Vol. 5, No. 61 COVID-19 Has Feds Seeking Delay on Some Hanford Tasks
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Cleanup & Remediation
6,000 Hanford Workers Now Inside the Fence
More than half of the Department of Energy’s 11,000-member workforce at the Hanford Site are back inside the fence, a Department of Energy official said Wednesday. Hanford is bringing 190 additional workers back onsite this week, Erik Olds, DOE’s deputy integration manager for direct-feed low-activity waste, told the Hanford Advisory Board during an online meeting. […]
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Plutonium Pit Production
NNSA Could Publish Environmental Study on Savannah River Pit Plant Soon
The National Nuclear Security Administration will soon finish an environmental review that will allow the civilian nuclear-weapons agency to formalize a decision to make plutonium pits in South Carolina, a source said Wednesday. The semiautonomous Department of Energy agency had approved the final site-specific environmental impact statement this week and could publish it any day, […]
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Commercial Decommissioning
TMI-2 License Transfer Expected Soon, NRC Official Says
The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission plans to complete the Three Mile Island Unit 2 license transfer by fall of this year, according to Bruce Watson, Chief of the NRC Reactor Decommissioning Branch. If approved, GPU Nuclear, the FirstEnergy subsidiary that currently owns the reactor, will be allowed to transfer its license to a TMI-2 Solutions, […]
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Cleanup & Remediation
Washington State Nuclear Oversight Director Leaving Post
The head of the nuclear waste cleanup program at the Washington state Department of Ecology is leaving the position at the end of October to take another job with the state. Ecology cleanup director Alex Smith is moving to a position with the Washington Department of Natural Resources as the deputy supervisor for aquatics, she […]
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Commercial Decommissioning
Holtec to submit Palisades application by early 2021
Holtec plans to submit its license transfer application to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to acquire the Palisades Power Plant by the end of this year or early 2021, Andrea Sterdis, Holtec’s vice president of regulatory & environmental affairs, said Tuesday. The company announced plans to acquire the Covert, Michigan-based plant from Entergy Corp. for decommissioning […]
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International
NNSA, Norway, Working on Downblend Study for Norwegian HEU
The National Nuclear Security Administration is consulting with Norway on a study about whether the nordic nation can downblend its own stock of highly enriched uranium and thorium, U.S. and Norwegian officials announced this week. In 2020, the semiautonomous Department of Energy nuclear weapons agency expects to spend only about $50,000 on the effort, which […]
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Nuclear Weapons & Stockpile
Clarification
The story “FirstEnergy Outs its Own Investigation by SEC” [Weapons Complex Morning Briefing, 09/23/2020] should have said that FirstEnergy Corp. no longer owns the Davis-Besse and Perry nuclear power plants, which allegedly benefited from a financial bailout that the Ohio legislature agreed to pass because of a bribery scheme to which FirstEnergy has been tied […]
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Cleanup & Remediation
Correction:
The story “Bechtel, Amentum Predecessor to Pay About $58M to Resolve Fraud Claims at Hanford” [Weapons Complex Morning Briefing, 09/22/2020] should have said that, in addition to Bechtel, AECOM Energy & Construction is the other company named in the Justice Department settlement on overbilling at the Hanford Site in Washington state. AECOM Energy and Construction […]