Cleanup & Remediation

A group of current and former Department of Energy contractors at the Portsmouth Site in Ohio are again targets of a federal lawsuit, this one filed by a plaintiff suffering from cancer who attended a now-shuttered middle school near the former gaseous diffusion plant. Christian Rose, diagnosed in June with Burkitt Lymphoma, a cancer of […]

The Department of Energy is giving interested bidders two extra weeks to submit proposals for the new Occupational Medical Contract at the Hanford Site in Washington state, according to a procurement notice published Monday. Response to the partial request for proposals that came out last month are now due April 24 rather than the earlier […]

The Department of Energy has a nickname: “the Department of Everything,” the acting DOE nuclear cleanup boss told weapons complex citizen advisory board chairs Tuesday.   The DOE Office of Environmental Management senior adviser William (Ike) White retold the joke during a Washington, D.C., meeting. The description applies to an agency involved in issues ranging from […]

The federal watchdog for Department of Energy nuclear defense sites continues to pursue “an aggressive staffing plan” initiated over the past two years to make up for workforce brain-drain, according to an agency budget justification document issued last week. For fiscal year 2024, the administration of President Joe Biden (D) requested $47.2 million for the […]

The 1,200 or so employees at the Department of Energy’s Office of Environmental Management will almost-certainly be retired by the time the Hanford Site in Washington state is fully cleaned up, based upon the budget request issued last week by the White House. The acting boss for Environment Management, said last fall the nuclear cleanup […]

Bills pending before the South Carolina legislature could split the state regulator for the Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site near Aiken into two separate organizations, a state agency official told the Citizens Advisory Board for the federal complex Monday. Susan Fulmer, manager of federal remediation for the South Carolina Department of Health and Environmental […]

Work continues on transfer of the Savannah River Site landlord authority to the Department of Energy’s semi-autonomous National Nuclear Security Administration, the top cleanup fed at the South Carolina complex told a DOE advisory panel this week. A joint team of DOE Office of Environmental Management and National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) representatives should issue […]

Work continues on transfer of the Savannah River Site landlord authority to the Department of Energy’s semi-autonomous National Nuclear Security Administration, the top cleanup fed at the South Carolina complex told a DOE advisory panel this week. A joint team of DOE Office of Environmental Management and National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) representatives should issue […]

Bills pending before the South Carolina legislature could split the state regulator for the Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site near Aiken into two separate organizations, a state agency official told the Citizens Advisory Board for the federal complex Monday. Susan Fulmer, manager of federal remediation for the South Carolina Department of Health and Environmental […]

A small business solicitation for nuclear cleanup, expected out within the next month, could be the only new one to hit the street by August, the Department of Energy Environmental Management Consolidated Business Center said this week. The DOE previously said the request for proposals (RFP) Small Business Nationwide Deactivation, Decommissioning and Removal contract could […]

The 2024 budget for the Department of Energy’s Hanford Site in Washington state would grow to an unprecedented $3 billion or so from $2.7 billion this year, if President Joe Biden’s fiscal 2024 budget request became law. Overall, however, the administration’s budget request would keep funding at the DOE Office of Environmental Management about flat […]

The Department of Energy is “on track” to start solidifying liquid radioactive waste at the Hanford Site in Washington state “no later than 2025,” the agency said in its latest budget request this week.  That timeline, less optimistic than the December 2023 goal the DOE’s Office of Environmental Management was targeting until a few months […]

The Department of Energy’s Huntington Ingalls-led legacy cleanup team at the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico is being extended for another three years, a company official told a federal advisory board meeting this week. Newport News Nuclear BWXT Los Alamos (N3B) “was recently notified that DOE will exercise the first option period under […]

The Department of Energy is “on track” to start solidifying liquid radioactive waste at the Hanford Site in Washington state “no later than 2025,” the agency said in its latest budget request this week.  That timeline, less optimistic than the December 2023 goal the DOE’s Office of Environmental Management was targeting until a few months […]

The Department of Energy’s Office of Environmental Management would, after helping prop up the Uranium Enrichment Decontamination and Decommissioning Fund again in fiscal 2024, effectively stay flat at $8.3 billion, according to White House budget request details released this week. Defense Environmental Cleanup, the largest tranche of the nuclear cleanup budget, would be relatively flat […]

