s Area G next week, DOE’s local cleanup fed told a citizens advisory board this week. “We are resuming normal operations, processing operations at Area G next week,” Michael Mikolanis, manager of the DOE Environmental Management […]

Under current projections, the Department of Energy could process nearly all of the salt waste inventory from 43 high-level radioactive waste tanks at the Savannah River Site by 2033, the top official for the agency’s Office of Environmental Management there said recently. The 2033 date cited by Michael Budney, manager of the Savannah River Operations […]

The Santa Fe-based Southwest Research and Information Center, a frequent critic of the Department of Energy’s operation of the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant, has appealed an Oct. 27 ruling by the New Mexico Environment Department authorizing completion of a new underground utility shaft at the transuranic waste disposal facility. Southwest Research Information Center (SRIC) attorney […]

As soon as next week, the Department of Energy’s Office of Environmental Management should issue a draft solicitation for a Decontamination and Decommissioning Contract at the Portsmouth Site in Ohio, the agency said recently. The draft request for proposals (RFP) should show up sometime between Nov. 17 and Dec. 17, the agency’s nuclear-weapons cleanup office […]

The volume of low-level radioactive waste shipped to the Nevada National Security Site from Department of Energy cleanup sites is picking up again after dipping to half of its normal level of more than 1 million cubic feet per year during the pandemic, an agency official at the site told the Nevada Site Specific Advisory […]

More than 90% of the workers for both the Department of Energy environmental management field office and the legacy cleanup contractor at the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico, are now vaccinated against COVID-19, a federal official told a DOE advisory committee Wednesday. In addition, cleanup of radioactive contamination on a stretch of a […]

As soon as next week, the Department of Energy’s Office of Environmental Management should issue a draft solicitation for a Decontamination and Decommissioning Contract at the Portsmouth Site in Ohio, the agency said recently. The draft request for proposals (RFP) should show up sometime between Nov. 17 and Dec. 17, the agency’s nuclear-weapons cleanup office […]

The Department of Energy does not expect a delay to a crucial cesium-removal demonstration at the Hanford Site’s tank farms, despite the discovery last month that parts of the system might be prone to leaks, an agency spokesperson said Tuesday. The “leak-tightness” issue, as the Defense Nuclear Facility Safety Board (DNFSB) called it in a […]

The Santa Fe-based Southwest Research and Information Center, a frequent critic of the Department of Energy’s operation of the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant, has appealed an Oct. 27 ruling by the New Mexico Environment Department authorizing completion of a new underground utility shaft at the transuranic waste disposal facility. Southwest Research Information Center (SRIC) attorney […]

Before it even started, the Department of Energy on Tuesday cancelled a competition for a Savannah River Site management and operations contract worth billions, citing an increase of National Nuclear Security Administration nuclear weapons work at the site. “The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) is indefinitely delaying the Final Request for Proposal (RFP) for the […]

Under current projections, the Department of Energy could process nearly all of the salt waste inventory from 43 high-level radioactive waste tanks at the Savannah River Site by 2033, the top official for the agency’s Office of Environmental Management there said recently. The 2033 date cited by Michael Budney, manager of the Savannah River Operations […]

More COVID-19 vaccine refusers have joined a lawsuit against Savannah River Nuclear Solutions, the management and operations contractor at the Savannah River Site, and have amended their lawsuit to list fear of death from vaccines as a reason a federal judge should block the contractor’s vaccine mandate. The amended complaint filed this week fine-tuned the […]

SUMMERLIN, NEV. The Department of Energy expects the integrated Waste Treatment Unit to take up to seven years to treat roughly 850,000 gallons of highly radioactive sodium-bearing liquid tank waste at the Idaho National Laboratory, an agency official said Friday. Following the heatup that started Oct. 24, DOE and Fluor Idaho is about to commence […]

The Government Accountability Office says in a recent report the Department of Energy should better evaluate and prioritize research and development needs across the weapons complex, rather than relying so much on individual field offices and national labs. The Government Accountability Office (GAO) also said in the report released Thursday that DOE’s assistant secretary for […]

A federal district judge in Tennessee has refused to issue a preliminary injunction against the Department of Energy’s management contractor for the Oak Ridge National Laboratory in a case brought by a small group of plaintiffs refusing to comply with a vaccine mandate. While contractor UT-Battelle’s treatment of employees seeking vaccine exemptions could have been […]

Although a federal judge in Tennessee turned down a preliminary injunction for vaccine holdouts at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory, and contractor UT-Battelle has asked that the lawsuit be tossed, a federal magistrate could take over the case. On Tuesday, District Judge Charles Atchley, Jr. said he wants a federal magistrate judge […]

Between now and 2025, the Department of Energy envisions having a single operations office at the Hanford Site in Washington state rather than the current two, according to a procurement-related document. Although they have separate budgets approved by Congress, the Richland Operations Office and the Office of River Protection have reported to the same boss, […]

Talks between Washington state and the Department of Energy over the future of Hanford Site cleanup continued this fall at a very granular level, according to the latest court-mandated status update about these so-called “holistic” negotiations.. “Since filing the last update on July 30, 2021, the Parties have continued to participate in mediation sessions, including […]

Members of United Steelworkers Local Union 1-689, working in deactivation and demolition at the Department of Energy’s former gaseous diffusion plant complex in Ohio,this week  approved a two-year contract extension Monday with Fluor-BWXT Portsmouth. The local union’s president, Herman Potter, declined to provide a vote count. Turnout was light but those who did vote went […]

There were 99 confirmed active cases of COVID-19 in the Department of Energy nuclear cleanup complex during the past week, a spokesperson with the office of Environmental Management said via Thursday email.  That is 16 less than the prior week. It is also much less than late September when the Environmental Management (EM) weekly case […]

SUMMERLIN, NEV. — The Department of Energy should have a new 10-year authorization to continue operating the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico in place before 2024, the manager of the agency’s Carlsbad Field Office said Wednesday. The Waste Isolation Pilot Plant’s (WIPP) current 10-year state license expired months ago and DOE will operate […]

SUMMERLIN, NEV. Like other branches of the federal government, the Department of Energy’s Office of Environmental Management has a graying workforce and a pressing need to attract new blood in the coming years, speakers said here Thursday at the Radwaste Summit. The crowd at the summit “looks fabulous, I must say, but none of us […]

Though it has posted a loss for the year so far overall, Fluor, Irving, Texas, ratcheted up its earnings guidance for continuing operations in 2021 after boosting the bottom line and booking a big contract extension from DOE, the company reported this week. Also, in an earnings presentation Friday, Fluor — whose team at the […]

SUMMERLIN, NEV. The Department of Energy expects to fill most of its vacancies at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant near Carlsbad, N.M., by May 2022, representatives of the Government Accountability Office, said here Thursday. The Government Accountability Office (GAO) reported last November the DOE Carlsbad Field Office that oversees the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) […]

Dozens of Savannah River Nuclear Solutions employees suing the Department of Energy contractor over a vaccine mandate got a two-week extension, to Nov. 17, to revise their complaint and respond to the company’s motion to dismiss the suit. The plaintiffs’ response to the motion to dismiss by Savannah River Nuclear Solutions (SRNS), the Fluor-led operations […]

SUMMERLIN, NEV. — The Department of Energy should have a new 10-year authorization to continue operating the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico in place before 2024, the manager of the agency’s Carlsbad Field Office said Wednesday. The Waste Isolation Pilot Plant’s (WIPP) current 10-year state license expired months ago and DOE will operate […]