Contracts & Procurement

Centrus Energy Corp., Bethesda, Md., on Wednesday posted net income of about $41.5 million, or $2.95 a share for the 2021 third quarter, up from a loss of $7 million or 83 cents a share, in the year-ago period. Quarterly revenue was about $91 million, up from more than $57.5 million a year ago, mostly […]

More than 90% of the workers for both the Department of Energy environmental management field office and the legacy cleanup contractor at the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico, are now vaccinated against COVID-19, a federal official told a DOE advisory committee Wednesday. In addition, cleanup of radioactive contamination on a stretch of a […]

As soon as next week, the Department of Energy’s Office of Environmental Management should issue a draft solicitation for a Decontamination and Decommissioning Contract at the Portsmouth Site in Ohio, the agency said recently. The draft request for proposals (RFP) should show up sometime between Nov. 17 and Dec. 17, the agency’s nuclear-weapons cleanup office […]

Before it even started, the Department of Energy on Tuesday cancelled a competition for a Savannah River Site management and operations contract worth billions, citing an increase of National Nuclear Security Administration nuclear weapons work at the site. “The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) is indefinitely delaying the Final Request for Proposal (RFP) for the […]

Declining to block the lab’s COVID-19 vaccine mandate, a judge ruled Monday that Los Alamos National Laboratory Employees who will not take a required COVID-19 vaccine and are unsatisfied with receiving unpaid leave as their religious exemption from the shot must hash things out with the lab in arbitration. Pending the outcomes of other lawsuits […]

Bill Condon became the lead for Amentum’s Nuclear & Environment Business, replacing the recently promoted Jim Blankenhorn, and will quarterback the company’s pursuit of Department of Energy defense-nuclear site contracts, the closely held Germantown, Md., group announced. A longtime URS man who remained with the company through the AECOM years, Condon has more than 30 […]

This week, the Department of Energy will brief losing bidders about its rationale for awarding multi-billion-dollar nuclear-cleanup contracts to teams led by Amentum and BWX Technologies, a senior industry official said last week at the Radwaste Summit in Summerlin, Nev. The executive made the comments on the sidelines of the annual summit, sponsored by ExchangeMonitor […]

More COVID-19 vaccine refusers have joined a lawsuit against Savannah River Nuclear Solutions, the management and operations contractor at the Savannah River Site, and have amended their lawsuit to list fear of death from vaccines as a reason a federal judge should block the contractor’s vaccine mandate. The amended complaint filed this week fine-tuned the […]

SUMMERLIN, NEV. The Department of Energy expects the integrated Waste Treatment Unit to take up to seven years to treat roughly 850,000 gallons of highly radioactive sodium-bearing liquid tank waste at the Idaho National Laboratory, an agency official said Friday. Following the heatup that started Oct. 24, DOE and Fluor Idaho is about to commence […]

SUMMERLIN, NEV. — The Department of Energy’s plan to conduct market research about siting a federal interim spent fuel storage facility might amount to nothing if industry and spent fuel host communities do not raise a ruckus around it, a trade group executive said this week at the annual Decommissioning Strategy Forum. Although a Department […]

SUMMERLIN, NEV — When it comes to getting spent nuclear fuel away from former power plant sites, the industry is “doing the wrong thing” to pressure the federal government to take action, a utility executive said here this week. “[W]e really need to engage our governors and host communities more effectively to urge the federal […]

SUMMERLIN, NEV. — Advocacy in Washington for a consent-based approach to siting a permanent repository for the nation’s nuclear waste is only a political football that stalling “meaningful” progress towards a disposal solution, an official from the county hosting the moribund Yucca Mountain repository said here this week. “I believe we’re at a point where […]

A federal district judge in Tennessee has refused to issue a preliminary injunction against the Department of Energy’s management contractor for the Oak Ridge National Laboratory in a case brought by a small group of plaintiffs refusing to comply with a vaccine mandate. While contractor UT-Battelle’s treatment of employees seeking vaccine exemptions could have been […]

Although a federal judge in Tennessee turned down a preliminary injunction for vaccine holdouts at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory, and contractor UT-Battelle has asked that the lawsuit be tossed, a federal magistrate could take over the case. On Tuesday, District Judge Charles Atchley, Jr. said he wants a federal magistrate judge […]

Between now and 2025, the Department of Energy envisions having a single operations office at the Hanford Site in Washington state rather than the current two, according to a procurement-related document. Although they have separate budgets approved by Congress, the Richland Operations Office and the Office of River Protection have reported to the same boss, […]

