Savannah River Site

Liquid waste operations at the Savannah River Site restarted this week following a 15-month layup that included multiple delays to resumption due to maintenance issues at the Defense Waste Processing Facility (DWPF). The DWPF is responsible for converting millions of gallons of radioactive liquid waste at the Energy Department facility in South Carolina into a […]

A final hearing to help determine if the Savannah River Site’s management and operations contractor overcharged the federal government by $5 million will likely be held in October, according to a status report filed Monday in the lawsuit. The joint report was submitted by legal teams for Savannah River Nuclear Solutions (SRNS) and the U.S. […]

Bechtel, a major contractor for the Energy Department’s nuclear complex, announced Thursday it will move its corporate headquarters to one of Washington, D.C.’s Northern Virginia suburbs. The international engineering, procurement, and construction company said it will move corporate operations from Houston and San Francisco to Reston, Va., by the end of 2018. Bechtel already has […]

The Energy Department’s staggering environmental liability at its Manhattan Project and Cold War nuclear sites keeps Assistant Energy Secretary for Environmental Management Anne Marie White “up at night,” she said Thursday in Washington, D.C. Environmental liability is one of the U.S. government’s larger line items, behind the federal debt and entitlement programs such as Social […]

Liquid waste processing at the Savannah River Site almost restarted last month after a 15-month outage, but is instead slated to begin next week after workers fix a seal at the site’s major waste processing facility that allows treated waste to properly pour into the storage canister. Chemical operations at the 310-square-muile site near Aiken, […]

The New Mexico Environment Department said June 1 it was not ready to decide whether to change the way it measures the volume of transuranic waste disposed of underground at the Energy Department’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP). The New Mexico agency plans a more extensive “Class 3” review of the site permit modification, which […]

Spending plans that would ensure the Energy Department’s Office of Environmental Management (EM) will have somewhere in the neighborhood of $7 billion for cleanup of Cold War nuclear sites in fiscal 2019 continue to make their way through Congress. On Friday morning, the House of Representatives approved its fiscal 2019 energy and water appropriations as […]

The Senate’s latest National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) would allow the Department of Energy to spend $5.63 billion on defense environmental cleanup operations in fiscal 2019. That matches the department’s request for the budget year beginning Oct. 1, but it is $50 million lower than the level authorized in the House NDAA. The Senate measure […]

A federal judge in South Carolina could rule by Friday whether to prohibit the U.S. Department of Energy from issuing a full stop work order at the Savannah River Site’s MOX project, state Attorney General Alan Wilson said Tuesday. The state is asking U.S. District Judge J. Michelle Childs for a preliminary injunction to prevent DOE from fully […]

The Savannah River National Laboratory (SRNL) has been in an operational safety pause since April 26 due to a “trend of concerns” that include deficiencies in safety, work performance, and planning, the Department of Energy said this week. The pause covers nearly all work at the lab, except essential activities needed to maintain safe operations. A DOE spokesperson […]

The South Carolina Attorney General’s Office on Tuesday will ask a federal judge to issue a preliminary injunction preventing the Department of Energy from stopping construction of its plutonium conversion plant at the Savannah River Site. The state filed a preliminary injunction request and full lawsuit on May 25 in U.S. District Court with the […]

Just as the clock was about to run out on its existing agreement, the Energy Department said Thursday it had awarded a contract extension to the current radioactive liquid waste manager at the Savannah River Site in South Carolina. The contract extension will keep Savannah River Remediation on the job for “up to” 10 months, […]

The Savannah River National Laboratory (SRNL) has been in an operational safety pause since April 26 due to a “trend of concerns” that include deficiencies in safety, work performance, and planning, the Department of Energy said this week. The pause covers nearly all work at the lab, except essential activities needed to maintain safe operations. […]

The Senate Appropriations Committee wants the Energy Department’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) in New Mexico to start planning for accommodating 34 metric tons of processed plutonium that was supposed to be converted into nuclear reactor fuel at the Mixed Oxide Fuel Fabrication Facility (MFFF) in South Carolina. Energy Secretary Perry officially canceled the MOX […]

The House and Senate disagree about whether to fund construction of new tritium facilities at the Savannah River Site in fiscal 2019, according to their latest appropriations proposals. The Senate Appropriations Committee, in a bill approved late last week, fully backed the Trump administration’s $27 million request for new tritium-related infrastructure at the South Carolina […]

