Office of Environmental Management (EM)

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Timothy Walsh, President Donald Trump’s nominee to be assistant secretary of energy for environmental management, or EM-1, told the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee Wednesday his military and business background has prepared him to lead the world’s largest nuclear cleanup. An Army veteran and company commander in the 82nd Airborne Division […]

The Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board (DNFSB) has asked the Department of Energy for a briefing on plans to refurbish an old shaft and hoist relied upon for emergency evacuation of underground workers at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP). “Despite long-standing recognition of underlying problems, age-related degradation and technical obsolescence issues with the shafts […]

WASHINGTON, D.C. – Timothy Walsh, President Donald Trump’s nominee to be assistant secretary of energy for environmental management, or EM-1, told the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee Wednesday his military and business background has prepared him to lead the world’s largest nuclear cleanup. An Army veteran and company commander in the 82nd Airborne Division […]

The Bonneville Power Administration, a regional authority for the Department of Energy, and DOE’s Office of Environmental Management have flipped the switch on a major new 18-mile electric transmission line at the Hanford Site in Washington state. The new 230-kilovolt transmission line connects two substations at the nuclear cleanup site and replaces an 80-year-old line, […]

The Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board (DNFSB) has asked the Department of Energy for a briefing on plans to refurbish an old shaft and hoist relied upon for emergency evacuation of underground workers at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP). “Despite long-standing recognition of underlying problems, age-related degradation and technical obsolescence issues with the shafts […]

Three months after he was nominated to head the Department of Energy’s $8-billion nuclear cleanup office, Colorado developer Timothy Walsh will undergo a hearing this week before the Senate Energy & Natural Resources Committee. Walsh, nominated in March to head DOE’s Office of Environmental Management, is one of four people nominated to the Department of […]

The Department of Energy’s underground disposal site for defense-related transuranic waste is still well behind its shipment rate from before a major accident in 2014, but things are gradually rebounding, according to the Government Accountability Office. “According to DOE officials, WIPP [the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant near Carlsbad, N.M.] had been receiving as many as […]

The House Appropriations subcommittee on Energy and Water will mark up its fiscal 2026 budget bill, which would appropriate funds to the Department of Energy and National Nuclear Security Administration, on Monday July 7. The hearing is scheduled to start on Monday at 6 p.m. Eastern Time. Also, on Thursday, July 17, the full House […]

Sixteen single-wide office trailers in the 100-K area of the Department of Energy’s Hanford Site at Richland, Wash., have been torn down, DOE said Tuesday. Hundreds of engineers and other staff at the former plutonium production complex near the Columbia River have worked at the office trailer complex since 2000, DOE said in a Tuesday […]

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission held a public online meeting on June 26 to take comments on closure plans for the Calcined Solids Storage Facility at the Department of Energy’s Idaho National Laboratory. “Calcine is a solid, granular waste form produced through the calcination of liquid radioactive waste resulting, in part, from spent nuclear fuel (SNF) […]

Secretary of Energy Chris Wright this week announced Department of Energy plans to end what he calls “permitting paralysis” under the National Environmental Policy Act. Wright announced the changes, which are in line with a prior executive order by President Donald Trump, in a July 2 press release. DOE published an interim final rule rescinding […]

The Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site in South Carolina said June 17 it has removed waste from two more radioactive waste tanks at the 310-square-mile facility near the Georgia state line. Tanks 11 and 15 are the fourth and fifth waste tanks in 12 months to meet the “preliminary cease waste removal” designation, DOE’s […]

The Department of Energy’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) in New Mexico received 53 defense-related transuranic waste shipments in May, based on revised figures. DOE revised the figures on its public website for WIPP around June 27 after learning the website initially failed to update and record the 24 shipments that took place between May […]

The Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site in South Carolina said June 17 it has removed waste from two more radioactive waste tanks at the 310-square-mile facility near the Georgia state line. Tanks 11 and 15 are the fourth and fifth waste tanks in 12 months to meet the “preliminary cease waste removal” designation, DOE’s […]

The Department of Energy’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) in New Mexico received 53 defense-related transuranic waste shipments in May, based on revised figures. DOE revised the figures on its public website for WIPP around June 27 after learning the website initially failed to update and record the 24 shipments that took place between May […]

