Cleanup & Remediation

With the calendar year ticking away, the Energy Department has issued another procurement inquiry — this one a draft request for proposals for a contract valued at roughly $120 million over seven years to provide occupational medical services at the Hanford Site in Washington state. The Energy Department announced the draft RFP on Wednesday. The […]

Jacobs Engineering Group is in discussions to divest its 41 percent share of Mission Support Alliance, the support services contractor at the Department of Energy’s Hanford Site in Washington state. Jacobs’ acquisition of CH2M, which was completed on Dec. 15, leaves the new owner with a conflict of interest at Hanford. Along with being part […]

Having just completed its $3.27 billion buyout of CH2M, Dallas-based Jacobs Engineering released new information Monday about its business going forward as a $15 billion engineering and infrastructure heavyweight. “Today, we are celebrating the creation of a new Jacobs,” Chairman and CEO Steve Demetriou said in a news release. In the release, Jacobs praised CH2M’s […]

A lapse in communication procedures likely contributed the spread of radioactive particles at the Department of Energy’s Hanford Site that contaminated 14 vehicles and led to checks at seven workers’ homes. As of midday Thursday, 240 workers at the Washington state facility had requested bioassays to determine whether they had inhaled radioactive particles. The spread […]

The work of the Energy Department’s nuclear cleanup branch should not be changed significantly by its shift into the Office of the Undersecretary for Science, industry sources said this week. Energy Secretary Rick Perry announced the new home of DOE’s Office of Environmental Management on Dec. 15 as part of a larger DOE reorganization. Moving […]

A team comprised of Stoller Newport News Nuclear and BWX Technologies has been awarded a $1.39 billion contract for legacy cleanup operations at the Energy Department’s Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico. This will be Stoller’s first major operational contract at the nuclear weapons lab, where BWXT is an old hand as a partner […]

Congress on Thursday adopted another budget continuing resolution to keep the federal government, including the Energy Department and its Office of Environmental Management, running through Jan. 19 The stopgap funding measure cleared the House in a 231-188 vote, and the Senate followed up with a 66-32 decision. Just before press time for Weapons Complex Monitor, […]

Placing the Energy Department’s nuclear cleanup branch within the Office of the Undersecretary for Science should not result in sweeping changes in the work, industry sources said this week. Energy Secretary Rick Perry announced the long-anticipated DOE reorganization on Friday. Moving the department’s $6.5 billion Office of Environmental Management from the Office of Management and […]

With the calendar year ticking away, the Energy Department has issued another procurement inquiry — this one a draft request for proposals for a contract valued at roughly $120 million over seven years to provide occupational medical services at the Hanford Site in Washington state. The Energy Department announced the draft RFP on Wednesday. The […]

The total number of vehicles at the Hanford Site with possible specks of radioactive contamination rose to 14 Wednesday after a spread of contaminants that appeared to start Friday at the facility’s Plutonium Finishing Plant. At least two vehicles might have been contaminated before workers drove them home Friday after completion of demolition of the […]

Lynchburg, Va.-based BWX Technologies is interested in a potential 10-year, $4 billion support services contract at the Energy Department’s Hanford Site in Washington state, a spokesperson confirmed Tuesday. BWXT was one of many well-known DOE contractors to send representatives last week to information sessions on DOE’s draft request for proposals on the Hanford Mission Essential […]

Federal and New Mexico officials have scheduled a public meeting on Jan. 16 to discuss planning issues connected with a 2016 settlement agreement to revamp the approach to legacy cleanup at the Department of Energy’s Los Alamos National Laboratory. The New Mexico Environment Department will host the meeting, and DOE’s Environmental Management (EM) Los Alamos […]

Radioactive contamination has been found on eight vehicles that were parked at the Hanford Site’s Plutonium Finishing Plant after a spread of contamination in recent days. Four of the vehicles belonged to employees working on plant demolition and two of them might have already been contaminated when workers left Hanford for the weekend on Friday […]

Changes must be made to Hanford Site’s Waste Encapsulation Storage Facility (WESF) to support moving 1,936 capsules of cesium and strontium out of underwater storage at the facility to dry storage nearby. The Department of Energy released more information about the project as it pursues a related modification to the dangerous waste portion of the […]

Centerra has won 96 percent of its potential fee award from the Department of Energy for providing a security force to protect the Savannah River Site in South Carolina. In particular, DOE in a new award-fee scorecard praised Centerra-Savannah River Site for establishing and testing an “active shooter response plan.” Centerra was also cited for […]