Bills pending before the South Carolina legislature could split the state regulator for the Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site near Aiken into two separate organizations, a state agency official told the Citizens Advisory Board for the federal complex Monday. Susan Fulmer, manager of federal remediation for the South Carolina Department of Health and Environmental […]

Details appended to President Joe Biden’s fiscal 2024 budget request show the budget for the Department of Energy’s Hanford Site in Washington state would grow to about $3 billion, up from $2.7 billion from the current fiscal year. “The fiscal year 2024 record Hanford budget request by President Biden of more than $3 billion is […]

Work continues on transfer of the Savannah River Site landlord authority to the Department of Energy’s semi-autonomous National Nuclear Security Administration, the top cleanup fed at the South Carolina complex told a DOE advisory panel Monday. A joint team of DOE Office of Environmental Management and National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) representatives should issue a […]

The top boss from the Department of Energy’s former prime contractor at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico is now a project manager with the Amentum-led environmental remediation contractor at the Oak Ridge Site in Tennessee, according to his LinkedIn profile. Sean Dunagan was president and project manager of Amentum-led Nuclear Waste Partnership […]

Employees of the Oak Ridge National Laboratory who sued over the lab contractor’s COVID-19 vaccination policy have “narrowed the issues” to be addressed in ongoing settlement talks, according to a recent court filing. Attorneys for the management contractor UT-Battelle, composed of the University of Tennessee and Battelle, and the half-dozen employees who sued, should report […]

Former Idaho Gov. Phil Batt (R) died March 4 at age 96. During Batt’s tenure, Idaho inked a 1995 settlement the U.S. Navy and Department of Energy governing cleanup and removal of nuclear spent fuel from the Idaho National Laboratory. Gov. Brad Little (R) immediately ordered the lowering of Idaho and American flags in Batt’s […]

Butte County, Idaho sued Secretary of Energy Jennifer Granholm in federal court this week over continued spent nuclear fuel storage at the Department of Energy’s Idaho National Laboratory. The county says DOE should bear the “social” and “economic” costs of the Idaho National Laboratory (INL) serving as a “default repository” for nuclear waste from entities […]

President Joe Biden recently announced his intent to nominate Patricia Lee, who has more than 30 years of experience with radiation protection issues at the Savannah River National Laboratory in South Carolina and elsewhere, to serve on the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board. Lee now serves as the portfolio manager for the laboratory’s digital enterprise, […]

President Joe Biden recently announced his intent to nominate Patricia Lee, who has more than 30 years of experience with radiation protection issues at the Savannah River National Laboratory in South Carolina and elsewhere, to serve on the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board. Lee now serves as the portfolio manager for the laboratory’s digital enterprise, […]

A small leak of simulant, detected last week, has been cleaned up at a waste treatment facility undergoing commissioning at the Department of Energy’s Idaho National Laboratory, a spokesperson said Wednesday. The “final preparations for the start of radiological operations” within the coming weeks, are continuing by DOE and its Jacobs-led contractor, Idaho Environmental Coalition, […]

A legal challenge to COVID-19 vaccination policy at the Department of Energy’s Hanford Site in Washington state will be heard in early May by a panel of judges for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, according to a notice posted online last week. Oral arguments in David Donovan versus Brian Vance are […]

PHOENIX – The Department of Energy is expected to hand down more guidance this spring and summer on what agency sites should do about a group of synthetic chemicals first widely-used during the Manhattan Project days for uranium-separation. That was the word here last Thursday from Karen Skubal, an environmental engineer with the DOE’s Office […]

The Department of Energy nuclear cleanup procurement office said this week it intends to increase the maximum value of a small business Technical Assistance Contract at the Moab Uranium Mill Tailings site in Utah by $1.7 million. In a Tuesday notice, the DOE Environmental Management Consolidated Business Center announced plans to increase the set-aside contract […]

The Department of Energy’s nuclear cleanup office should roll out its final solicitation for a national deactivation set-aside contract for small businesses by April 8, the agency said last week. The Small Business Nationwide Deactivation, Decommissioning and Removal contract pre-solicitation notice dated March 1 anticipates the final request for proposals (RFP) within 45 days from […]

President Joe Biden’s (D) administration announced Thursday it wants $8.3 billion for cleanup of Cold War and Manhattan Project nuclear properties for fiscal 2024, which would be flat with the final Congressional appropriation for the current spending year ending Sept. 30. A 182-page overview of the fiscal 2024 budget recommendation was released at mid-day by […]