Publications: ExchangeMonitor Morning Briefing

Friends and foes of Holtec International’s proposed interim storage facility for spent nuclear fuel were to meet in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia on March 5 for oral arguments. The three-judge panel scheduled to hear the arguments, in order of seniority on the court, are: Neomi Rao and Justin Walker, […]

The House on Wednesday easily passed a bipartisan nuclear-policy bill that serves as the lower chamber’s response to a similar bill the full Senate approved late last year. The Atomic Energy Advancement Act sailed through 365-36, with 29 representatives not voting and one representative voting “present.” That handily eclipsed the two-thirds majority the bill needed […]

Nuclear Naval reactor maker BWX Technologies is out of the submarine missile tube building business after completing its contracted work for the U.S. Navy and allied fleets in 2023, the company’s chief executive said on Feb. 27.  BWXT makes Common Missile Compartment tubes at its factory in Mount Vernon, Ind. The tubes are designed to […]

The Department of Energy is starting to shop for developers of carbon-free electricity projects on land at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant near Carlsbad, N.M., the agency announced Tuesday. The request for information notice was published online in the federal government’s System for Award Management (SAM.gov). The targeted projects should be capable of generating at […]

Earnings rose at BWX Technologies, Lynchburg, Va., for 2023, which the maker of nuclear naval reactors and manager of nuclear weapons sites attributed Tuesday mostly to favorable adjustments on government contracts. For the year, net earnings were $246.3 million, or $2.68 per share, up about 7.7% from $238.6 million, or $2.60 a share in 2023. […]

As signaled, the Department of Energy’s final solicitation for a new Technical Support Services contract at the Portsmouth/Paducah Project Office was published Tuesday. DOE’s Office of Environmental Management procurement office  said in mid-February that the final request for proposals (RFP) for technical support at the Portsmouth Site in Ohio, the Paducah Site in Kentucky and […]

Indiana in April planned to start the process of taking over regulation of some radioactive materials from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, according to a letter the commission posted online Tuesday. The state planned to submit a draft application around April 1, NRC’s Adelaide Giantelli wrote in a Feb. 23 letter to Courtney Eckstein, radiation control […]

In about a month, a New Jersey court will decide whether to force Holtec International to turn over additional information sought by a former finance chief who has sued the company for wrongful termination. Lawyers for Kevin O’Rourke, the ex-chief financial officer who sued in June, filed a motion with the Superior Court of New […]

Stormwater discharges from legacy nuclear work at the Department of Energy’s Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico, the subject of litigation in recent years, will be the focus of a virtual meeting on Wednesday. The DOE Office of Environmental Management and its Los Alamos cleanup prime, Newport News Nuclear-BWXT Los Alamos (N3B), said in […]

The Department of Energy cannot make utilities pay for storage of spent nuclear fuel with interest from their own decommissioning trust funds, a federal judge ruled this month. DOE had argued in the Court of Federal Claims that it should not have to pay $149 million in damages to three former power plant operators in […]

The Los Alamos County Council in New Mexico plans to honor retiring County Manager Steve Lynne during its regular Tuesday night meeting. Lynne will retire the following day, March 1, after working for Los Alamos County over 28 years according to a notice on the municipal board’s website. Lynne was deputy county manager in July […]

A South Dakota legislative committee on Thursday approved a bill that would clear the way for the state to sign an agreement to take over inspection and licensing responsibilities for nuclear material from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. The bill, introduced in January by State Rep. Mike Weisgram (R), is cruising through the state legislature. The […]

Here are some events related to defense and civilian nuclear matters that Exchange Monitor staff are tracking this week: 27-29: United Kingdom Nuclear Decommissioning Authority, Academic and Industry Research Forum. Cutlers’ Hall, Sheffield, U.K. Register online. 27: Earnings: BWX Technologies will host an earnings call starting at 5 p.m. Eastern Time to discuss quarterly and […]

