Idaho-based North Wind Portage has received the green light from the Department of Energy to commence transition to its new Moab Remedial Action Contract, potentially worth $614 million over 10 years for cleanup of uranium mill tailings in Utah.
“The transition task order may last up to 60 days,” a DOE spokesperson said by email Tuesday. Incumbent North Wind beat out six other small business bidders to win the contract last month.
North Wind Group acquired Portage in January 2017 and with it the current tailings remediation contract that began in October 2016 and is currently worth $197 million, based on a DOE website. The current expiration date is listed as March 31 on the existing contract. North Wind Portage has a 10-year history at the Moab site.
The project involves remediation of the 435-acre Atlas Mineral Corp. uranium ore processing site near Moab, including a uranium mill tailings pile near the Colorado River. So far, more than 12.2 million tons, or three-quarters of the mill tailings left at the site when Atlas stopped operating it in the 1980s has been dug up and shipped 32 miles to an engineered disposal facility near Crescent Junction, Utah.
Final remediation of both the Moab tailings pile and the Cross Junction disposal site are included in the new contract. The DOE issued the final request for proposals for the new contract in February 2021. The solicitation called for bidders to submit a closure strategy for the facilities, Aaron Deckard, procurement director for DOE’s Environmental Management Consolidated Business Center said Tuesday during a presentation to attendees of the annual Waste Management Symposia in Phoenix.
