Publications: ExchangeMonitor Morning Briefing

A federal judge in Washington won’t expedite a collective bargain action brought by the Hanford Guards Union until Department of Energy contractor Hanford Mission Integration Solutions has a chance to answer the union’s complaint. Chief U.S. District Judge Stanley Bastian on July 11 ruled against the Hanford Guards Union Local 21 request to expedite the […]

Congress need not authorize every interim storage site for nuclear waste and an appeals court’s decision that it must destroyed long-held expectations, a nuclear-industry trade group said in a Friday filing with the U.S. Supreme Court. A 2023 ruling by the U.S. Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals that outlawed commercial interim storage licensed by the […]

As is often the case, the Senate Armed Service Committee is using a must-pass defense policy bill to have a congressional watchdog delve into issues facing the Department of Energy’s nuclear weapons cleanup complex. Based on the bill report, here is a summary of what Senate Armed Services wants the Government Accountability Office (GAO) to […]

Several members of the New Mexico congressional delegation used an opinion column in a state newspaper to continue calling for extending and expanding the Radiation Exposure Compensation Act. A bill to do exactly that has passed the Senate but awaits action in the House of Representatives. “The version of [the Radiation Exposure Compensation Act] RECA […]

Here are some events related to civilian nuclear matters that Exchange Monitor staff are tracking this week. 17: Public meeting, comment gathering, Nuclear Regulatory Commission staff: to clarify or supplement the March 4, 2024, 10 CFR 2.206 petition regarding a seismically initiated severe accident at Diablo Canyon Nuclear Plant. 3:00 p.m. – 4:00 p.m. Members […]

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission planned Thursday evening to hold a public meeting in Benton Harbor, Mich., to discuss its pending environmental review of Holtec International’s plan to restart the Palisades Nuclear Power Plant.  The hybrid meeting will be webcast from Lake Michigan College’s Mendel Center beginning at 6:00 p.m. Eastern time, according to NRC’s website. […]

The Amentum-Atkins partnership in charge of radioactive tank waste operations at the Department of Energy’s Hanford Site in Washington state is shopping for a small business to assist with regulatory documents and closure plans for single-shell tank farms. Washington River Protection Solutions (WRPS) issued a request for proposals in an online notice Tuesday for a […]

Department of Energy contractors should consider requiring “diversity training” when developing diversity plans, according to the latest version of its acquisition guide, published this week. That’s despite recent pushback by Republican House appropriators. Diversity plans were already required by DOE’s acquisition regulation. The changes published this week, dated June 2024, ratchet up requirements to monitor […]

The Senate Armed Services Committee wants the Government Accountability Office to examine the culture and workings of the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board, according to a bill report the committee published this week. “Recent assessments from the National Academy of Public Administration and from the Office of the Inspector General for the Nuclear Regulatory Commission […]

The Senate Armed Services Committee wants the secretaries of energy and defense to brief Congress if either plans an alternative to the W80-4 warhead for a nuclear-armed, sea-launched cruise missile, according to a draft National Defense Authorization Act released Monday. The briefing would have to detail the benefits and cost expectations of any alternative, according […]

The Senate Armed Services Committee wants a report from the Air Force and Pentagon about the possible deployment of 450, rather than 400, Sentinel intercontinental ballistic missiles. The lawmakers asked for the study in a bill report published the same week the Department of Defense announced further cost overruns and developmental delays for LGM-35A Sentinel, […]

WASHINGTON — The first draft of the National Nuclear Security Administration’s 2025 budget passed the House Appropriations Committee Tuesday on a largely party line vote and one new directive about nuclear nonproliferation in Eastern Europe. The committee passed the bill 30-26, which if made law would provide some $25.5 billion to the National Nuclear Security […]

The House Appropriations Committee on Tuesday voted 30-26, largely along party lines, to approve a budget bill that would provide more than $8.3 billion for the Department of Energy’s nuclear cleanup branch in fiscal 2025. There was little mention of DOE’s Office of Environmental Management during the hour-plus markup. The measure will next be considered […]

