Cleanup & Remediation

CH2M Hill Plateau Remediation Co. has awarded an $11.3 million subcontract to prepare for installation of remotely operated equipment to clean up the highly radioactive spill beneath the Hanford Site’s 324 Building. The subcontract went to Apollo Mechanical Contractors, headquartered in Kennewick, Wash., near Hanford. Apollo is expected to begin work in the next few […]

The Savannah River Site in South Carolina garnered a 99.9 percent compliance rate last year for the amount of pollutants it discharges into water on and off the site, according to the management and operations contractor for the Department of Energy facility. The compliance rate is based on the regularity with which SRS remained in […]

Senior officials with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency will attend a “community listening session” Thursday on the West Lake Landfill in Missouri. The landfill holds waste from the former uranium production facility at Mallinckrodt Chemical Works in St. Louis. It is encompassed within a federal Superfund site, alongside the adjacent Bridgeton Landfill, where an underground […]

Pasadena, Calif.-based Tetra Tech has received an $85 million contract from the Environmental Protection Agency to evaluate uranium contamination at 30 former uranium mines located on and near Navajo Nation land. The contract also covers training Navajos to carry out work associated with the evaluation and remediation, according to an Oct. 11 EPA press release. […]

While it has settled the case, Hanford Site subcontractor Sage Tec on Friday vigorously denied allegations made in a federal fraud lawsuit. The company released a statement a week after the Department of Justice said Sage Tec had agreed to pay a $235,000 settlement. Sage Tec was accused of using its status as a small, […]

About 200 workers were recently laid off from the MOX project at the Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site, construction prime CB&I AREVA MOX Services said this week. Gentry Brann, a spokeswoman for contractor parent CB&I, said the project employed about 2,200 workers at SRS before the recent layoffs. She did not say when the layoffs […]

  The state of South Carolina has asked for summary judgment in its recent $100 million lawsuit against the Department of Energy over plutonium disposition at the Savannah River Site. The request was filed Oct. 6 – the same day the federal agency asked that the suit be thrown out. South Carolina filed the complaint […]

The hundreds of security personnel still on strike at the Energy Department’s Savannah River Site in South Carolina are expected to return soon as their union and employer wrap up negotiations for a contract that won’t expire until October 2022. It was not immediately clear when the deal will be signed. Among its provisions, the new labor agreement […]

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), a vocal advocate for the Energy Department’s Mixed Oxide Fuel Fabrication Facility and a sometimes-vocal critic of President Donald Trump, spent the U.S. Columbus Day holiday golfing with the commander in chief, multiple news outlets reported. CNN captured video of the senator on the Trump National Golf Club in Sterling, Va. A […]

The hundreds of security personnel still on strike at the Energy Department’s Savannah River Site in South Carolina are expected to return soon as their union and employer wrap up negotiations for a contract that won’t expire until October 2022. It was not immediately clear when the deal will be signed. Among its provisions, the new labor agreement […]

About 200 workers were recently laid off from the MOX project at the Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site, construction prime CB&I AREVA MOX Services said this week. Gentry Brann, a spokeswoman for contractor parent CB&I, said the project employed about 2,200 workers at SRS before the recent layoffs. She did not say when the layoffs […]

Energy Secretary Rick Perry told a House of Representatives panel Thursday that progress is being made in improving the history of cost overruns and missed deadlines on big projects administered through the Energy Department’s Office of Environmental Management. Perry testified for more than three hours before the House Energy and Commerce energy subcommittee. While much […]

Installation of the two melters for the Low-Activity Waste Facility at the Hanford’ Site’s Waste Treatment Plant has been completed, a key milestone on the project, plant officials announced Wednesday. “When operational, these melters will be the largest operating vitrification plant melters in the world,” said Bill Hamel, Department of Energy project director for the […]

A Benton County, Wash., Superior Court jury found in favor of a former employee’s lawsuit against Mission Support Alliance on Tuesday, requiring the Hanford Site support services contractor to pay damages of $8.1 million. Manager Julie Atwood resigned when she was told she would be fired from MSA in 2013. She filed a lawsuit claiming […]

The state of South Carolina has asked for summary judgment in its recent $100 million lawsuit against the Department of Energy over plutonium disposition at the Savannah River Site. The request was filed Oct. 6 – the same day the federal agency asked that the suit be thrown out. South Carolina filed the complaint on Aug. […]

