Oak Ridge, Tenn.,- based Navarro Research & Engineering won the $76-million Carlsbad Technical Assistance Contract from the Department of Energy and promptly drew a bid protest by a firm called Pecos Technical Solutions.
A DOE chart of major contracts for the Office of Environmental Management, updated July 21, has Navarro taking over from incumbent North Wind Portage by the end of this month as provider of tech services at the Carlsbad Field Office in New Mexico, which oversees the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant.
The bid protest with the Government Accountability Office (GAO) was dated July 26, and the federal watchdog has penciled in a Nov. 3 decision date in the case, according to a notice filed on the website.
Two sources familiar with the protest said Pecos is a joint venture led by Oak Ridge, Tenn.,-based Spectra Tech. One of the sources said another partner is apparently Trinity Engineering Associates. Like Spectra Tech, Trinity was one of the firms listed among the participants in a November 2020 pre-proposal virtual conference on the contract.
The final request for proposals for the Carlsbad support contract was published by DOE in October 2020. Under this small business set-aside, Navarro will provide the Carlsbad Field Office with engineering and technical reviews, quality assurance, and project management technical assistance. In April, a Navarro-led team took over management of the 222-S Laboratory at the Hanford Site in Washington state.