Members of United Steelworkers Local Union 1-689, working in deactivation and demolition at the Department of Energy’s former gaseous diffusion plant complex in Ohio,this week  approved a two-year contract extension Monday with Fluor-BWXT Portsmouth. The local union’s president, Herman Potter, declined to provide a vote count. Turnout was light but those who did vote went […]

There were 99 confirmed active cases of COVID-19 in the Department of Energy nuclear cleanup complex during the past week, a spokesperson with the office of Environmental Management said via Thursday email.  That is 16 less than the prior week. It is also much less than late September when the Environmental Management (EM) weekly case […]

SUMMERLIN, NEV. Like other branches of the federal government, the Department of Energy’s Office of Environmental Management has a graying workforce and a pressing need to attract new blood in the coming years, speakers said here Thursday at the Radwaste Summit. The crowd at the summit “looks fabulous, I must say, but none of us […]

Though it has posted a loss for the year so far overall, Fluor, Irving, Texas, ratcheted up its earnings guidance for continuing operations in 2021 after boosting the bottom line and booking a big contract extension from DOE, the company reported this week. Also, in an earnings presentation Friday, Fluor — whose team at the […]

Though it has posted a loss for the year so far overall, Fluor, Irving, Texas, ratcheted up its earnings guidance for continuing operations in 2021 after boosting the bottom line and booking a big contract extension from DOE, the company reported this week. Also, in an earnings presentation Friday, Fluor — whose team at the […]

SUMMERLIN, NEV. The Department of Energy expects to fill most of its vacancies at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant near Carlsbad, N.M., by May 2022, representatives of the Government Accountability Office, said here Thursday. The Government Accountability Office (GAO) reported last November the DOE Carlsbad Field Office that oversees the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) […]

SUMMERLIN, NEV. — A labor union official representing workers at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge Site in Tennessee had kind words Thursday for the manner in which the site’s remediation contractor, an Amentum-Jacobs partnership, handled its COVID-19 vaccine mandate. “They confronted their unvaccinated,” by setting an early, Oct. 1 deadline, Jimmy Hart, president of […]

The Navy exercised a one-year, $1-billion option on Fluor Marine Propulsion’s Naval Reactors contract, which includes management of the National Nuclear Security Administration’s multi-site Naval Nuclear Laboratory in Idaho, New York and Pennsylvania, the parent company said this week. Fluor Marine Propulsion, Arlington, Va., snagged the naval labs business from Bechtel Marine Propulsion Corp. in 2018 as […]

Fresh off a big win at the Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site last week, BWX Technologies, Lynchburg, Va., reported Oct. 29 that profits dipped a little in the third quarter as revenue took a bit of a tumble. BWXT Technologies (BWXT) posted net income of about $60 million, or 63 cents a share in […]

Leidos, the lead team member on the Hanford Site’s support services contractor, is offering employees who don’t want to take a COVID-19 vaccination the option of moving over to the commercial side of the business, CEO Roger Krone said this week on a conference call. Based on vaccination cards turned into the company, Krone said […]

Members of United Steelworkers Local Union 1-689, working in deactivation and demolition at the Department of Energy’s former gaseous diffusion plant complex in Ohio, approved a two-year contract extension Monday with Fluor-BWXT Portsmouth. The local union’s president, Herman Potter, declined to provide a vote count. Turnout was light but those who did vote went “overwhelmingly […]

Leidos, the lead team member on the Hanford Site’s support services contractor, is offering employees who don’t want to take a COVID-19 vaccination the option of moving over to the commercial side of the business, CEO Roger Krone said Tuesday on a conference call. Based on vaccination cards turned into the company, Krone said Leidos […]

Between now and 2025, the Department of Energy envisions having a single operations office at the Hanford Site in Washington state rather than the current two, according to a procurement-related document. Although they have separate budgets approved by Congress, the Richland Operations Office and the Office of River Protection have reported to the same boss, […]

The Navy exercised a one-year, $1-billion option on Fluor Marine Propulsion’s Naval Reactors contract, which includes management of the National Nuclear Security Administration’s multi-site Naval Nuclear Laboratory in Idaho, New York and Pennsylvania, the parent company said Monday. Fluor Marine Propulsion, Arlington, Va., snagged the naval labs business from Bechtel Marine Propulsion Corp. in 2018 […]

The Government Accountability Office says in a recent report the Department of Energy should better evaluate and prioritize research and development needs across the weapons complex, rather than relying so much on individual field offices and national labs. The Government Accountability Office (GAO) also said in the report released Thursday that DOE’s assistant secretary for […]