Publications: ExchangeMonitor Morning Briefing

This week, a trade group for nuclear professionals released a 76-page report that recommends changes to the Environmental Protection Agency’s standards for nuclear-waste repositories.  Broadly, the new report from the Illinois-based American Nuclear Society (ANS) aims to make the standards set for the failed Yucca Mountain deep-geologic repository in Nevada the standard for all U.S. […]

Waste Control Specialists was expected to provide an update next week in Andrews, Texas, about the company’s efforts to expand its existing low-level waste disposal site there, a tri-state waste-disposal commission announced Wednesday. The update from Waste Control Specialists, which operates a state-owned low-level waste disposal site at its Andrews County property, was scheduled as […]

Dan Brouillette, the second secretary of energy of the Donald Trump administration, will become president and CEO of the Edison Electric Institute, effective Oct. 1, the trade group for investor-owned electric companies said Wednesday. Edison Electric Institute (EEI) Chair Pedro Pizarro made the announcement in a press release, about five months after longtime EEI head […]

Members of United Steelworkers Local 1-689 employed in cleanup at the Department of Energy’s Portsmouth Site in Ohio voted Monday to extend their existing collective bargaining deal with Fluor-BWXT Portsmouth until March, a union official said. The extension includes a retroactive 2% raise, a $1,500 cash bonus and buys time until a new Amentum-led team […]

The Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico received 39 shipments of transuranic waste during July and is on pace for its biggest year since an accidental underground radiation release in 2014, according to a Department of Energy website. Along with 31 shipments from Idaho National Laboratory, there were five from the Los Alamos National […]

Frank Rose, the National Nuclear Security Administration’s principal deputy administrator, recently spent a week in East Asia where he visited counterparts in Japan and South Korea. The trip, from July 18 to July 24 “aimed to strengthen bilateral ties, regional nuclear security, and enable discussions of how best to address challenges in the evolving geopolitical […]

Southeast New Mexico College in Carlsbad is receiving $11.7 million in Department of Energy grant money over five years to develop employee training programs for the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant, the agency said Monday. The college will collaborate with DOE and the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP), to provide training and education for current and […]

The New Mexico Environment Department plans a hybrid public meeting next month on the proposed new 10-year hazardous waste permit for the Department of Energy’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant near Carlsbad. The meeting, slated to start at 5 p.m. Mountain Time on Sept. 22, will be conducted both online via Webex and in-person at locations […]

In court documents filed Monday Holtec International, Jupiter, Fla., formally denied its ex-finance chief’s allegations that the company overvalued itself in an investor pitch.  Holtec also said the former chief financial officer, Kevin O’Rourke, acted maliciously and breached a non-disclosure agreement by filing a lawsuit that detailed, among other things, Holtec’s attempts to woo Hyundai […]

Looking toward a future as a developer of small nuclear reactors, Holtec International, Jupiter, Fla., added power generation to the responsibilities of its lead decommissioning executive, the company announced Monday. Kelly Trice is now president Nuclear Generation and Decommissioning for Holtec, the company wrote in a press release. In his new role, Kelly will now […]

Atkins Nuclear Secured Holding Corp. has appointed a former Bechtel National executive, Michael Hughes, to serve as an outside director on the Atkins board of directors, the company said in a Monday press release. Hughes, who has 35 years of experience leading nuclear ventures around the Department of Energy’s weapons complex, will provide oversight for […]

A community organization focused on reindustrialization around the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge Site in Tennessee will close up shop within two years, the group said last week. The Community Reuse Organization of East Tennessee (CROET) is starting the “orderly, planned closing of the CROET Corporation and its affiliate organization, Heritage Center, LLC,” CROET announced […]

Consolidated Nuclear Security set up a reliable fire suppression system and procedures at the Y-12 National Security Complex in Oak Ridge, Tenn., according to a recent assessment by the Department of Energy’s Office of Enterprise Assessments. The Bechtel National-led site prime contractor “has established a comprehensive sitewide [fire protection program] and policy to ensure the […]