Having just completed its $3.25 billion buyout of CH2M, Dallas-based Jacobs Engineering released new information Monday about its business going forward as a $15 billion engineering and infrastructure heavyweight. “Today, we are celebrating the creation of a new Jacobs,” Chairman and CEO Steve Demetriou said in a news release. In the release, Jacobs praised CH2M’s […]

Cavendish Nuclear has secured a £95 million ($127 million) contract to design and build glove boxes for safe handling of nuclear materials at the Sellafield site in the United Kingdom. The number of glove boxes covered by the 10-year contract was not specified in press releases from Cavendish Nuclear and the U.K. Nuclear Decommissioning Authority, […]

The Federal Aviation Administration on Monday announced that it is prohibiting flights of unmanned aerial vehicles over seven Department of Energy sites around the country. Drone flights will be banned from the surface to 400 feet above ground level at the Hanford Site in Washington state, the Pantex Plant in Texas, the Los Alamos National […]

A new stop work order was declared at the Hanford Site’s Plutonium Finishing Plant over the weekend after another radioactive contamination spread, likely linked to the final demolition of the plant’s Plutonium Reclamation Facility. Small amounts of contamination were found outside the demolition zone Friday night, after a 13-month project to raze the reclamation facility […]

The lure of a potential 10-year, $4 billion support services contract at the Hanford Site in Washington state prompted some of the biggest names within the Department of Energy weapons cleanup complex to sign up for an information session last week on a draft request for proposals for the work. The incumbent contract is held […]

After extending the deadline for an extra week due to Southern California wildfires, the California Department of Toxic Substances Control (DTSC) has closed out the public comment period on two major reports on the cleanup of the radioactively contaminated Santa Susana Field Laboratory. The public comment period for the Santa Susana draft program environmental impact […]

Workers at the Hanford Site in Washington state on Friday finished demolishing the most highly contaminated section of the Plutonium Finishing Plant, its Plutonium Reclamation Facility. Demolition of the reclamation facility began in November 2016 and was almost complete before contractor CH2M Hill Plateau Remediation Co. issued a stop work order Wednesday following possible worker […]

A federal judge has agreed to push the trial date in the Hanford Site chemical vapors lawsuit out to Nov. 26, 2018, more than three years after the case was filed. The new trial date comes after the expiration of the current contract period of one of the plaintiffs, Washington River Protection Solutions (WRPS), unless […]

The Department of Energy on Friday made official a long-rumored bureaucratic reorganization that puts the agency’s Cold War nuclear-cleanup programs under new management but leaves the quasi-independent National Nuclear Security Administration essentially unchanged. The Department of Energy’s (DOE) roughly $6.5-million-a-year Office of Environmental Management (EM), steward of environmental remediation of Cold War nuclear weapons sites […]

After a three-year hiatus, the Department of Energy’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant near Carlsbad, N.M., should resume salt mining in a matter of days, according to site management and operations contractor Nuclear Waste Partnership (NWP). The resumption would mark another key step toward a return to normalcy for the nation’s only permanent underground disposal site […]

Colorado-based CH2M on Friday officially became a wholly owned subsidiary of Dallas-based Jacobs Engineering, CH2M announced in a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. More details about the merger will be disclosed Monday, CH2M said at press time. CH2M shareholders voted Wednesday to approve the buyout. The preliminary results of the special meeting […]

With settlement talks continuing, parties in the chemical vapors lawsuit at the Hanford Site in Washington state have asked a federal judge to delay the trial date for another three months. Parties are requesting that the trial date be extended until Nov. 27, 2018. If a trial occurs then, it would be three years after […]

Following an extended back and forth with the Department of Energy, contractor Bechtel has only been required to repay a sliver of the $5.5 million in costs challenged in a federal audit for its work over several years at the Hanford Site in Washington state. A final determination, issued by DOE Contracting Officer Ronald Cone […]

The contaminated Molten Salt Reactor Experiment at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee could be encased in concrete, according to the top nuclear cleanup official at the Department of Energy site. Oak Ridge Office of Environmental Management (OREM) Manager Jay Mullis told an environmental advisory board in November that DOE is considering the plan. […]

CH2M Hill Plateau Remediation Co. stopped demolition of the Hanford Site’s Plutonium Finishing Plant for two days this week after laboratory results came back positive for air samples collected in seven monitors. The monitors were worn by workers on their lapels to detect radioactive contaminants near the air they breathe. A positive result could mean […]