Since Oct. 1, the Department of Energy’s Office of Environmental Management has gained its first Senate-confirmed boss in years and the megadollar Waste Treatment Plant at the Hanford Site finally started turning radioactive sludge into a solid glass form.
Those are perhaps the two biggest headlines around the Environmental Management (EM) cleanup complex since DOE and other federal agencies experienced a lapse in funding on Oct. 1.
Forty-three days is a long time and Weapons Complex Monitor would like to welcome back its many readers at agencies, contractors and subcontractors affected by the just-concluded government shutdown.
Here’s a quick summary of big developments affecting Cold War and Manhattan Project sites since Sept. 30.
After decades of planning, construction, modifications and setbacks, the Bechtel-built Waste Treatment and Immobilization Plant at Hanford began turning some of the less-radioactive tank waste into glass logs. This came a week or so after the Washington state Department of Ecology gave final approval to the startup of the Direct-Feed-Low-Activity-Waste Facility at the plant.
Around that same time, Tim Walsh, a combat veteran and real estate developer from Colorado, was confirmed by the U.S. Senate to be assistant secretary for Environmental Management or EM-1. Walsh, who was sworn in later in October, becomes the first Senate-confirmed EM leader since Anne Marie White was confirmed in March 2018 during the first Donald Trump administration.
Walsh’s arrival at EM was far from the only big personnel move around the DOE nuclear complex. Teresa Robbins, former acting head of DOE’s semiautonomous National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA), took a deputy field manager post at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge Office of Environmental Management Tennessee.
In addition, Jeff Avery, who has held senior level posts at both EM and NNSA, revealed he is taking an executive level position with Westinghouse Electric.
In other personnel news, the term of Thomas Summers, acting chair of the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board (DNFSB), ended Oct. 18. His departure left only one member on what is supposed to be a panel of five safety experts.
Speaking of the safety panel, filings with DNFSB showed the Integrated Waste Treatment Unit for sodium-bearing waste at Idaho National Laboratory will remain offline until early 2026.
The Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) near Carlsbad, N.M., has continued to operate and DOE reported the facility received 432 shipments of transuranic waste during fiscal 2025. WIPP, however, evidently is still not taking enough in-state waste to satisfy the head of the New Mexico Environment Department. New Mexico continues to press for more shipments to WIPP from the Los Alamos National Laboratory.
Those are some of the watercooler highlights that happened during the shutdown. Hope this helped you catch up – and welcome back.