A California member of the House Armed Services Committee, famed for his opposition to the current nuclear modernization regime, announced Monday that he has a form of blood cancer. Rep. John Garamendi (D-Cali.), 79, was diagnosed with early stage multiple myeloma, a form of “treatable” blood cancer, according to a press release on his website. […]

A federal judge in New Mexico granted the Department of Energy and the New Mexico Environment Department until Oct. 7 to continue settlement talks on changes to agreements governing legacy waste cleanup at the Los Alamos National Laboratory. U.S. Magistrate Judge John Robbenhaar on Tuesday ordered another 90-day extension of the settlement talks after the […]

Integrating “only” government-wide practices will not help keep nuclear weapons infrastructure projects on time and on budget, the head of the National Nuclear Security Administration said in a letter published Tuesday. “We strongly believe that the incorporation of government best practices alone will not fundamentally change our ability to integrate the program and project cost […]

Groups opposed to restarting the Palisades Nuclear Power Plant may still get a hearing over alleged misappropriation of decommissioning funds at the plant, according to a notice published Tuesday. According to Tuesday’s Federal Register notice, an NRC petition review board on July 2 ruled against the environmentalists and denied them a hearing but also said […]

President Joe Biden (D) on Tuesday signed a bill intended, among other things, to ease domestic and foreign deployment of U.S. nuclear technology and reform the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. The reforms of the Advanced Nuclear for Clean Energy (ADVANCE) Act were nested inside the Fire Grants and Safety Act of 2023, an unrelated bill used […]

The U.S. Department of Labor has set a July 18 information session in Lisle, Ill., for current and former nuclear weapons workers and survivors covered by the Energy Employees Occupational Illness Compensation Program Act. Presentations were scheduled for at 9:00 a.m. Central Time at the Sheraton Lisle Naperville, 3000 Warrenville Road, Lisle, Ill., according to […]

The full Senate Tuesday voted 54-to-41, mostly upon party lines, to confirm the nomination of Patricia Lee, a manager at the Department of Energy’s Savannah River National Laboratory in South Carolina, to be a member of the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board.  The final vote was tallied shortly after 3:00 p.m. Eastern time. The Senate […]

The Air Force’s next-generation nuclear-tipped, silo-based intercontinental ballistic missile will continue but will be drastically restructured amid further cost increases and schedule delays announced Monday by the Department of Defense.  The new overall cost estimate for Sentinel is $140.9 billion: 81% higher than the September 2020 estimate when the program entered its manufacturing phase and […]

The Senate Armed Services Committee’s version of a must-pass defense policy bill would again authorize more than $7 billion for the Department of Energy to carry out Defense Environmental Cleanup at nuclear weapons complex sites. Language in the nearly 1,200-page bill would also allow the secretary of energy to accelerate cleanup at nuclear facilities if […]

The Senate Armed Services Committee wants to require the Department of Energy to pick two to four possible sites for a new domestic uranium enrichment facility for defense programs, according to a bill report published Monday. The report was appended to the panel’s version of the 2025 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), which the Senate […]

In Iran’s election run-off Friday, Iran’s citizens voted in a candidate that promised in his campaign to negotiate with the U.S. and Europe on nuclear activities again, media outlets reported. Masoud Pezeshkian, a lawmaker and heart surgeon, defeated conservative opponent Saeed Jalili narrowly — with only 50% voter turnout nationwide — on the campaign of […]

Complex-wide plutonium modernization is up slightly, with Los Alamos plutonium funding shifting to operations from modernization, in the House’s first draft of the Department of Energy’s 2025 budget. The full House Appropriations Committee was to debate and vote on the legislation Tuesday during a multi-bill markup scheduled to begin on Capitol Hill at 9:00 a.m. […]

The Department of Energy’s $8-billion nuclear cleanup branch has started implementing some best practices sought by the Government Accountability Office but still has far to go, according to a report out Monday. The DOE Office of Environmental Management “is updating its site-specific life-cycle cost and schedule estimates to use as baselines to track progress and […]