Office of Environmental Management (EM)

The West Valley Demonstration Project, a nuclear cleanup site 35 miles south of Buffalo, N.Y., again has a congressional member in the House of Representatives effective Tuesday, albeit a short timer. Republican Joe Sempolinski was sworn in Tuesday by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) to represent the 23rd congressional district of New York.   “It […]

The Department of Energy’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant near Carlsbad, N.M., received 25 shipments of defense-related transuranic waste during August, according to the public website. That’s far more than the seven received at the underground salt mine during August 2021. The increased number of shipments during the past month means the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant […]

Cleanup contractor Newport News Nuclear BWXT-Los Alamos (N3B) last week began excavating corrugated metal pipes containing radioactive waste buried at the Department of Energy’s Los Alamos National Laboratory, a spokesperson confirmed Tuesday. Retrieval of the corrugated metal pipes began Sept. 8 as part of a project that could last into March 2024, the spokesperson said […]

During a federal appeals court hearing Tuesday on mandatory COVID-19 vaccination for most federal employees, the Department of Justice attorney said a federal district judge was wrong to shut down the policy spawned by a September 2021 executive order just as an administrative board was about to start ruling on requests for exemptions.  Charles Scarborough, […]

Cleanup contractor Newport News Nuclear BWXT-Los Alamos (N3B) last week began excavating corrugated metal pipes containing radioactive waste buried at the Department of Energy’s Los Alamos National Laboratory, a spokesperson confirmed Tuesday. Retrieval of the corrugated metal pipes began Sept. 8 as part of a project that could last into March 2024, the spokesperson said […]

The Department of Energy’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant near Carlsbad, N.M., received at least 23 shipments of defense-related transuranic waste during August, according to the public website. That’s far more than the seven received at the underground salt mine during August 2021. The increased number of shipments during the past month means the Waste Isolation […]

The West Valley Demonstration Project, a nuclear cleanup site 35 miles south of Buffalo, N.Y., will again have a congressional member in the House of Representatives effective Tuesday, albeit a short timer. Republican Joe Sempolinski will be sworn in Tuesday by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) to represent the 23rd congressional district of New York, […]

The entire Fifth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals is poised to hear oral arguments Tuesday on whether President Joe Biden’s administration exceeded its authority by requiring that most federal employees get vaccinated against COVID-19. The Fifth Circuit has a livestream link where the public can listen to the hearing in real time although the livestream […]

The Department of Energy’s Office of Legacy Management, long-term custodian of 101 previously contaminated sites cleaned up by other federal entities, expects to see its portfolio nearly double over time, a top administrator said last week. The Office of Legacy Management will take charge of 20 more sites over the next five years, Jay Glascock, […]

More than a year after President Joe Biden announced the effort, much of the Department of Energy’s weapons complex is struggling to understand the particulars of the Justice40 Initiative if comments Wednesday by nuclear cleanup advisory board chairs are any indication. In broad terms, Justice40 was set up by Biden’s July 2021 Executive Order 14008, […]

The Department of Energy plans to increase the ceiling for the Moab Technical Assistance Contract held by S&K Logistics Services to $29.8 million from $24.3 million, according to a notice published Thursday on a federal procurement website.  The Cincinnati-based Environmental Management Consolidated Business Center posted a “justification for other than full and open competition” on […]

The Department of Energy granted a request by Los Alamos National Laboratory’ cleanup contractor in New Mexico to resume “drilling and draining” containers with free liquids to prepare them for shipment to the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant, an agency spokesperson said Sept. 2. DOE has also endorsed plans by Newport News Nuclear BWXT-Los Alamos (N3B) […]

Discovery of radioactive contamination on a transuranic waste transportation container in August prompted the Department of Energy to pause certain work at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant near Carlsbad, N.M., a spokesperson said Sept. 2. During maintenance on Aug. 24, a staffer spotted an “unexpected substance” near the bottom of the shipping container, a Waste […]

In one of its first public field hearings since before the COVID-19 pandemic, the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board will review operations at the Department of Energy’s Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico this November. During a Nov. 16 session in Santa Fe, the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board (DNFSB) will look into both […]

The Department of Energy now expects to replace an aging electrical substation on the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant grounds near Carlsbad, N.M., in 2023, a spokesperson said this week. The substation replacement project is now planned for “the spring time frame,” a spokesperson for the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) said in a Tuesday email […]

