Cleanup & Remediation

While Amentum is a new company, it is far from a new face doing business for government nuclear and environmental agencies, a senior executive said Tuesday. The former AECOM Management Services division officially became Amentum on Jan. 31 with the closure of the $2.4 billion sale to affiliates of New York-based investment firms Lindsay Goldberg […]

Engineering and construction giant AECOM has completed the $2.4 billion sale of its Management Service business to an affiliate of two New York investment firms. Sale of the subsidiary to American Securities LLC and Lindsay Goldberg LLC closed on Jan. 31, according to an AECOM press release Monday. The new company, called Amentum, is now […]

The Energy Department on Tuesday issued a request for proposals (RFP) for a new small business set-aside contract to provide support services at the Paducah Site in Kentucky. Incumbent Swift & Staley’s five-year, $185 million contract expires in September. The DOE Office of Environmental Management said last month it could soon issue a solicitation for […]

Long-anticipated talks between the Department of Energy and the Washington state Department of Ecology on cleanup issues at the Hanford Site should finally begin by early March. The two sides have agreed on the scope of the talks, Ecology Nuclear Waste Program Manager Alex Smith said Wednesday during a meeting of the Hanford Advisory Board. […]

There has been no apparent movement by the Trump administration over the last year to fill vacant and expired terms on the federal Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board (NWTRB). The only change to the board in that time was the departure last May of another member, Linda Nozick, a civil and environmental engineering professor at […]

The Energy Department and contractor CH2M Plateau Remediation have finished taking down the main processing facility at the Hanford Site’s Plutonium Finishing Plant. With the building’s demolition, full removal of the Plutonium Finishing Plant should be finished this summer by the Jacobs subsidiary. Remaining work involves packaging and disposal of the rubble from the Plutonium […]

A lawsuit claiming the Savannah River Site’s security contractor discriminated against a former employee should be dismissed because it was filed past the time allowed under the statute of limitations, a federal magistrate judge recommended. Judge Paige Gossett also noted on Jan. 30 that Marcialena Brown’s $3.5 million complaint covers both Centerra-SRS and two company […]

The Energy Department and contractor CH2M Plateau Remediation have finished taking down the main processing facility at the Hanford Site’s Plutonium Finishing Plant. With the building’s demolition, full removal of the Plutonium Finishing Plant should be finished this summer by the Jacobs subsidiary. Remaining work involves packaging and disposal of the rubble from the Plutonium […]

Long-anticipated talks between the Department of Energy and the Washington state Department of Ecology on cleanup issues at the Hanford Site should finally begin by early March. The two sides have agreed on the scope of the talks, Ecology Nuclear Waste Program Manager Alex Smith said Wednesday during a meeting of the Hanford Advisory Board. […]

A lawsuit claiming the Savannah River Site’s security contractor discriminated against a former employee should be dismissed because it was filed past the time allowed under the statute of limitations, a federal magistrate judge recommended. Judge Paige Gossett also noted on Jan. 30 that Marcialena Brown’s $3.5 million complaint covers both Centerra-SRS and two company […]

After the Energy Department picked a rival contractor for the major cleanup contract at the Hanford Site in Washington state, Jacobs is anxiously awaiting a decision on a 10-year award for management of the facility’s radioactive tank waste. Jacobs subsidiary CH2M is the incumbent on the Hanford Central Plateau remediation project, but a Jacobs-led team […]

Vendors appear to have recently updated protests filed with the Government Accountability Office over two new contract awards, together potentially worth $14 billion, for work at the Energy Department’s Hanford Site in Washington state. Both additions were filed since Jan. 27 by corporate teams that days earlier filed protests against DOE awards for Hanford Site […]

Having successfully divested its government-contracting business, AECOM continues to look for a successor to Chairman and CEO Michael Burke. Burke, 56, announced in November that he plans to retire pending selection of a replacement. Speaking to financial analysts Monday during AECOM’s quarterly earnings call, he said a search committee is making good progress on finding […]

The Energy Department on Tuesday issued a request for proposals (RFP) for a new small business set-aside contract to provide support services at the Paducah Site in Kentucky. Incumbent Swift & Staley’s five-year, $185 million contract expires in September. The DOE Office of Environmental Management had said last month it could soon issue a solicitation […]