The U.S. Department of Energy is studying vitrification technologies as options for treating 1.2 million gallons of calcine, a high-level radioactive waste at the Idaho National Laboratory, a DOE advisory board heard Thursday. DOE is looking at options from three prospective suppliers: an Atkins-Catholic University joint venture, Orano and Veolia, said Valerie Kimbro, a nuclear […]

A group of 20 people fired by a Department of Energy cleanup contractor at the Oak Ridge Site filed a motion last week urging a federal district judge in Eastern Tennessee to reconsider his earlier ruling rejecting their request to join an ongoing lawsuit by three similar plaintiffs. The former employees of Amentum-led UCOR filed […]

The Department of Energy’s National Nuclear Security Administration is shopping around for a new Nevada Field Office headquarters in greater Las Vegas, a federal advisory board heard Wednesday evening. Jill Hruby, who heads DOE’s semi-autonomous National Nuclear Security Administration, is slated to meet with Las Vegas officials next week in Washington, D.C., to discuss a […]

The partial evacuation Tuesday afternoon at the 222-S Laboratory at the Department of Energy’s Hanford Site in Washington state was done as a precaution after “about a thimble full” of a legacy chemical was discovered prior to disposal, an agency spokesperson said in Wednesday emails. The evacuation of 50 to 60 people, initially reported by […]

The Amentum-led environmental prime at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge Site in Tennessee this week told a federal appeals court it should have sovereign immunity, as a federal contractor, from a lawsuit by a radiation technician who was fired after refusing COVID- 19 vaccination. In its 36-page filing Tuesday, UCOR LLC told the U.S. […]

A private equity firm that acquired and merged several businesses that work for the Department of Energy sold the rolled-up companies to Cadre Holdings, a Jacksonville, Fla., maker of law-enforcement equipment. Cadre acquired Alpha Safety Group, created by Benford Capital Partners of Chicago in 2021 from the former Nuclear Filter Technologies, for a little more […]

Several recent tests of the Air Force’s land-based, LGM-35A Sentinel intercontinental ballistic missile at Naval Air Weapons Station China Lake, Calif., reflect “significant progress” in the weapon’s engineering, manufacturing and development phase, missile prime Northrop Grumman said Tuesday. “Forward and aft sections of a Sentinel ICBM [intercontinental ballistic missile ] missile were evaluated through a […]

The 222-S Laboratory at the Department of Energy’s Hanford Site in Washington state was evacuated Tuesday afternoon due to concerns over chemical exposure, the Tri-City Herald reported. The evacuation occurred around 2:20 p.m. Pacific Time after an employee at the 222-S Laboratory, managed by Navarro-led Hanford Laboratory Management and Integration, handled a vial of the […]

Proposals are due by the end of February from subcontractors interested in overhauling the electric power infrastructure within Area 100 of the Department of Energy’s Hanford Site in Washington state, according to an updated procurement notice. Proposals in response to the solicitation launched by Leidos-led Hanford Mission Integration Solutions, which acts as city manager for […]

The cleanup contractor at the Department of Energy’s Idaho National Laboratory is on track to resume treating sodium-bearing liquid waste in March, but some fixes are still needed, according to a Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board update. Jacobs-led Idaho Environmental Coalition finished a maintenance outage at the Integrated Waste Treatment Unit (IWTU) in mid-January after […]

Holtec International has filed for federal relief from what the Jupiter, Fla., company says is the biggest regulatory hurdle to restarting the Palisades Nuclear Plant in Michigan. Pending a big federal loan and the replacement of some major hardware including a new steam generator, Holtec plans to be ready to restart Palisades “in the third […]

A small bipartisan group in the House released a foreign aid bill with new border security policies and war aid for Ukraine, but no stimulus funds for domestic uranium enrichment. The roughly $66-billion bill sponsored by Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick (R-Pa.) is a counterproposal to the roughly $95-billion foreign aid bill the Senate passed on Thursday, […]