Vol. 2, No. 34 DOE Cleanup Officials Hope for Infrastructure Dollars, Gird for Funding Cuts
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Budget & Policy
Senators Ping Perry About Postponed Whistleblower Protections
Three Democratic Senators on Monday asked newly minted Energy Secretary Rick Perry to instate new whistleblower protections at the agency that the Trump administration delayed as part of a government-wide regulatory freeze. The whistleblower protection was part of a rule published in the waning days of Barack Obama’s administration that clarified DOE may assess civil penalties against contractors that […]
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National Laboratories
LANL Prepares to Treat Nitrate Salts Drums
PHOENIX — The Los Alamos National Laboratory expects next month to begin treating 60 drums that contain a combustible mix of nitrate salts and kitty litter like that one that blew open and released a small amount of radiation into the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in 2014, officials said here Monday. The incident closed the […]
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National Laboratories
WIPP Shipping Queue Gelling; Oak Ridge, LANL at Back of Line This Year
PHOENIX — The first three sites to ship transuranic waste to the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) in New Mexico will be privately operated Waste Control Specialists of Andrews, Texas; the Idaho National Laboratory, and the Savannah River National Laboratory, a senior DOE official said here Monday. DOE has not yet decided which of those […]
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Interim Storage & Waste Disposal
Michigan Senate Panel OKs Rad Waste Resolutions
The Michigan Senate Energy and Technology Committee last week advanced three resolutions calling on the federal government to take action to address the naitonal dilemma posed by high-level radioactive waste and spent nuclear fuel. “Safe and reliable nuclear energy provides much or our nation’s power and can continue to help us meet our current and […]
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Commercial Decommissioning
Pilgrim to Remain in NRC Column 4
Entergy’s Pilgrim Nuclear Power Station will remain in Column 4 of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s Action Matrix, the regulator said last week in its annual assessment of the beleaguered plant. “While the plant remains in Column 4, the NRC will continuously assess Pilgrim’s performance to evaluate the need for additional regulatory action up to and […]
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Plutonium Pit Production
NRC Lauds MOX Contractor’s 2016 Construction, Safety Performance
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission lauded CB&I AREVA MOX Services, which is building the embattled Mixed Oxide Fuel Fabrication Facility in South Carolina, for its construction program and oversight in an assessment of the contractor’s construction activities and safety performance during 2016. The regulatory body said in a March 2 letter to CB&I AREVA MOX Services that the […]
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International
Veolia Snags U.K. Nuclear Plants’ Water Treatment Contract
French waste management company Veolia announced Monday that its Nuclear Solutions branch has secured a contract to provide treatment systems for irradiated water at four U.K. nuclear power plants being dismantled by Magnox Ltd. Veolia will design, construct, and deploy its Modular Active Effluent Treatment Plants (MAETPs) to remove radioactive material from effluent and pond water at […]