Office of Environmental Management (EM)

At the Department of Energy’s request, bidders on a major nuclear cleanup contract at the Portsmouth Site in Ohio have agreed to keep their bids on the table for 60 days longer than planned, industry sources said this week. Within the past week, DOE procurement officials asked teams to keep their contract offers for the […]

The Department of Energy’s “fast-track, design-build approach” at the multibillion-dollar Waste Treatment and Immobilization Plant at the Hanford Site in Washington state resulted in cost increases and schedule delays, according to an Office of Inspector General probe of whistleblower allegations. The report by DOE Inspector General Teri Donaldson was drafted back in August 2020 but […]

The Department of Energy is seeking new members to join its federal advisory board for the Office of Environmental Management, according to a Monday Federal Register notice. The deadline for nominations to the Environmental Management Advisory Board is May 15. Customarily DOE draws the advisory board members for the $8-billion-plus Office of Environmental Management from […]

Due to vacancies, the Savannah River operations office for DOE nuclear cleanup is not doing safety system oversight assessments as often as specified in agency guidance, according to a report out this month from the DOE Office of Enterprise Assessments. It has become a common refrain across the weapons complex, and now, staffing holes are […]

The Integrated Waste Treatment Unit at the Department of Energy’s Idaho National Laboratory has resumed running simulant as the contractor awaits final federal approval to start mixing in liquid sodium-bearing radioactive waste, a DOE spokesperson said Wednesday. The federal agency and its cleanup contractor at the site, Jacobs-led Idaho Environmental Coalition, hope to be operating  […]

The Department of Energy and a contractor await permission from the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission to return a problem transuranic waste container, now in a parking lot at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico, back to the Savannah River Site in South Carolina, managers in Carlsbad, N.M., said recently. The issue came up […]

Randall Hendrickson, acting head of regulatory and policy affairs for the Department of Energy’s nuclear cleanup office, is leaving the government to take a job in private industry, the agency said this week. Hendrickson’s departure was announced in an email to DOE Office of Environmental Management staff by Jeff Avery, DOE’s principal deputy assistant secretary […]

HPM Corp., the Kennewick, Wash.,-based company with a $152-million Department of Energy contract to provide employee medical services at the Hanford Site in Washington state is being sold to California-based WorkCare, the parties confirmed Wednesday. The Tri-City Herald newspaper reported Tuesday HPM Corp., longtime holder of the Hanford Occupational Medical Contract, is being sold to […]

The Department of Energy is extending Swift & Staley as site services contractor at the Paducah Site in Kentucky through July 2024, the agency said in a procurement notice this week. The move is meant to buy the DOE Office of Environmental Management time to recompete a contract agreement for the landlord services award made […]

The federal government will respond in fewer than two weeks to New Mexico’s request for major changes to the Department of Energy’s long-term transuranic waste disposal program in the state, a senior agency official said at a forum this week. The New Mexico Environment Department is considering a new 10-year hazardous waste permit for the […]

Bechtel National chose an executive who led construction of two new nuclear power reactors in Georgia to temporarily run the Waste Immobilization and Treatment Plant project at the Department of Energy’s Hanford Site in Washington state, the company said late Thursday. Effective immediately John Atwell is the acting project director for the Waste Immobilization and […]

The head of the new prime at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico aims to meet the Department of Energy and dispose of 400 shipments of transuranic waste at the site in 2023. Ken Harrawood, president and project manager for Bechtel’s Salado Isolation Mining Contractors, told a Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) Public […]

The Integrated Waste Treatment Unit at the Department of Energy’s Idaho National Laboratory has resumed running simulant as the contractor awaits final federal approval to start mixing in liquid sodium-bearing radioactive waste, a DOE spokesperson said Wednesday. The federal agency and its cleanup contractor at the site, Jacobs-led Idaho Environmental Coalition, hope to be operating  […]

HPM Corp., the Kennewick, Wash.,-based company with a $152-million Department of Energy contract to provide employee medical services at the Hanford Site in Washington state is being sold to California-based WorkCare, the parties confirmed Wednesday. The Tri-City Herald newspaper reported Tuesday HPM Corp., longtime holder of the Hanford Occupational Medical Contract, is being sold to […]

The Department of Energy said Tuesday it is renewing its financial assistance, worth about $3.9-million, to the Washington, D.C.-based Energy Communities Alliance through April 11, 2028. The DOE Office of Environmental Management announced the reupping of the non-competitive financial assistance cooperative agreement with the community advocacy organization in a Tuesday press release. As recipient of […]

