Washington River Protection Solutions (WRPS), the waste storage tank farm contractor at the Hanford Site, has named a new president.
John Eschenberg, WRPS deputy project manager of waste feed delivery, will succeed Mark Lindholm as president on Oct. 8 after a transition period.
Lindholm, WRPS president and project manager since October 2015, sent a message to employees Wednesday saying he will remain based in the Hanford area as an AECOM senior vice president of strategic initiatives. Washington River Protection Solutions is owned by AECOM and Atkins.
Eschenberg worked for the Department of Energy’s Hanford Office of River Protection from 2003 to 2009, including as the project manager for the Waste Treatment Plant. He returned to Hanford in early 2018 after a 14-month stint as project director for Salt Waste Processing Facility Integration and Tank Closure Cesium Removal for Savannah River Remediation, liquid waste manager at the Savannah River Site in South Carolina.
Eschenberg has served as a manager in DOE’s three major programs: Environmental Management, Science, and the National Nuclear Security Administration, Lindholm said. He has 25 years of industry experience in nuclear construction and contract management.
“I believe this team, along with John’s capable leadership, will continuing making great progress,” Lindholm told employees.
Washington River Protection Solutions has a 10-year contract worth $7.1 billion to manage underground tanks that hold 56 million gallons of radioactive waste generated by decades of plutonium production at Hanford. The contract expires next month, but DOE has said it plans to extend the contract for up to a year.
Lindholm listed accomplishments at WRPS in recent years, including 7.6 million hours worked without a lost-time injury. Washington River Protection Solutions has earned four consecutive DOE Voluntary Protection Program Innovation Awards, and in 2017 it won the Campbell Institute Innovation Challenge award for a program to monitor workers to prevent heat-related disorders. The contractor also received the Project Management Institute’s Project of the Year award in 2017 for its work to empty double-shell Tank AY-102, which was leaking waste between its shells.
“Our time together hasn’t been without challenges,” Lindholm told employees, discussing efforts to protect workers from inhaling chemical vapors associated with tank waste. “To address challenges associated with chemical vapors, we have extended stacks in the farms, tested new abatement technologies and enhanced our protective gear in the field to safeguard our employees,” he said.
