Office of Environmental Management (EM)

Earnings rose at Amentum, Chantilly, Va., in the first quarter of fiscal 2025, which the company that recently combined with the government contracting wing of Jacobs attributed to strong core businesses linked with national security. In response to questions from Wall Street analysts during a Wednesday morning conference call, CEO John Heller said Amentum management […]

Crews at the Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site (SRS) in South Carolina are continuing a program started in 2016 to save storage space by double-stacking canisters of vitrified high-level waste. Employees started the latest double-stacking phase, inside Glass Waste Storage Building 2 in December 2024. Crews have already modified 150 positions there so far, […]

With the retirement of chair Joyce Connery on Friday, the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board (DNFSB) is down to two members and no longer has a quorum. The five-member panel with a mission to provide independent safety analysis and advice to the Department of Energy, now has only two members: Acting Chair Thomas Summers and […]

A bipartisan group of U.S. senators are reintroducing a bill to reauthorize and expand the Radiation Exposure Compensation (RECA) Act. A similar bill passed the Senate last session but never made it to a vote in the House of Representatives. On Thursday Jan. 23, Sen. Martin Heinrich (D-N.M.) announced he and Sen. Ben Ray Luján […]

The White House this week invited employees of the federal government, including those connected with nuclear energy, weapons and cleanup, to take something akin to a buyout, by submitting a “deferred resignation.” . In a memo dubbed “fork in the road” the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) said federal employees can submit deferred resignations by […]

Jeff Avery, the No. 2 officer at the Department of Energy’s Office of Environmental Management, is moving over to the National Nuclear Security Administration, according to a memo distributed Monday. An “EM Colleagues” memo Monday from Environmental Management office senior adviser Candice Robertson detailed Avery’s move. Robertson also announced Roger Jarrell is returning to the […]

ARLINGTON, VA – Dennis Carr, the president and CEO of the prime contractor for the Savannah River Site in South Carolina says he is not seeking to head the Department of Energy’s Office of Energy, although “if asked I would consider it.” “People keep coming up and asking me that,” Carr told Exchange Monitor Tuesday […]

ARLINGTON, VA — The Fluor-led prime contractor for the Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site in South Carolina is drawing up a “master campus plan” for the 310-square-mile site to present to the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA). The plan, required for NNSA sites, is a major undertaking, Savannah River Nuclear Solutions (SRNS) President and […]

A top manager at the Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site in South Carolina expects upcoming modifications to the Salt Waste Processing Facility (SWPF) should help the plant meet its elusive production goals.  When it started hot operations in October 2020, SWPF was expected to treat between four million and six million gallons of salt […]

The Senate overwhelmingly voted Thursday evening to confirm former North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum (R) to be secretary of interior, and also took a step closer to a confirmation vote on Secretary of Energy nominee Chris Wright.  Burgum, who would also lead President Donald Trump’s National Energy Council, easily won confirmation to head the Interior […]

A top manager at the Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site in South Carolina expects upcoming modifications to the Salt Waste Processing Facility (SWPF) should help the plant meet its elusive production goals.  When it started hot operations in October 2020, SWPF was expected to treat between four million and six million gallons of salt […]

ARLINGTON, VA — The Fluor-led prime contractor for the Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site in South Carolina is drawing up a “master campus plan” for the 310-square-mile site to present to the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA). The plan, required for NNSA sites, is a major undertaking, Savannah River Nuclear Solutions (SRNS) President and […]

ARLINGTON, VA – Dennis Carr, the president and CEO of the prime contractor for the Savannah River Site in South Carolina says he is not seeking to head the Department of Energy’s Office of Energy, although “if asked I would consider it.” “People keep coming up and asking me that,” Carr told Exchange Monitor Tuesday […]

Jeff Avery, the No. 2 officer at the Department of Energy’s Office of Environmental Management, is moving over to the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA), and a corporate official who worked at DOE during the first Donald Trump administration is being detailed to the nuclear cleanup branch in a senior adviser role, according to a […]

A bipartisan group of U.S. senators are reintroducing a bill to reauthorize and expand the Radiation Exposure Compensation (RECA) Act (RECA). A similar bill passed the Senate last session but never made it to a vote in the House of Representatives. On Thursday, Sen. Martin Heinrich (D-N.M.) announced he and Sen. Ben Ray Luján (D-N.M.) […]

