Vol. 33, No. 24 
Replacement parts among plenty of risks for Hanford liquid waste project, GAO reports
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Cleanup & Remediation
New chief of waste and materials management at EM
The Department of Energy’s Office of Environmental Management appointed Betsy Forinash, a 30-year veteran of nuclear-cleanup and regulatory work, as the deputy assistant secretary for waste and materials management, the cleanup branch said Thursday. Forinash’s selection was announced by Candice Robertson, acting principal deputy assistant secretary for the Office of Environmental Management, or EM-2, in […]
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Decommissioning
Portsmouth X-326 Building comes down
The cleanup contractor at the Department of Energy’s Portsmouth Site in Ohio has brought down the 56-acre X-326 Process Building, the agency said Thursday. The demolition of X-326 down to the slab is a big milestone for the DOE Office of Environmental Management and was telegraphed last week by speakers for the agency and contractor […]
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Transuranic Waste
Incumbent WIPP waste hauler CAST wins follow-on contract
The Department of Energy on Thursday awarded incumbent CAST Specialty Transportation a new five-year contract with a maximum $100-million value for haulage of defense-related transuranic waste to the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant near Carlsbad, N.M. CAST won the new Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) Transportation Services small business set-aside contract over three other proposals, the […]
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Transuranic Waste
WIPP shipments running behind 2021 levels through May
The Department of Energy’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant near Carlsbad, N.M., received 12 shipments during May, according to the public website for the disposal site. The dozen shipments in May 2022 are eight fewer than the 20 recorded in May 2021. So far during the calendar year 2022, the underground salt mine has received 67 […]
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Transuranic Waste
DOE Carlsbad boss reacts to stranded Los Alamos waste; shrugs off question of rail transport
SUMMERLIN, NEV. — The manager of the Department of Energy’s Carlsbad Field Office in New Mexico last week declined to provide a timeline for moving potentially combustible drums of stranded Los Alamos National Laboratory transuranic waste to the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant from a private site in Texas. Reinhard Knerr, who manages the DOE Carlsbad […]
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Cleanup & Remediation
Moab tailings cleanup enters home stretch, DOE officials tell NRC
The Department of Energy expects priority work at the Moab uranium tailings site in Utah to be largely done within four years, officials with DOE’s Office of Environmental Management told the Nuclear Regulatory Commission during a virtual briefing Wednesday. “We are getting close to closure,” at the Moab Uranium Mill Tailings project, said Russell McCallister, […]
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Transuranic Waste
DOE assessment urges improved safety practices on WIPP utility shaft
The subcontractor in charge of sinking a new utility shaft at the Department of Energy’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant near Carlsbad, N.M., needs to fix potential safety hazards, the federal agency said in a recent assessment. While prime contractor Nuclear Waste Partnership and subcontractor Harrison Western-Shaft Sinkers have a “generally adequate construction safety program,” they […]
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Cleanup & Remediation
Hanford vaccine objectors file appeal with Ninth Circuit
Hanford workers in Washington State who unsuccessfully challenged the site’s COVID-19 vaccine mandate in federal district court are taking their case to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. A group of 317 federal and contractor employees at the Hanford Site, three of whom say they have been fired from their jobs, filed […]
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National Laboratories
Oak Ridge Laboratory workers settle vaccination case in federal court
Six employees at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee have settled their lawsuit contesting the COVID-19 vaccination policy implemented by prime contractor UT-Battelle, according to documents filed in federal court this week. U.S. District Judge Charles Atchley Jr. officially closed the books on the case in a single-page order Tuesday, citing […]
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High-Level & Tank Waste
Wrap Up: IWTU test plugging away; legal support sought; plaintiff lawyer dies
The Department of Energy’s confirmatory run of its Integrated Waste Treatment Unit at the Idaho National Laboratory has been paused once for about a day since its resumption May 23, a state official said Tuesday. The Integrated Waste Treatment Unit (IWTU) “is currently operating at steady state conditions for the Confirmatory Run,” Kim Custer, a […]