LAWMAKERS WANT GAO TO EXAMINE WIPP OPERATIONS

In the wake of two incidents that have resulted in the ongoing shutdown of the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant, the Senate Armed Services Committee is looking to have the Government Accountability Office review operations at the facility. The Senate version of the Fiscal Year 2015 National Defense Authorization Act would direct the GAO to “review program operations at the plant with respect to safety and contractor assurance systems and compare the operations of the plant with respect to best practices developed by the GAO for program management and safety standards by the DOE and other applicable agencies,” according to the committee report accompanying the bill. Details of the bill were made public yesterday.

The WIPP facility is expected to be shut down for the foreseeable future as the Department of Energy works to recover from a truck fire that occurred in early February, and a radiological release that occurred later that month. A DOE investigation into the truck fire found that the incident had been preventable and highlighted a number of issues, including a lack of preventative maintenance and an inadequate response to the incident. The DOE investigation into the radiological release, the cause of which remains unknown, found inadequate safety requirements, safety culture concerns and lax oversight, among other concerns.