Budget & Policy

The primary obstacle to opening Yucca Mountain in Nevada as a nuclear waste-disposal site could be Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), the House’s top Energy Department appropriator said Thursday. “[I]n the Senate they have a two-vote Republican majority,” Rep. Mike Simpson (R-Idaho) said during the Energy Department-sponsored National Cleanup Workshop in Alexandria, Va. “One of those […]

A number of major policy questions must be addressed before the federal government drops the mixed-oxide fuel (MOX) project in South Carolina in favor of a “dilute and dispose” approach to disposal of 34 metric tons of surplus weapon-grade plutonium, House Appropriations energy and water subcommittee Chairman Mike Simpson (R-Idaho) said Thursday. “There are a […]

With a large budget request, a programmatic review process encompassing top officials at Department of Energy headquarters and sites, and political appointees who seem to share a “bias for action,” there is cause for optimism about increasing the pace of cleanup of DOE’s nuclear legacy, officials said Wednesday. That was the sense that emerged following […]

Acting Assistant Energy Secretary for Environmental Management James Owendoff said Wednesday not to expect a major formal “list” of objectives to be published from his recently completed 45-day review of the Department of Energy’s nuclear cleanup office. “There is not a list out there per se,” he said during DOE’s National Cleanup Workshop in Alexandria, […]

Nevada on Tuesday extended a contract with a Texas-based law firm to continue fighting the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste repository for another six months at a cost of roughly $1 million. Extending the contract of Egan, Fitzpatrick, Malsch & Lawrence, which also has an office in Washington, D.C., was one of many business items considered […]

The primary obstacle to opening Yucca Mountain in Nevada as a nuclear waste-disposal site could be Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), the House’s top Energy Department appropriator said Thursday. “[I]n the Senate they have a two-vote Republican majority,” Rep. Mike Simpson (R-Idaho) said during the Energy Department-sponsored National Cleanup Workshop in Alexandria, Va. “One of […]

Deputy Energy Secretary Dan Brouillette used an appearance before the National Cleanup Workshop on Wednesday to both praise the Energy Department Office of Environmental Management’s accomplishments and pledge a commitment to shorter cleanup timelines during the Trump administration. The recently sworn-in official pointed to improvements at the Hanford Site in Washington state, by far the […]

Acting Assistant Energy Secretary for Environmental Management James Owendoff said Wednesday not to expect any big formal “list” of objectives to be published from his recently completed 45-day review of the Department of Energy’s nuclear cleanup office. There has been much buzz about the 45-day review since Owendoff was named to head DOE’s Office of […]

Nevada on Tuesday extended a contract with a Texas-based law firm to continue fighting the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste repository for another six months at a cost of roughly $1 million. Extending the contract of Egan, Fitzpatrick, Malsch & Lawrence, which also has an office in Washington, D.C., was one of many business items considered […]

Former House Armed Services Committee Chairman Howard “Buck” McKeon penned an op-ed in support of the Department of Energy Mixed Oxide Fuel Fabrication Facility in South Carolina, which since retiring from Congress he has lobbied the federal government to continue building. “I am concerned about the effect on our national security of a further proliferation […]

The Senate Appropriations Committee on Thursday Approved $790 million for nonproliferation, anti-terrorism, demining, and related programs for 2018: a high-water mark for the State Department account that includes international nuclear nonproliferation efforts. The Senate recommendation is about 60 percent more than what the White House requested for the account in 2018 as part of a […]

Congress this week passed a temporary spending bill that will keep the Department of Energy funded at 2017 levels for at least more than two months into the new fiscal year, setting up another holiday-season budget showdown on Capitol Hill. The House on Friday voted in favor of a Senate-approved plan of disaster relief and debt-ceiling […]

SUMMERLIN, Nev. — Plans for a new permanent ventilation system at the Energy Department’s Waste Isolation Pilot Project in New Mexico should not be held back by a continuing resolution that will keep the federal government running into December, DOE’s top official at the site said Wednesday. Carlsbad Field Office Manager Todd Shrader shared his prediction […]

The White House shouted its objection to the Mixed Oxide Fuel Fabrication Facility and reseearch on a new intermediate-range missile system in a statement of administration policy Thursday. The measures are part of the Senate’s National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) for fiscal 2018, which the upper chamber plans to take up next week now that […]

The drive to restart the Energy Department’s application to license Yucca Mountain in Nye County, Nev., as a permanent nuclear-waste repository has stalled at least for another three months under a stopgap budget bill expected to become law soon. Both chambers of Congress by Friday had approved a continuing resolution that funds the federal government for […]