Thom Mason, director of Los Alamos National Laboratory, said Tuesday that the lab cannot rely on wind and solar power for its capabilities or to power its supercomputers. “That was part of a pretty extensive analysis on how to get more power on site,” Mason said in response to a question about the Electric Power […]

The Department of Energy has posted the times and coordinates for a pair of February public scoping meetings on soil cleanup plans at the Energy Technology Engineering Center section of the Santa Susana Field Laboratory Site in Simi Valley, California. An online or virtual meeting regarding a supplemental Environmental Impact Statement on cleanup of contaminated […]

Joyce Connery, who is departing as a nuclear safety watchdog after nearly a decade, would not be shocked to see the President Donald Trump (R) administration revive then-President Joe Biden’s (D) nomination of a former Department of Energy cleanup boss to the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board —only this time paired with one or more […]

Among the flurry of executive orders President Donald Trump signed Monday after being sworn in are measures to implement a federal hiring freeze and telling government staff to return to in-person work. “Heads of all departments and agencies in the executive branch of government shall, as soon as practicable, take all necessary steps to terminate […]

The Department of Energy is putting the brakes on most contract solicitations, reports and personnel moves, Acting Secretary of Energy Ingrid Kolb said this week. In a Monday memo, viewed by Exchange Monitor, Kolb said most contract procurements of $100,000 or more were to be put on hold as were most loan guarantees, hirings, promotions […]

The Senate Environment and Natural Resources Committee on Thursday endorsed the nomination of Liberty Energy CEO Chris Wright to be secretary of energy by 15-to-5, with Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.) being one of the five Democrats to vote against the executive. The nominations of both Wright and former North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum (R) to […]

The Department of Energy is putting the breaks on most contract solicitations, reports and personnel moves, Acting Secretary of Energy Ingrid Kolb said this week. In a Monday memo, viewed by Exchange Monitor, Kolb said most contract procurements of $100,000 or more were to be put on hold as were most loan guarantees, hiring, promotions […]

After a delay, the subcontractor that built a new ventilation system at the Department of Energy’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant site in New Mexico is expected to soon turn over the keys to the project to the prime contractor, according to a federal update. A Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board (DNESB) staff report on Waste […]

Chris Wright, President-elect Donald Trump’s nominee for secretary of energy, pledged Wednesday to support ample Department of Energy funding “to clean up the mess” left at the Hanford Site in Washington state. “I cannot overstate how critical I think it is to finish the job to finish the cleanup at Hanford,” a fracking company chief […]

Citizen groups were largely unimpressed by a Department of Energy plan to define and give priority to what the agency calls “legacy” transuranic waste sent to a deep underground disposal site near Carlsbad, N.M., but the mayor of the city endorsed the approach. That is according to a review of public comments, due Jan. 3, […]

The Department of Energy’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant near Carlsbad, N.M., received fewer shipments of defense-related transuranic waste during 2024 than in 2023, a decline that bosses at the underground disposal site hinted at during the fall. With annual results counted, the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) finished 2024 with 470 shipments down from 489 […]

The Waste Isolation Pilot Plant near Carlsbad, N.M., has commenced its annual maintenance outage and won’t be receiving more shipments of transuranic waste until mid-March, the Department of Energy said Tuesday. Two of the bigger work chores scheduled for the outage include installation of final duct work for the new Safety Significant Confinement Ventilation System […]

After about four years of talks and 185 public comments, two federal agencies and Washington state have blessed an amended 15-year plan for treating radioactive waste at the Department of Energy’s Hanford Site. In a press release, the agencies reiterated they are sticking with the August 2025 deadline for starting to solidify some of the […]

President-elect Donald Trump this week announced Darío Gil, a senior vice president at IBM, is his pick to be Department of Energy undersecretary of science in the incoming administration. The Office of Science, which supports DOE’s national laboratories, was the administrative stovepipe for DOE’s Office of Environmental Management during the first Trump term. Science, like […]

WASHINGTON — Brandon Williams, a former one-term congressman from New York’s 22nd district, is President Donald Trump’s (R) pick to head the Department of Energy’s semi-autonomous National Nuclear Security Administration. Chris Wright, Trump’s nominee for Secretary of Energy, told the Exchange Monitor here Wednesday after his confirmation hearing that he picked Williams personally for the […]