Mike Nartker
WC Monitor
10/10/2014
While contractors have made management changes in connection with the current shutdown of the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant, the federal government doesn’t appear likely to follow suit anytime soon. Both WIPP’s managing contractor and the Los Alamos National Laboratory, where waste processing issues are suspected of being a factor in the WIPP shutdown, have moved or relieved senior managers. However, when asked on the sidelines of a Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board hearing this week if DOE’s Office of Environmental Management plans to make management changes, acting Assistant EM Energy Secretary Mark Whitney replied, “I really am focused on recovery and having the right team in place to execute the recovery, and I think we have the right team in place to implement the recovery plan.”
For the federal management at Los Alamos, which is overseen by the National Nuclear Security Administration, any potential changes will be addressed as part of the planned transition of cleanup work there from NNSA to EM, according to NNSA spokesman Derrick Robinson. The time frame for that transition, though, has yet to be determined. “EM and NNSA are developing a plan to transition management of legacy environmental cleanup to EM. The management and organizational structure of the local DOE office that will manage this EM-funded work scope after the transfer will be addressed as part of the transition,” Robinson said in a written response this week.
In response to a truck fire and radiological release at WIPP earlier this year, URS moved the former head of WIPP contractor Nuclear Waste Partnership, Farok Sharif, to TRU Waste Program project manager and brought in Bob McQuinn as NWP’s new president, among other changes. More recently, Los Alamos moved late last month to relieve four senior managers of their duties due to issues with the lab’s transuranic waste program that are seen as potentially having been a factor in the radiological release at WIPP.
Investigations Also Found Concerns With DOE Management, Oversight
However, investigations into the WIPP incidents have also found issue with federal management and oversight as well. DOE’s investigation into the response to the radiological release at WIPP identified management concerns both at the Department’s Carlsbad Field Office and at DOE headquarters. “DOE HQ failed to ensure that CBFO was held accountable for correcting repeated identified issues involving radiological protection, nuclear safety, Integrated Safety Management System, maintenance, emergency management, work planning and control and oversight,” says a DOE Accident Investigation Board report released in April.
The investigation also found that both the Carlsbad Field Office and NWP had “failed to identify weaknesses in conduct of operations, maintenance, radiological protection, nuclear safety, emergency management, and safety culture,” and “failed to adequately complete corrective actions from prior assessments to prevent or minimize recurrence,” the report says.
