Publications: ExchangeMonitor Morning Briefing

Oak Ridge, Tenn.,-based Navarro Research & Engineering has hired Susanna Waters as director of business development, to work with environmental and nuclear customers at NASA, the Department of Defense and the Department of Energy. Waters has more than a decade of relevant business development experience, Navarro President and CEO Susana Navarro said in a September […]

October 03: Meeting: The Northern New Mexico Site Specific Advisory Board meets in hybrid session starting at 1 p.m. Mountain Time. In-person meeting at the Hotel Don Fernando de Taos, 1005 Paseo Del Pueblo Sur, Taos, New Mexico 87571. To attend send an email by Sept. 28 to Menice B. Santistevan, menice.santistevan@em.doe.gov. 03: Meeting: Oregon […]

The full Senate was set to vote Thursday on a temporary budget bill for fiscal year 2023, setting up most Department of Energy nuclear programs to continue operating with this year’s budget through Dec. 16. On Tuesday, Senators voted 72-23 to invoke cloture on the bill that will become the continuing resolution, removing a procedural […]

Tropical storm conditions are possible Friday around Aiken County, S.C., and the Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site, according to the National Weather Service. Wind gusts of up to 32 miles per hour are expected today with showers possible, according to today’s forecast. The chance of precipitation is 90% Friday and rain is expected to […]

The Department of Energy’s Office of Environmental Management should bring in an outside entity to gauge the effectiveness of the overhauled procurement strategy implemented in 2019 to improve its multi-billion-dollar nuclear cleanup operation, the Government Accountability Office said Wednesday. The head of DOE’s Office of Environmental Management (EM) should also develop specific performance goals for […]

Expedited spent fuel removal is underway at the Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site in South Carolina, now that the agency has decided not to recover high-enriched uranium from the L-Basin storage area, a manager told a federal advisory board Tuesday. “We just kept recovering and kept recovering … and we did not have a […]

The company in charge of decommissioning a former Vermont nuclear power plant aims to load and store the last of the facility’s low-level waste next month, according to a Wednesday statement from its CEO. NorthStar, which is in the process of dismantling Vermont Yankee Nuclear Power Station, “anticipates being able to load the Greater than […]

The Maryland couple whose shoddy spycraft got them arrested for trying to sell nuclear submarine secrets to a foreign power again pleaded guilty for their alleged crimes on Tuesday, deciding not to face a jury after a federal judge threw out their first plea deal. The Washington Post reported that both Jonathan Toebbe and his […]

Management at the Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site is participating in daily calls about Hurricane Ian with emergency officials for the state of South Carolina, a spokesperson at the federal complex said Tuesday. “Site resources have been identified and will be available to respond to any potential site hurricane impacts,” the spokesperson said via […]

The head of the Department of Energy field office overseeing the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant near Carlsbad, N.M., expects the facility to finish fiscal 2022 with 225 shipments of transuranic waste, short of its target of 299. As of Aug. 29, the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) has received 217 shipments of defense-related transuranic waste […]

Kimberly Budil, director of the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, admitted last week to all hands at the California nuclear-weapons design lab that she had been arrested for driving under the influence and speeding. Budil, the first woman to run Livermore, has been director of the younger of the two U.S. weapon-design labs for about a […]

A federal district court judge in Tennessee has told litigants to resume mediation in a case involving a half-dozen employees suing the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory contractor over its COVID-19 vaccination policy. In an order Monday, U.S. District Court Judge Charles Atchley, Jr. said he is not enthused about going forward with […]

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission does not have a schedule for when it will address a recent request from the state of Nevada aimed at reopening, and eventually ending, the agency’s licensing proceedings for the proposed Yucca Mountain nuclear waste repository, a spokesperson said Tuesday. Although Nevada’s Sep. 20 request is in front of NRC’s five-member […]

Due primarily to COVID-19, Los Alamos National  Laboratory believed it could take a year longer than expected for the the lab to casting 10 plutonium pits annually in New Mexico, according to an internal document. A redacted copy of the Los Alamos-authored document, dated September 2021 and released by the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) […]

The Senate Tuesday evening advanced a continuing budget resolution that, if made law, would avert an impending government shutdown and keep federal funding at 2022 levels. The stopgap budget, which on Tuesday, by a 72-23 margin, the upper chamber agreed to vote on later this week, would largely keep federal spending at the levels set […]

The company in charge of decommissioning a former Massachusetts nuclear power plant said Monday night that, if it decides to follow through on a controversial plan to release irradiated wastewater from the facility, it will do so early next year. The earliest time “under consideration” for discharging water from Pilgrim Nuclear Power Station would be […]

The Department of Energy plans to ink a contract extension by Friday with the management and operations manager for the Savannah River Site in South Carolina, an agency executive told a federal advisory board Monday. “A new contract should be signed sometime this week because Sept. 30 is approaching fast,” said Jimmy “Mac” McMillian, DOE […]

Organizations within the National Nuclear Security Administration bureaucracy are reviewing a draft cybersecurity directive the agency wrote after a third-party review, the weapons steward told the Government Accountability Office last week. The semiautonomous Department of Energy weapons agency planned to issue a final supplemental directive, titled Baseline Cybersecurity Program, by April 30, according to the […]

The Santa Susana Field Laboratory, including the portion being cleaned up by the Department of Energy, will have a new congressional representative in January 2023 thanks to redistricting. Following the 2020 Census, the independent California Citizens Redistricting Commission redrew the state’s congressional districts, moving the 2,850-acre Santa Susana Field Laboratory in Ventura County, Calif., to […]

ARLINGTON, VA — During a conference dominated by workforce continuity issues, it was noted Friday that Department of Energy field office managers for nuclear cleanup, who often head the biggest employers in rural locales, have been in their current posts for less than five years.  Being a major government employer in small-town America poses unique […]

Here are some events related to defense and civilian nuclear matters that Exchange Monitor staff are tracking this week. 26: Pilgrim Nuclear Power Station’s Nuclear Decommissioning Citizens’ Advisory Panel (NDCAP) to meet. Dave Noyes, senior compliance officer at Holtec International, to provide an update on wastewater release plans. Plymouth town hall, Great Room. 26 Court […]

A citizens’ advisory panel was scheduled Monday to discuss a controversial proposal that would see irradiated wastewater from a shuttered Massachusetts power plant discharged into the Cape Cod Bay, according to a meeting agenda. Holtec International, which is currently decommissioning the Plymouth, Mass., Pilgrim Nuclear Power Station, is set to provide the community-led nuclear decommissioning […]

A California congressman who has been a vocal proponent of a federal nuclear waste solution took some credit Tuesday for the Department of Energy’s recently-unveiled interim storage funding opportunity, according to a press release. Rep. Mike Levin (D-Calif.), who counts San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station (SONGS) among his constituents in California’s 49th congressional district, “helped […]

An Energy Northwest official told a state board Tuesday that an investigation will be completed soon into spiked tritium levels in the groundwater near the Columbia Generating Station reactor north of Richland, Wash. Felicia Najera-Paxton of Energy Northwest gave a brief update to the Washington Energy Facility Evaluation Council — a permitting and watchdog board […]

ARLINGTON, VA —The acting boss of the Department of Energy’s Office of Environmental Management, a top manager from the agency’s Office of Nuclear Energy and key congressional representatives were to kick off the National Cleanup Workshop here Tuesday.    The workshop is hosted annually by the Energy Communities Alliance in cooperation with DOE and the Energy […]