Office of Environmental Management (EM)

Utah-based EnergySolutions and Texas-based Waste Control Specialists (WCS) have been awarded Energy Department contracts to dispose of low-level radioactive waste (LLW) and mixed-low level radioactive waste. The contracts are indefinite delivery/indefinite quantity (ID/IQ) agreements, DOE said in a press release. It did not provide dollar values for the contracts. The two vendors will compete for […]

No injuries or environmental contamination apparently resulted after a drum of radioactive waste overheated and breached Wednesday at the Department of Energy’s Idaho Site, cleanup contractor Fluor Idaho said. The accident occurred Wednesday evening at the Radioactive Waste Management Complex (RWMC) Accelerated Retrieval Project (ARP 5) containment structure before 11 p.m. MDT Thursday, Fluor said in […]

The Department of Energy and its regulators at the Hanford Site will hold their annual meeting on budget priorities on April 23. Representatives from both DOE Hanford offices – the Richland Operations Office and the Office of River Protection — will provide an overview of cleanup work completed and work to be done. The meeting […]

The annual Bridging Partnerships Small Business Symposium, offering tips for small businesses interested in work at the Hanford Site, is set for April 18-19 at the Three Rivers Convention Center in Kennewick, Wash. Cost to attend the symposium, presented by the Department of Energy and its Hanford prime contractors, is $100. The first day will […]

The Energy Department’s Office of Environmental Management (EM) has a busy procurement schedule for bid proposals and contract awards into 2019. The most recent Environmental Management Consolidated Business Center timeline for requests for proposals and contract awards was presented last month at the Waste Management Symposia by Norbert Doyle, EM’s acting deputy assistant secretary for […]

A radioactive mouse was discovered and later killed about seven weeks ago at one of the Savannah River Site radioactive waste storage tank farms, according to an occurrence report submitted to the Department of Energy. The quarterly report was submitted by Savannah River Remediation (SRR), liquid waste contractor for the DOE facility in South Carolina. […]

Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.) on Wednesday pressed Energy Secretary Rick Perry to ensure that a focus on particular projects at the Hanford Site does not come at the expense of others. Perry and other Energy Department officials appeared before the Senate Appropriations energy and water subcommittee to discuss the agency’s $30.6 billion budget request for fiscal […]

The prime cleanup contractor for the Energy Department’s Oak Ridge Reservation in Tennessee said Tuesday it self-reported the unauthorized work done by two employees at a retired experimental reactor in February 2017, which led to a $120,000 penalty. URS-CH2M Oak Ridge (UCOR) is also taking corrective actions not just at the Molten Salt Reactor Experiment […]

The parties in the federal trial over vapors at the Hanford Site have requested another extension to the case, after failing to reach a settlement agreement before a deadline Monday for the plaintiffs to identify their expert witnesses. A joint motion requesting that Judge Thomas Rice delay the trial for a 10th time was filed […]

Procurement officials at the U.S. Energy Department’s Office of Environmental Management are trying to reduce the typical two-year process for awarding major contracts to one year. Tamara Miles, federal procurement director for the DOE Environmental Management Consolidated Business Center, discussed efforts to expedite contract awards during a panel session last month at the Waste Management […]

The prime contractor for the Energy Department’s Oak Ridge Office of Environmental Management (OREM) in Tennessee has been fined $120,000 for not getting proper approval before carrying out certain work at the long-retired molten site reactor experiment (MSRE) during 2017. The Office of Enforcement within DOE’s Office of Enterprise Assessments outlined the penalty in a […]

The Energy Department’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) near Carlsbad, N.M., anticipates receiving about 300 shipments during the 12 months from February 2018 and February 2019. That’s according to slides shared by Carlsbad Field Office Manager Todd Shrader at the Waste Management Symposium last month in Phoenix, Ariz. During this period, DOE and WIPP management […]

The parties in the federal trial over Hanford vapors have requested an extension yet again, after failing to reach a settlement agreement before a deadline Monday for the plaintiffs to identify their expert witnesses. A joint motion requesting that Judge Thomas Rice delay the trial for a 10th time was filed Friday in U.S. District […]

With an industry pre-proposal site tour set for Tuesday, the Outfall 200 Mercury Treatment Facility contract solicitation In Oak Ridge, Tenn., is already drawing a lot of questions from prospective bidders. Fourteen questions and answers were posted on the solicitation website April 6. They cover everything from conflict of interest, to weight limits for dump […]

The management and operations contractor for the Energy Department’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant  (WIPP) near Carlsbad, N.M., is reviewing bid proposals from companies hoping to build a new permanent underground ventilation system for deep-underground disposal site. Bid proposals were received March 21 and are now under review, Nuclear Waste Partnership (NWP) spokesperson Donavan Mager said […]