The federal government will respond in fewer than two weeks to New Mexico’s request for major changes to the Department of Energy’s long-term transuranic waste disposal program in the state, a senior agency official said at a forum Tuesday night. The New Mexico Environment Department is considering a new 10-year hazardous waste permit for the […]

Randall Hendrickson, acting head of regulatory and policy affairs for the Department of Energy’s nuclear cleanup office, is leaving the government to take a job in private industry, the agency said Tuesday. Hendrickson’s departure was announced in an email to DOE Office of Environmental Management staff by Jeff Avery, DOE’s principal deputy assistant secretary for […]

The Department of Energy is extending Swift & Staley as site services contractor at the Paducah Site in Kentucky through July 2024, the agency said in a procurement notice Monday. The move is meant to buy the DOE Office of Environmental Management time to recompete a contract agreement for the landlord services award made in […]

The Department of Energy and a contractor await permission from the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission to return a problem transuranic waste container, now in a parking lot at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico, back to the Savannah River Site in South Carolina, managers in Carlsbad, N.M., said recently. The issue came up […]

An investigative office within the Department of Energy is looking into a December 2022 accident at the Savannah River Site in South Carolina that resulted in an employee of the prime contractor having a finger amputated. The enforcement unit within DOE’s Office of Enterprise Assessments told Savannah River Nuclear Solutions president and CEO Stuart MacVean […]

A few days before Christmas, the Department of Energy, together with the South Carolina Department of Health and Environmental Control and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency agreed to the broad framework for completing radioactive tank waste cleanup at the Savannah River Site. The primary goal of the revised Federal Facility Agreement, announced Tuesday, is to […]

Following a December court decision, the Department of Energy is officially canceling the solicitation that resulted in incumbent Swift & Staley winning — and then eventually losing — a new set-aside contract two years earlier for landlord services at the Paducah Site in Kentucky. “DOE has determined that canceling this solicitation is in the best […]

The Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board is still looking for a successor to its first executive director of operations, who left in August, the board said in a recent report to Congress. “The board is actively recruiting to fill that vacancy in 2023,” according to the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board’s 33rd Annual Report to […]

Valerie McCain, the Bechtel project manager in charge of building the Department of Energy’s multibillion-dollar waste vitrification plant at the Hanford Site in Washington state, died unexpectedly, the company announced this week. “It is with great sadness that we share the news that Valerie McCain, project director of the Waste Treatment and Immobilization Plant and […]

A U.S. appeals court recently upheld a nation-wide injunction against President Joe Biden’s COVID-19 vaccination mandate for most federal workers. The ruling 10-6 ruling on March 23 from a majority of judges on the New Orleans-based U.S. Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, who heard oral arguments in September, upheld the January 2022 preliminary injunction issued […]

The Department of Energy Office of Environmental Management has issued stopgap extensions to avoid lapses in nuclear cleanup work this week at the Portsmouth Site in Ohio and treatment of a uranium enrichment byproduct there, and at the Paducah Site in Kentucky. Fluor-BWXT Portsmouth and Atkins-led Mid-America Conversion Services will both receive contract extensions of […]

The Department of Energy will temporarily suspend some work to contain underground hexavalent chromium contamination at the Los Alamos National Laboratory while talks continue with New Mexico officials over the effectiveness of the treatment, officials said Wednesday night. The agency’s local Environmental Management field office and its site cleanup contractor will halt injection of clean […]

Perma-Fix, Atlanta, closed out a tough 2022 with bigger losses and less revenue than a year ago, but the ill-effects of COVID-19 on the company’s business tapered off last year, the chief executive officer said last week. “While 2022 was a challenging year due to the lingering effects of the COVID-19 pandemic, which delayed projects […]

The Department of Energy will temporarily suspend some work to contain underground hexavalent chromium contamination at the Los Alamos National Laboratory while talks continue with New Mexico officials over the effectiveness of the process, officials said Wednesday night. The agency’s local Environmental Management field office and its site cleanup contractor will halt injection of clean […]

A federal magistrate judge was assigned to handle pre-trial matters in a racial discrimination lawsuit brought by an employee at the Department of Energy’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico who claims he was unfairly bypassed for promotion by the former site management contractor. U.S. District Judge James Browning issued an order earlier this […]