The Senate Appropriations Committee wants the Energy Department’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) in New Mexico to start planning for accommodating 34 metric tons of processed plutonium that was supposed to be converted into nuclear reactor fuel at the Mixed Oxide Fuel Fabrication Facility (MFFF) in South Carolina. Energy Secretary Perry officially canceled the MOX […]

Making good on a recent threat, South Carolina on Friday sued the Department of Energy over its plan to halt construction of a plutonium recycling plant at the Savannah River Site. In a 42-page lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court, South Carolina Attorney General Alan Wilson said shuttering the MOX program will breach a deal between […]

Longtime Energy Department nuclear cleanup hand Ken Picha has been named to a top post at DOE’s Office of Environmental Management (EM) on an acting basis. Assistant Secretary of Energy for Environmental Management Anne Marie White said in a widely distributed email Friday that Picha is replacing Dae Chung as acting EM associate principal deputy […]

South Carolina could sue the Department of Energy today over plans to terminate the Savannah River Site’s MOX project, state Attorney General Alan Wilson said in a letter Tuesday to DOE Secretary Rick Perry. The Energy Department earlier this month formalized plans to convert the unfinished Mixed Oxide Fuel Fabrication Facility (MFFF) for production of […]

The full Senate Appropriations Committee on Thursday approved a $43.8 billion energy and water development bill for fiscal 2019, which includes almost $7.2 billion for the Energy Department’s Office of Environmental Management. The panel’s provision for the Cold War cleanup program exceeds the $6.9 billion passed last week by the House Appropriations Committee. The bill […]

BWX Technologies-led Savannah River EcoManagement answered additional Energy Department questions this week about its revised proposal to become the next liquid waste manager at the Savannah River Site in South Carolina, an industry source said. Personnel from the partnership, which also includes Bechtel National and Honeywell International, were scheduled to make a brief presentation and […]

Energy Secretary Rick Perry should not assume New Mexico will automatically accept a dramatic expansion in the mission of the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP), Sen. Tom Udall (D-N.M.) told fellow members the Senate Appropriations Committee on Thursday. While transuranic waste from DOE sites is shipped to the underground repository for permanent disposal, Udall cautioned […]

BWX Technologies-led Savannah River EcoManagement answered additional Energy Department questions this week about its revised proposal to become the next liquid waste manager at the Savannah River Site in South Carolina, an industry source said. Personnel from the partnership, which also includes Bechtel National and Honeywell International, were scheduled to make a brief presentation and […]

South Carolina intends to sue the Department of Energy by Friday over plans to terminate the Savannah River Site’s MOX project, state Attorney General Alan Wilson said in a letter Tuesday to DOE Secretary Rick Perry. The Energy Department earlier this month formalized plans to convert the unfinished Mixed Oxide Fuel Fabrication Facility (MFFF) for production of plutonium […]

In what could be a bid to save a major nuclear-nonproliferation project in his state, South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster (R) was to meet Monday with President Donald Trump in Washington, sources said. Earlier this month, McMaster — an early political supporter of the president — said he wanted to appeal to Trump personally to […]

The blockbuster lawsuit between the Department of Energy and the prime contractor for the unfinished Mixed Oxide Fuel Fabrication Facility (MFFF) will go to trial in April 2019, a federal judge ordered this week. Judge Thomas Wheeler of the U.S. Court of Federal Claims handed down the order the week after DOE made official its […]

The Department of Energy aims later this month to resume liquid waste processing at the Savannah River Site, two months after the initial March projection. Meeting that schedule would cap off a 15- month pause of waste processing at the DOE facility near Aiken, S.C. The two-month delay was caused by a malfunctioning diesel generator […]

The Energy Department as of Thursday had yet to finalize an agreement to keep incumbent Savannah River Remediation (SRR) overseeing liquid waste management at the Savannah River Site in South Carolina beyond May 31. A DOE proposal published March 21 would keep SRR on the job for up to another 10 months, to the end […]

The Department of Energy would receive about $53 million less than requested for liquid waste management at the Savannah River Site in fiscal 2019 under legislation advanced Wednesday by the House Appropriations Committee. All told, the DOE facility in South Carolina would receive $1.38 billion under the energy and water funding bill for the budget […]

A leaked report from a nominally independent office within the National Nuclear Security Administration offers a trove of new details about the plan the agency must sell to Congress in order to start producing nuclear-warhead cores in South Carolina. On May 10, Energy Secretary Rick Perry said he would officially cancel the Mixed Oxide Fuel […]