Engineering and construction giant AECOM said Monday it has completed the $2.4 billion sale of its Management Service business to a joint venture of two New York investment firms. Sale of the subsidiary to American Securities LLC and Lindsay Goldberg LLC closed on Friday, according to an AECOM press release. The new company, which will […]

New Mexico’s entire congressional delegation this month called on the Department of Energy to suspend a controversial order that the federal Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board (DNFSB) says has curtailed its access to nuclear-weapon sites. The Energy Department should lift the almost 2-year-old Order 140.1 to comply with recent changes to federal law that require […]

A new inspector general’s report bashed the human resources department at the federal Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board as ineffective, inefficient, and incapable of supporting the agency’s oversight of defense-nuclear sites. The board’s “human resources program is currently not designed and implemented to effectively support the execution of its mission,” reads a report issued this […]

The Department of Energy should expand its use of underground research laboratories (URLs) for research on geologic disposal of nuclear waste, including establishing facilities in the United States, a federal panel of experts said in a report Tuesday. That would include establishing one or more underground research laboratories, potentially using existing underground facilities, according to […]

Secretary of Energy Dan Brouillette is establishing a new office to manage “all policy within the Department,” and appointing a new personal adviser for nuclear security, according to an all-hands memo dated Tuesday. To do this, Brouillette will rebrand the current Office of Policy (OP) as the Office of Strategic Planning and Policy (OSSP), which […]

Wide-ranging talks between the U.S. Department of Energy and the Washington state Department of Ecology on radioactive waste issues at the Hanford Site have apparently not progressed beyond the starting line. “The parties are still working through some preliminary arrangements,” Ecology spokesman Randy Bradbury said in a Jan. 23 email. The agencies confirmed in October […]

Demolition of a Cold War-era legacy facility in December still leaves more than 1,100 facilities and buildings to tear down at the Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site in South Carolina. Specifically, 1,127 facilities have been identified for eventual demolition, SRS spokesman Monte Volk said via email. Those facilities encompass offices, power production plants, and […]

An article in the Jan. 24 issue of Weapons Complex Monitor should have stated the Savannah River National Laboratory has an annual budget of roughly $350 million.

The Government Accountability Office should by the end of April rule on challenges to $14 billion worth of Energy Department contract awards at the Hanford Site in Washington state. With the deadline now passed for additional challenges, the GAO has single protests on its docket for each award: the 10-year, $10-billion Hanford Central Plateau cleanup […]

The Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board wants to forge a closer working relationship with the Department of Energy’s Office of Environmental Management. In a Jan. 10 letter to DOE Senior Adviser for Environmental Management William (Ike) White, Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board Chairwoman Jean Bahr urged “a framework for more regular interaction” between the two […]

Fluor-BWXT Portsmouth, the Energy Department’s cleanup contractor at the former gaseous diffusion plant in Pike County, Ohio, pocketed 86% of its potential fee for fiscal 2019, or $19.20 million of the available $22.78 million. The vendor claimed about $3.61 million of a potential $6.68 million in subjective fee for the federal budget year that ended […]

The Washington state Court of Appeals heard arguments Tuesday on a lower court’s $8.1 million award in 2017 to a former employee of Energy Department contractor Mission Support Alliance (MSA) at the Hanford Site. The support services vendor is asking Division III of the appeals court to reverse the award against it and former vice […]

While it does not say much about them publicly, the Energy Department’s Office of Environmental Management watches potential mergers and acquisitions of its major contractors with more than passing interest, DOE’s top nuclear cleanup official said Thursday. As an example, Environmental Management wants to be sure the government contracting branches of heavyweights AECOM and Fluor […]

Los Alamos County, N.M., wants a federal review board to reverse a December decision by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency saying the county’s stormwater discharges contribute to pollution of the Rio Grande River. In a petition filed Jan. 17 with the EPA’s Environmental Appeals Board, Los Alamos County seeks to overturn the Dec. 16 decision […]

Las Vegas-based Longenecker & Associates said in Tuesday it has hired a former Fluor supervisor as its manager for New Mexico projects. Lindsay Wallace started Monday and her role will include serving as Longenecker’s program manager for legacy cleanup at the Los Alamos National Laboratory. Longenecker has a subcontract with Newport News Nuclear BWXT Los […]

International engineering and construction provider AECOM appears poised to complete the $2.4 billion sale of its government contracting division to a joint venture of two New York investment firms, a company official said Tuesday. Eric Knox, AECOM vice president for strategic development for nuclear and environment, cited the impending change during a panel discussion at […]