Publications: ExchangeMonitor Morning Briefing

The Department of Energy plans to extend North Wind Solutions’ transuranic waste processing work by up to 24 months at the Oak Ridge Site in Tennessee, according to a recently-posted notice on a federal procurement website. The DOE issued its justification for issuing the extension, without a full and open competition, on Thursday. The federal […]

A bill pending in the Texas state legislature’s environment committee would ban the storage of high-level waste, including spent nuclear fuel, in the Lone Star State, its Republican sponsor said Monday The measure would “eliminate the need to conflate the phantom menace of high-level radioactive waste” with comparatively safe low-level waste and ensure that the […]

This week marks the end of a mandatory waiting window for the Texas A&M University’s Board of Regents to officially approve Katherine Banks, dean of the College of Engineering and vice chancellor of engineering and national laboratories, as the system’s next president. At deadline Tuesday for Weapons Complex Morning Briefing, the board of regents was […]

The Department of Energy has named Mark Bollinger as its new acting deputy manager for the Carlsbad Field Office in New Mexico, which oversees the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant. Bollinger took over the No. 2 manager slot on March 14 at Carlsbad, reporting to manager Reinhard Knerr, according to a Twitter post last week from […]

Earnings improved at Centrus Energy Corp., the Bethesda, Md.,-based fuel broker and nuclear technology company, in both the fourth quarter and 2020 as a whole, according to financial results released late last week. In its Thursday press release, Centrus reported net income of $54.4 million for the 12 months ended Dec. 31, 2020 compared with […]

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission and the companies involved in the sale of Three Mile Island Nuclear Generating Station have a little over three weeks to respond to an environmental group’s request to hold off on the transaction, according to an agency filing. The NRC, the FirstEnergy companies and the EnergySolutions subsidiary responsible for decommissioning the […]

The Senate is primed this week to confirm David Turk as the deputy secretary of energy after a procedural motion last week to end debate on the former Biden staffer and Obama administration official. Sen. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.), the majority leader, filed cloture on Turk’s nomination Thursday, meaning the Senate had, starting then, a little […]

After a former lobbyist accused him of sexual harassment, Rep. Tom Reed (R-N.Y.), whose 23rd congressional district includes the West Valley Demonstration Project, will retire from the House of Representatives rather than run for re-election, the lawmaker announced via Twitter on Sunday. Reed further said he will not seek any political office in 2022. The […]

The story “False High Dose at Pantex This Year Caused by Lost Badge Near Linear Accelerator” (Weapons Complex Morning Briefing, March 18, 2021) should have said that the Nevada National Security Site analyzed a Pantex Plant employee’s dosimeter.

It can happen on submarines, it can happen in the mail and it can happen if you fly a lot: a dose big enough to keep you out of radiological areas for a while. At the Pantex Plant earlier this year, it happened because someone left their dosimeter near a linear accelerator. That’s according to […]

Next week, a committee of the Texas state House of Representatives will consider a bill that would ban storage of high-level nuclear waste, including spent fuel from power plants, in the Lone Star state. H.B. 2692, proposed earlier this month by state Rep. Brooks Landgraf (R), will hear debate in the state’s House Environmental Regulation […]

An environmental watchdog group that previously raised concerns about environmental law violations in the sale of Three Mile Island Nuclear Generating Station is now formally asking the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to pump the brakes on the transaction, according to new documents. In a motion dated Monday, Three Mile Island Alert (TMIA) argued that until the […]

The Department of Energy, Washington State and the Environmental Protection Agency are meeting more frequently these days to negotiate changes to legally binding Hanford cleanup deadlines that longstanding technical challenges — and later, COVID-19 — may have made untenable, a Washington state official said Wednesday. “I am optimistic on some progress we have made,” Bowen […]

The Department of Energy could formally reply to subcontractor complaints at the Hanford Site in Washington state “within the next few days or the next few weeks,” Brian Vance, the top manager at the facility said Wednesday. The DOE Office of Environmental Management executive made his comments during a virtual meeting of the Hanford Advisory […]

Virginia-based Bechtel announced in a press release this week that Stephen Bechtel Jr., who served three decades as CEO of the privately-held company that bears his family’s name, died Monday at age 95. In 1960 Stephen Bechtel Jr. became CEO of the company started by his grandfather in 1898, according to the Washington Post, and […]

New Mexico is one step closer to getting the inside baseball on proposed spent fuel repositories after a bill that would expand the mandate of a radioactive waste task force won approval in the state House’s environmental committee this week. Senate Bill (SB) 82, proposed by state Sen. Jeff Steinborn (D), passed the state House […]

The U.S. Senate Monday voted 51-to-40 to confirm Rep. Debra Haaland (D-N.M.) as secretary of interior, which will create a vacancy in the congressional district that includes the Department of Energy’s Sandia National Laboratories facilities in Albuquerque. Haaland presented House Speaker Nancy Pelosi with her letter of resignation Tuesday and issued a farewell address to […]

As a legal battle continues over the decommissioning of Indian Point Nuclear Generating Station, the company in charge of dismantling the plant took to local media last week to plead their case. Decommissioning the Buchanan, N.Y. power plant could lead to a “rebirth and re-use” of the land it’s located on, bringing new jobs and […]

Bechtel National earned 70%, or $5.54 million out of a potential $7.88 million, for its work on the Waste Treatment Plant at the Department of Energy’s Hanford Site in Washington state in 2020. That is according to a fee scorecard released this week by the DOE’s Office of Environmental Management for the 2020 calendar year.  […]

Former National Nuclear Security Administration Administrator Lisa Gordon-Hagerty joined the board of directors of Visible Assets, a closely held New Hampshire company that sells rugged, magnetic-based  asset-tracking and “internet of things” systems to military and high-tech clients.  Visible Assets announced the move in a press release on Tuesday. It’s the first publicly announced foray back […]

The United Kingdom officially announced Tuesday that it will raise the cap on its nuclear arsenal to 260 submarine-launched ballistic-missile warheads from the previous target of 180 warheads. “In 2010 the Government stated an intent to reduce our overall nuclear warhead stockpile ceiling from not more than 225 to not more than 180 by the […]

In a policy and organizing blitz on Monday, the co-owners of the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station released a voluminous new report about the logistics of relocating the plant’s spent fuel and formed a new stakeholders group focused on the federal government. Action for Spent Fuel Solutions Now, spearheaded by Southern California Edison (SCE) and […]

Jim Bittner is taking over as vice president and general manager for BWX Technologies’ Nuclear Operations Groups’ Lynchburg, Va., manufacturing facility, which manufactures reactors for naval aircraft carriers and submarines, the company announced Monday. Bittner will be in charge of about 2,200 employees in Lynchburg, which is one of the two commercial facilities certified by […]

The Department of Energy plans a virtual pre-solicitation conference March 30 to share details on procurement for the new Waste Isolation Pilot Plant Transportation Services Contract. The DOE cleanup office plans to skip the draft-request-for-proposals stage and issue a final solicitation this spring, possibly in May. The DOE’s Office of Environmental Management will hold the […]

Contractor North Wind Portage has received final go-ahead to tear down the last few remaining contaminated buildings within the Department of Energy’s portion of the Santa Susana Field Laboratory in Ventura County, California. The California Department of Toxic Substances Control in a March 4 letter approved DOE plans for demolition of the remaining buildings at […]