Hanford Subcontractor Settles Federal Fraud Case Sage Tec and its owner, Laura Shikashio, have agreed to pay $235,000 to settle allegations of subcontracting fraud at the Hanford Site in Washington state, the Department of Justice said on Oct. 6. The announcement came less than a month after a second Hanford-area company in the federal court […]

The hundreds of security personnel still on strike at the Energy Department’s Savannah River Site in South Carolina are expected to return soon as their union and employer wrap up negotiations for a contract that won’t expire until October 2022. It was not immediately clear when the deal will be signed. Among its provisions, the new labor agreement […]

A Benton County, Wash., Superior Court jury found in favor of a former employee’s lawsuit against Mission Support Alliance on Tuesday, requiring the Hanford Site support services contractor to pay damages of $8.1 million. Manager Julie Atwood had resigned when she was told she would be fired from MSA in 2013. She filed a lawsuit […]

Sage Tec and its owner, Laura Shikashio, have agreed to pay $235,000 to settle allegations of subcontracting fraud at the Hanford Site in Washington state, the Department of Justice said Friday. The announcement came less than a month after a second Hanford-area company in the federal court case, Federal Engineers & Constructors (FE&C), agreed to […]

The state of South Carolina has asked for summary judgment in its recent $100 million lawsuit against the Department of Energy over plutonium disposition at the Savannah River Site. The request was filed Friday – the same day the federal agency asked that the suit be thrown out. South Carolina filed the complaint on Aug. 7 in […]

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), a vocal advocate for the Energy Department’s Mixed Oxide Fuel Fabrication Facility and a sometimes-vocal critic of President Donald Trump, spent the U.S. Columbus Day holiday golfing with the commander in chief, multiple news outlets reported. CNN captured video of the senator on the Trump National Golf Club in Sterling, Va. […]

The federal trial for the Hanford Site chemical vapors safety lawsuit case has been delayed until Aug. 29, 2018. Judge Thomas Rice, of U.S. District Court for Eastern Washington, agreed Thursday to delay the trial and interim deadlines in the case by about 30 days at the request of defendants and plaintiffs. The next deadline […]

South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster is urging the state’s congressional delegation to continue advocating for the MOX project at the Energy Department’s Savannah River Site, which is again in danger of being defunded. In a Sept. 14 letter, McMaster provided all lawmakers from the state with a recent report from the governor’s South Carolina Nuclear […]

The Department of Energy on Tuesday finalized the membership package to reconstitute the Hanford Advisory Board (HAB), which has been unable to establish a quorum to conduct business for three months. Membership for about half the members of the board expired at the end of June. Half of the members and their alternates for 32 […]

Crews at the Hanford Site in Washington state by Thursday morning had injected 61 truckloads of grout into the PUREX Plant waste storage tunnel that was discovered on May 9 to have partially collapsed. Work was scheduled to continue Thursday night, when traffic would be light as cement trucks hauled the grout to the underground […]

The Department of Energy’s Volpentest HAMMER Federal Training Center at the Hanford Site was praised at its 20th anniversary celebration Thursday by officials ranging from national and international organized labor leaders to the governor of Washington. The 88-acre facility, a training center for Hanford workers, includes classrooms and an extensive set of training props, including: […]

The Energy Department’s Savannah River Site downblended 16 kilograms of nuclear weapon-usable plutonium in fiscal 2017, and is expected to nearly double amount in the current budget year. Officials from the South Carolina facility reported the figure last week during a bimonthly meeting of the SRS Citizens Advisory Board (CAB). Downblending began in September 2016, […]

In what appears to be a sign of progress, Bechtel National has filed a revised preliminary documented safety analysis to the Department of Energy for the Hanford Site Waste Treatment Plant’s High-Level Waste Facility. The document is intended to support the resumption of procurement and construction on the facility, according to a newly released weekly […]

The California Department of Toxic Substances Control expects cleanup work to begin at the Santa Susana Field Laboratory (SSFL) site in 2019 and possibly be finished in 2034, according to the timeline laid out in the agency’s latest monthly report on the radioactively contaminated 2,850-acre site in Ventura County. The Santa Susana project has been […]

A new president has been named for Hanford Site support services provider Mission Support Alliance (MSA) as the current president, Bill Johnson, moves on to a corporate job at Leidos. Johnson has served as MSA president since early 2015 and will leave Hanford on Oct. 16, according to a message he sent to employees Thursday. […]