Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP)

Top federal and contractor managers at the Department of Energy’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico said Thursday they still hope to beat a 2026 date for operation of a new underground ventilation project criticized recently by the Government Accountability Office. There will be no additional public written report issued on corrective actions being […]

Barring settlement, a federal racial discrimination lawsuit brought by a security officer against the Department of Energy contractor running the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant near Carlsbad, N.M., would go to trial early next year. In an order last month, U.S. District Judge James Browning scheduled a trial starting Jan. 9, 2023 in litigation brought by […]

Contractor inexperience with big-ticket projects and the Department of Energy’s failure to fully account for risks contributed to mushrooming cost and a three-year slide in schedule for a critical underground ventilation system at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico, a government watchdog reported this week. Since 2018, the cost estimate for the Safety […]

Barring settlement, a federal racial discrimination lawsuit brought by a security officer against the Department of Energy contractor running the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant near Carlsbad, N.M., would go to trial early next year. In an order last month, U.S. District Judge James Browning scheduled a trial starting Jan. 9, 2023 in litigation brought by […]

Contractor inexperience with big-ticket projects and the Department of Energy’s failure to fully account for risks contributed to mushrooming cost and a three-year slide in schedule for the new underground ventilation system at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico, according to a government watchdog report published Tuesday. Since 2018, the cost estimate for […]

The Department of Energy received 10 shipments of defense-related transuranic waste at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico during February. A March 14 search of the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) public website showed 10 shipments for the month taking place between Feb. 7 and Feb. 24. Five were received from the Idaho […]

A new ventilation system to dramatically increase underground airflow at the Department of Energy’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant near Carlsbad, N.M., is more than half finished and  should start operating during the summer of 2026, according to materials presented at last week’s Waste Management Symposia in Phoenix. The overall Safety Significant Confinement Ventilation System (SSCVS) […]

PHOENIX – The 2,100-plus attendees at Waste Management Symposia were asked upon registration to place a color-coded dot on their name badges to show their level of COVID-era comfort about personal space and handshakes. Then, when the conference began, attendees were asked to observe a moment of silence for Ukrainians being shelled by Russia’s army. […]

The legacy cleanup contractor for the Department of Energy’s Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico won 72% of its subjective fee and 91% of its performance-based fee during fiscal 2021, according to an agency scorecard posted this week. Altogether, Newport News Nuclear BWXT (N3B)-Los Alamos took home $8.37 million out of a potential $9.77 […]

Next Monday, Feb. 28, will mark a return-to-onsite work for most Department of Energy Idaho National Laboratory personnel, according to a recent staff report from the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board, which said COVID-19 is still complicating work there. Meanwhile, as of the seven-day period ended Thursday, Feb. 24, there were only 82 confirmed active […]

Next Monday, Feb. 28, is the current target for a return-to-onsite work for most Department of Energy Idaho National Laboratory personnel, according to a recent staff report from the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board, which said COVID-19 is still complicating work there. Another Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board (DNFSB) memo said COVID is also still […]

In social media posts Thursday, U.S. Sen. Ben Ray Luján (D-N.M.) says he has returned to Washington, D.C., where he is “back at work and will return to the Senate floor soon,” following his January stroke.  “Through the love and support from my family, medical team, and New Mexicans, I’m getting stronger each day in […]

The Department of Energy’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico received eight shipments of defense-related transuranic waste during the month of January, according to the latest data on the public website for the disposal facility. During January the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) received four shipments each from the Idaho National Laboratory and an […]

The Department of Energy’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico received eight shipments of defense-related transuranic waste during the month of January, according to the latest data on the public website for the disposal facility. During January the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) received four shipments each from the Idaho National Laboratory and an […]

Something akin to the canceled Yucca Mountain high-level radioactive waste repository in Nevada is still central to disposal of thousands of canisters from the Department of Energy’s Hanford Site in Washington state, according to the lifecycle cost report published last week. The Bechtel-built Waste Treatment Plant at Hanford, expected to run for 40 years or […]