The winner of a decade-long, $45-billion liquid-waste cleanup contract at the Hanford Site on Tuesday appealed a court order that blocked work on the deal at the behest of a losing bidder. Hanford Tank Waste Operations and Closure asked the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit to overturn a June decision by the Court […]

Holtec International planned to meet with Nuclear Regulatory Commission staff Aug. 29 to discuss what the company says is the biggest regulatory hurdle to restarting the Palisades Nuclear Generating Station. The commission posted a notice of the meeting online Tuesday. Executives with Holtec International will join members of the NRC’s Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation […]

Secretary of Energy Jennifer Granholm this week traveled to Missouri where she visited with the congresswoman whose district includes Jana Elementary School, which was closed and vacated due to radioactive contaminants from the Manhattan Project discovered in Coldwater Creek, just outside the school. The school is near the Formerly Utilized Sites Remedial Action Program cleanup […]

Workers at the Hanford Site in Washington state last week practiced thee early steps of solidifying liquid radioactive waste inside glass, a site contractor said Tuesday in a press release. Personnel poured glass beads called frit into a heated melter at the Waste Treatment and Immobilization Plant, liquifying the glass in a first-ever trial run […]

Perma-Fix, Atlanta, turned a profit in the second quarter of the year as revenues rose and the company regained what its CEO called pre-pandemic momentum. On a call with investors last week, CEO Mark Duff also said that Perma-Fix is on a team fighting to force the Department of Energy and the court system to […]

After almost four years on the job, Philip Strawbridge on Aug. 4 announced he would retire as Centrus Energy Corp.’s chief financial officer by the end of the month.  Strawbridge, who was 64 when he took the job, has served as a senior vice president, chief financial officer, chief administrative officer and treasurer of Centrus […]

The Department of Labor will host an informational session next week in Ohio for current and former nuclear weapons workers who may qualify for federal financial compensation for on-the-job illnesses, the agency said Tuesday. Labor will host the seven-hour session about the Energy Employees Occupational Illness Compensation Program Act on Aug. 16 at a hotel […]

Earnings fell at Jacobs, Dallas, in the third quarter of its fiscal 2023 year as the international engineer company continued to move toward a sale of its government contracting business. Net earnings for the quarter ended June 30 were $164 million, or $1.29 a share, down from net earnings of $196 million or $1.52 a […]

Revenue and earnings rose in the second quarter at Parsons Corp., Centreville, Va., buoyed year-over-year by the start of some federal contract work and the 2022 acquisition of cyber firm Xator. Net earnings for the second quarter ended were roughly $43 million, or $0.38 a share, up from about $18 million or $0.17 a share […]

A National Nuclear Security Administration facility in Albuquerque, N.M., received Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design Platinum certification from the U.S. Green Building Council, a first for any of the agency’s roughly 1,000 buildings. The John A. Gordon Albuquerque Complex Facility, a satellite campus that provides high-performance computing, research and engineering capabilities to nearby Los […]

Employees of federal agencies, including the Department of Energy and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, were racing home early ahead of a big storm front that threatened the Washington, D.C. region with wind, rain, hail and perhaps even tornadoes. The Office of Personnel Management on Monday announced that federal offices would close at 3 p.m. That […]

International Atomic Energy Agency inspectors have gained access to the rooftops of two reactors of concern at Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhya Nuclear Power Plant and found no mines or explosives, the agency said Aug. 4.  Inspectors had asked for access to the roof area of reactors three and four repeatedly but were denied entry to inspect for […]

The Department of Energy said Friday it cleared a paperwork hurdle for a planned five-year extension of California’s Diablo Canyon Power Plant by adopting the Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s environmental reviews of the plant. DOE had a duty under federal law to do environmental diligence on Diablo Canyon after the department in 2022 agreed to provide […]