The House Energy and Commerce energy subcommittee will hold a hearing on the Department of Energy’s fiscal-year 2019 budget request on Thursday. The subcommittee is a Department of Energy (DOE) policy overseer and does not write the agency’s annual budget bills. The hearing is scheduled for 10 a.m. Eastern time and will be webcast from […]

The Energy Department’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant near Carlsbad, N.M., received 64 shipments of transuranic waste from Jan. 1 through March 21, 2018, according to the latest publicly available data. Of the shipments received by March 21, 48 came from the Idaho National Laboratory. The remaining 16 were split evenly between the Oak Ridge National […]

Interim storage of transuranic waste at the Separations Process Research Unit (SPRU) cleanup project in upstate New York will not be affected by a cost dispute between the U.S. Energy Department and its contractor, AECOM subsidiary URS. “Transuranic waste treatment, packaging, certification is the responsibility of DOE and is not part of the contract cost […]

Newport News Nuclear BWXT-Los Alamos (N3B) is on schedule at the end of April to take over as the new legacy cleanup contractor for the Energy Department’s Los Alamos Nuclear Laboratory in New Mexico. “We are ready to get started,” Nick Lombardo, president and project manager for the joint venture between Stoller Newport News Nuclear […]

The Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico is taking steps to address a recent series of errors in waste handling that earned it a state penalty, and to keep them from recurring, a spokesman said Wednesday. Among other measures, LANL voluntarily suspended all waste shipments from Dec. 18 through Feb. 28, while it investigated […]

The U.S. Energy Department will provide the University of Arkansas with $10 million to complete the environmental remediation of the Southwest Experimental Fast Oxide Reactor (SEFOR). Two members of the state’s congressional delegation, Sen. John Boozman (R) and Rep. Steve Womack (R), announced the funding this week. The money is included in the fiscal 2018 […]

The newly signed $1.3 trillion federal government omnibus spending bill for fiscal 2018 provides a boost for environmental remediation of the Department of Energy’s nuclear facilities at Oak Ridge, Tenn. About $639 million will go toward cleaning up Oak Ridge’s Manhattan Project and Cold War sites—$141 million over 2017’s enacted levels and $125 million more […]

In her first official visit to an Energy Department cleanup site since being sworn in last week, Assistant Secretary of Energy for Environmental Management Anne Marie White toured the Paducah Site in Kentucky on Thursday. She was part of a delegation including Energy Secretary Rick Perry and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.). After touring […]

Phil Breidenbach, former president and project manager for the contractor that manages the Energy Department’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico, has been named chief engineer for the current liquid waste manager at DOE’s Savannah River Site in South Carolina. Breidenbach is a vice president at AECOM, lead partner at Savannah River Remediation, along […]

Phil Breidenbach, former president and project manager for the contractor that manages the Energy Department’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico, has been named chief engineer for the current liquid waste manager at DOE’s Savannah River Site in South Carolina. Breidenbach is a vice president at AECOM, lead partner at Savannah River Remediation, along […]

The Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico is taking steps to address a recent series of errors in waste handling and keep them from recurring, a spokesman said Wednesday. Among other things, LANL voluntarily suspended all waste shipments from Dec. 18 through Feb. 28, while it investigated how it had mislabeled a container of […]

The former head of an advocacy group for communities around the Energy Department’s Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico said Tuesday she has repaid $800 in questioned expenses in an effort to resolve a public dispute that marred the end of her tenure. The contract between Andrea Romero Consulting and the Regional Coalition of […]

Newport News Nuclear BWXT-Los Alamos (N3B) is on schedule at the end of April to take over as the new legacy cleanup contractor for the Energy Department’s Los Alamos Nuclear Laboratory in New Mexico. “We are ready to get started,” Nick Lombardo, president and project manager for the joint venture between Stoller Newport News Nuclear […]

Interim storage of transuranic waste at the Separations Process Research Unit (SPRU) cleanup project in upstate New York will not be affected by a cost dispute between the U.S. Energy Department and its contractor, AECOM subsidiary URS. “Transuranic waste treatment, packaging, certification is the responsibility of DOE and is not part of the contract cost […]

The newly signed $1.3 trillion government omnibus spending bill for fiscal 2018 provides a boost for environmental remediation of the Department of Energy’s nuclear facilities at Oak Ridge, Tenn. About $639 million will go toward cleaning up Oak Ridge’s Manhattan Project and Cold War sites—$141 million over 2017’s enacted levels and $125 more than the […]