The Department of Energy and the prime for the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico last month brought online the 700-C underground ventilation fan not used regularly since the 2014 accident that forced the disposal site out of service for about three years. Reinhard Knerr, manager of DOE’s Carlsbad Field Office that oversees the […]

The Department of Energy and the prime for the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico last month brought online the 700-C underground ventilation fan not used regularly since the 2014 accident that forced the disposal site out of service for about three years. Reinhard Knerr, manager of DOE’s Carlsbad Field Office that oversees the […]

The Department of Energy’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico won’t launch its regular winter maintenance outage this month or next, deferring such work until fall, when an electrical substation was scheduled to be replaced. The annual maintenance outage, together with replacement of the roughly 30-year old surface Substation 3 at the Waste Isolation […]

The Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site in South Carolina should be ready to start shipping certain transuranic waste from downblended plutonium to its underground disposal site in New Mexico by the end of the summer, an agency official told the Savannah River Site Citizens Advisory Board Tuesday. The Savannah River Site (SRS) goal is […]

The Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site in South Carolina should be ready to start shipping certain transuranic waste from downblended plutonium to its underground disposal site in New Mexico by the end of the summer, an agency official told the Savannah River Site Citizens Advisory Board Tuesday. The Savannah River Site (SRS) goal is […]

The Department of Energy’s Office of Environmental Management plans to award new contracts this year at the Hanford Site in Washington state, the Moab uranium tailings site in Utah and the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico, the office said in its recent list of 2022 priorities. The biggest prize is the potential $45-billion, […]

The final numbers for December confirm 2021 was a bounce-back year of sorts for the Department of Energy’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico, which disposed of 21 more shipments of transuranic waste than during its first year of the COVID-19 pandemic. The Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) near Carlsbad, N.M., received 20 shipments […]

The final numbers for December confirm 2021 was a bounce-back year of sorts for the Department of Energy’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico, which disposed of 21 more shipments of transuranic waste than during its first year of the COVID-19 pandemic. The Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) near Carlsbad, N.M., received 20 shipments […]

The Department of Energy’s Office of Environmental Management plans to award new contracts this year at the Hanford Site in Washington state, the Moab uranium tailings site in Utah and the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico, the office said in its recent list of 2022 priorities. The biggest prize is the potential $45-billion, […]

Rep. Dina Titus (D-Nev.) wants Secretary of Energy Jennifer Granholm to provide details about a Department of Energy plan to bury certain nuclear waste, now at the Idaho National Laboratory, at the Nevada National Security Site. Titus said she was caught off guard by federal plans for the shipments from Idaho to the Nevada National […]

State and federal settlement talks about revamping the 2016 consent order for legacy cleanup at the Department of Energy’s Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico will continue into early April, according to a status report filed this month with a federal court. Representatives from the New Mexico Department of Environment (NMED) and DOE Office […]

The Department of Energy could solicit bids for long-term management and storage of elemental mercury in January, the Office of Environmental Management said in a procurement update after Christmas. After court action by gold mining companies forced DOE to drop earlier plans to designate Waste Control Specialists in West Texas as its preferred long-term storage […]

As of mid-December, the Department of Energy’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant near Carlsbad, N.M., had received 210 shipments of defense-related transuranic waste in 2021, beating the 2020 total of 192 shipments before the calendar year was out, according to the deep-underground repository’s website. In November alone, the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) received 27 shipments […]

Nuclear Waste Partnership, the Amentum-BWX Technologies team that runs the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico, won 62% of its subjective fee for fiscal year 2021 and 72% of its overall fee, according to a Dec. 30  scorecard from the Department of Energy. The contractor took home about $3.3 million out of a potential […]

Nuclear Waste Partnership, the Amentum-BWX Technologies team that runs the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico, won 62% of its subjective fee for fiscal year 2021 and 72% of its overall fee, according to a recently-released scorecard from the Department of Energy. The contractor took home about $3.3 million out of a potential $5.3 […]