Two megadollar Department of Energy nuclear cleanup contracts, together potentially worth more than $50 billion, could be awarded by early 2023, a top Office of Environmental Management procurement executive told a gathering in Santa Fe, N.M., Wednesday. The Integrated Tank Disposition Contract for the Hanford Site in Washington state and the Decontamination and Decommissioning Contract […]

The Department of Energy has yet to conclude an outage that began July 20 at the Tank-Side Cesium Removal project at the Hanford Site in Washington state, a spokesperson confirmed Thursday. Since beginning operation in late January, the Tank-Side Cesium Removal (TSCR) project has pre-treated 380,000 gallons of radioactive tank waste and DOE expects to […]

The state of Idaho made the Department of Energy pay about $10 million in penalties so far for its failure to clean up high-level sodium bearing radioactive waste at the Idaho National Laboratory, something the agency hopes to do before Jan. 1. Although DOE has yet to set a start-up date for radiological operation of […]

Two megadollar Department of Energy nuclear cleanup contracts, together potentially worth more than $50 billion, could be awarded by early 2023, a top Office of Environmental Management procurement executive told a gathering in Santa Fe, N.M., Wednesday. The Integrated Tank Disposition Contract for the Hanford Site in Washington state and the Decontamination and Decommissioning Contract […]

More than a year after President Joe Biden announced the effort, much of the Department of Energy’s weapons complex is struggling to understand the particulars of the Justice40 Initiative if comments Wednesday by nuclear cleanup advisory board chairs are any indication. In broad terms, Justice40 was set up by Biden’s July 2021 Executive Order 14008, […]

In one of its first public field hearings since before the COVID-19 pandemic, the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board will review operations at the Department of Energy’s Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico this November. During a Nov. 16 session in Santa Fe, the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board (DNFSB) will look into both […]

The Department of Energy now expects to replace an aging electrical substation on the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant grounds near Carlsbad, N.M., in 2023, a spokesperson said Tuesday. The substation replacement project is now planned for “the spring time frame,” a spokesperson for the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) said in an email reply to […]

Discovery of radioactive contamination on a transuranic waste transportation container in August prompted the Department of Energy to pause certain work at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant near Carlsbad, N.M., a spokesperson said Friday. During maintenance on Aug. 24, a staffer spotted an “unexpected substance” near the bottom of the shipping container, a Waste Isolation […]

The Department of Energy granted a request by Los Alamos National Laboratory’ cleanup contractor in New Mexico to resume “drilling and draining” containers with free liquids to prepare them for shipment to the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant, an agency spokesperson said Friday. DOE has also endorsed plans by Newport News Nuclear BWXT-Los Alamos (N3B) to […]

The Joe Biden administration overstepped its authority by utilizing the Procurement Act to impose a COVID-19 vaccination mandate for most employees of government contractors, a federal appeals court said Friday. However, a federal district judge in Georgia went too far in issuing a nationwide injunction against the contractor vaccine mandate, the panel of judges for […]

The Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board wants the Department of Energy and its legacy cleanup contractor to prioritize a new safety analysis for the waste handling area of the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico that is currently in limited operations. Since January 2020, contractor Newport News Nuclear BWXT-Los Alamos (N3B) has declared 24 […]

The Department of Energy Office of Enterprise Assessments is satisfied overall with safety programs Bechtel National is developing for a waste solidification plant aiming to start up late next year at the Hanford Site in Washington state, but says improvements are needed. One area the agency should address prior to startup of Direct-Feed-Low-Activity Waste (DFLAW) […]

Due in part to this year’s Cerro Pelado wildfire, the New Mexico Environment Department has given the cleanup contractor for the Department of Energy’s Los Alamos National Laboratory until Oct. 30 to perform sampling connected with a hexavalent chromium plume. The state agency officially granted a two-month extension in an Aug. 24 letter to the […]

The prime contractor for the Department of Energy’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico is investigating two separate incidents where technical safety requirement violations occurred at the disposal facility for defense-related transuranic waste, a spokesperson said late Wednesday. The incidents that led to the violations occurred Aug. 15 and Aug. 16, said the spokesperson […]

Online data suggests the Portsmouth Site in Pike County, Ohio appears to be the only Department of Energy nuclear cleanup site which still has a high local transmission rate of COVID-19. An Exchange Monitor search of county-by-county data posted on the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention CDC website listed Pike County, Ohio as about […]