The Senate is set to take up the National Defense Authorization Act after it deals with a three-month spending bill to keep the Energy Department and the rest of the government funded for the first quarter of fiscal 2018. Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) made the announcement Wednesday in a press conference after the GOP’s weekly […]

Congress is working on a stopgap spending bill that will, by and large, keep the Energy Department funded at 2017 levels until mid-December, leading lawmakers and President Donald Trump said Wednesday. The so-called continuing resolution will fund the federal government through Dec. 15, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) and House Minority Leader Rep. Nancy […]

The Energy Department’s Office of Environmental Management (EM) is establishing a new unit that will focus on the Hanford Site’s Waste Treatment Plant, Roger Jarrell, senior adviser to the secretary of energy for environmental management, said Tuesday. Efforts are being made to streamline management decisions at EM, a roughly $6 billion-per-year office that oversees cleanup […]

Don’t be surprised to see acting Assistant Energy Secretary for Environmental Management James Owendoff continue to lead the Energy Department’s nuclear cleanup program for several more months, a longtime industry observer told Weapons Complex Monitor this week. “I think they have got a clean slate at DOE on EM-1 candidates,” the source said. Owendoff, a longtime […]

The Energy Department’s Office of Environmental Management (EM) might have to wait to get the funding boost being considered on Capitol Hill, assuming an anticipated short-term budget measure becomes reality in the next few weeks. Congress, returning to Washington on Tuesday after its August recess, has only a few weeks to pass some sort of […]

The Senate is scheduled to take up the National Defense Authorization Act for fiscal 2018 when Congress returns from recess next week. A spokesman for Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said Thursday the annual military authorization legislation “will be on the floor next week,” although the exact timing of debate was yet to be decided. The bill […]

The National Nuclear Security Administration will apparently wait until at least December for the funding increase the White House has proposed, as Congress is expected to move quickly on a short-term spending bill that will hold the federal budget at current levels for the first three months of fiscal 2018. The move would, at least temporarily, […]

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission in July spent just shy of $149,000 of its remaining balance from the Nuclear Waste Fund on activities related to licensing of the planned Yucca Mountain repository in Nevada. Nearly all of the money — $143,744 – went toward knowledge management reports that provide technical data to assist in the review […]

The Senate appears set to take up the National Defense Authorization Act for fiscal 2018 when Congress returns from recess next week. The annual military authorization legislation — practically speaking, a policy bill that is a suggestion for subsequent appropriations bills that actually set agency budgets — would authorize the Energy Department’s semiautonomous National Nuclear Security Administration […]

Don’t be surprised to see acting Assistant Energy Secretary for Environmental Management James Owendoff continue to lead the Energy Department’s nuclear cleanup program for several more months, a longtime industry observer told Weapons Complex Morning Briefing on Tuesday. “I think they have got a clean slate at DOE on EM-1 candidates,” the source said. Owendoff, […]

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission in July spent just shy of $149,000 of its remaining balance from the Nuclear Waste Fund on activities related to licensing of the planned Yucca Mountain repository in Nevada. Nearly all of the money — $143,744 – went toward knowledge management reports that provide technical data to assist in the review […]

The Department of Energy’s proposed plan to remove plutonium from the Savannah River Site does not hold the agency accountable if it misses deadlines, South Carolina said this week in its latest filing in a federal lawsuit on the dispute. While the state wants the court to hold DOE’s feet to the fire, the department […]

Atkins executive Alan Parker has voluntarily withdrawn his name from consideration as a candidate for the position of Energy Department assistant secretary for environmental management, industry sources said. Parker, president and project manager for the Atkins-led DOE contractor Mid-America Conversion Services (now providing depleted uranium hexafluoride conversion at facilities in Ohio and Kentucky), was reported in […]

By Wayne Barber The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has not patronized Trump hotels or other businesses since Donald Trump became president, the regulator officially told the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee. In an Aug. 8 letter to NRC Chair Kristine Svinicki, Democrats on the committee asked if the agency had expended funds “on products or […]

Sen. Dean Heller’s (R-Nev.) primary challenger, the strongly pro-Trump campaign-trail veteran Danny Tarkanian, has yet to stake out an official position — in this U.S. Senate race, anyway — on disposing of nuclear waste at Yucca Mountain in Nye County, Nev. Tarkanian has given many interviews since declaring his latest run for office but has not […]