Paul Dabbar, a Department of Energy executive during the first Donald Trump administration, was confirmed by the U.S. Senate 56-to-40 Wednesday as Deputy Secretary of Commerce. Dabbar was undersecretary of energy for science during the first Trump administration. As part of that position during the first term, Dabbar had authority over the Office of Environmental […]

The Department of Energy’s nuclear cleanup branch has awarded a potential five-year $85-million technical services contract to a team led by South Carolina-based Catawba Engineering and Environmental Services. The consolidated Technical Support Services contract for DOE’s Office of Environmental Management has been won by Catawba TEAPEC, a small business venture made up of Catawba and […]

Nobody was hurt last month when a four-foot broken slab of concrete fell 1,400-feet down a utility shaft at the Department of Energy’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) near Carlsbad, N.M., according to a safety board report. Likewise, no equipment was damaged in the May 27 incident that happened while a subcontractor crew from Harrison […]

Half of the key assets the Department of Energy needs to dispose of defense-related transuranic waste in a New Mexico salt mine were in “substandard or inadequate condition in 2023,” the Government Accountability Office (GAO) said Tuesday. In a report to congressional committees, GAO said DOE’s Office of Environmental Management should do a better job […]

A BWX Technologies-led joint venture took over this week as the new remediation contractor at the West Valley Demonstration Project in Western New York. The four-month management transition started in February and ended Tuesday for West Valley Cleanup Alliance (WCVA), Jason Casper, the president and project manager of the alliance said during a Citizens Task […]

The Department of Energy’s former tank waste contractor at the Hanford Site in Washington state this week agreed to pay $6.5 million to the feds to settle a fraud case brought by a whistleblower. The Justice Department settlement with Amentum-led contractor Washington River Protection Solutions (WRPS) was announced Tuesday in a press release by Acting […]

Half of the key assets the Department of Energy needs to dispose of defense-related transuranic waste in a New Mexico salt mine were in “substandard or inadequate condition in 2023,” the Government Accountability Office (GAO) said Tuesday. In a report to congressional committees, GAO said DOE’s Office of Environmental Management should do a better job […]

The Department of Energy’s $8-billion nuclear cleanup office posted a new organizational chart earlier this month, reflecting that longtime fed Steve Trischman is now heading the office of corporate services. With the May 30 retirement of 32-year federal supervisor Dae Chung, Trischman  is now officially the acting associate principal deputy assistant secretary for the DOE […]

Nobody was hurt last month when a four-foot broken slab of concrete fell 1,400-feet down a utility shaft at the Department of Energy’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) near Carlsbad, N.M., according to a safety board report. Likewise, no equipment was damaged in the May 27 incident that happened while a subcontractor crew from Harrison […]

Centrus Energy, headquartered in Bethesda, Md., has been awarded an extended contract with the Department of Energy, worth about $110 million, to produce high-assay low-enriched uranium through June 30, 2026. In 2022, Centrus was awarded a three-phase follow-on contract to bring the cascade into production and produce HALEU for DOE’s use. DOE has exercised its […]

Pipe modifications in a tank farm at the Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site in South Carolina are winding down and should be complete in July, according to DOE.  The utility work at the 310-square-mile site near Aiken, S.C., comes  during a planned outage, which began on April 28 and is on track to finish […]

Amentum-led Southern Ohio Cleanup Co. has unveiled a website laying out its transition to become remediation contractor at the Department of Energy’s Portsmouth Site. DOE’s Office of Environmental Management awarded the contract, potentially worth about $5.9 billion over a decade, in June 2023. But it only greenlighted the start of transition this month following the […]

The Department of Energy’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) in New Mexico received 53 defense-related transuranic waste shipments in May, based on revised figures. DOE revised the figures on its public website for WIPP around June 27 after learning the website initially failed to update and record the 24 shipments that took place between May […]

Utah-based EnergySolutions has finished grouting and disposing of 1,000 gallons of liquid tank waste from the Department of Energy’s Hanford Site in Washington state. EnergySolutions said in a Wednesday news release it had completed solidification and disposal of 1,000 gallons of mixed low-level waste from Hanford as part of the much-anticipated Test Bed Initiative demonstration. […]

The Department of Energy’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) in New Mexico received 53 defense-related transuranic waste shipments in May, based on revised figures. DOE revised the figures on its public website for WIPP around June 27 after learning the website initially failed to update and record the 24 shipments that took place between May […]