Publications: ExchangeMonitor Morning Briefing

The latest issue of the annual Government Accountability Office (GAO) assessment of major defense acquisition programs outlined remaining risks to the design and on-time production of the Columbia-class ballistic missile submarine (SSBN). In its Defense Acquisition Annual Assessment, published June 3, the GAO noted while the Navy reports the nuclear reactor technology as mature since 2018, “several […]

The American Nuclear Society is urging the federal government to proceed with a moribund update to regulations on recycling of spent fuel from nuclear power plants. “While no new reprocessing facilities are planned in the United States at this time, this in itself should not be the rationale for suspending rulemaking,” ANS Executive Director and […]

The Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board (DNFSB) might lose credibility in the eyes of Department of Energy site host communities if it does not explain its opposition to proposed changes to federal nuclear safety standards in plain words, a community interest group said.  “It would be in the best interest for sites and communities to […]

A radiation-sensing helicopter owned by the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) flew over mass protests in Washington, D.C., on Tuesday, but was not part of the federal government’s response to the activity on the ground, an agency spokesperson said Wednesday morning. “NNSA’s Nuclear Emergency Support Team (NEST) rotary-wing aircraft conducted a routine proficiency flight on […]

Bechtel National earned $5 million of the potential $7.87 million 2019 fee for ongoing construction on the Waste Treatment Plant at the Hanford Site in Washington state, the Energy Department said Tuesday. By claiming an overall score of “good” and winning roughly 64% of the maximum available fee for the 12 months ended Dec. 31, […]

Sen. Bob Menendez (D-N.J.), ranking member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, on Tuesday introduced legislation that would require President Donald Trump to extend the New START nuclear arms control treaty with Russia. The measure, which would need a veto-proof majority to become law, would require Trump to extend New START unless Russia “is not […]

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission is allowing an Oregon utility during the COVID-19 pandemic to delay mandatory physical requalifications for security personnel at the spent fuel storage pad for a decommissioned nuclear power plant. Portland General Electric Co. received notice from the regulator on May 28. The document was posted to the NRC website on Tuesday. […]

While the outcome of the Republican primary remained uncertain Wednesday morning, Teresa Leger Fernandez has apparently won the Democratic Party nomination to succeed Rep. Ben Ray Luján (D-N.M.) as the House member for the congressional district covering the Energy Department’s Los Alamos National Laboratory. Leger Fernandez, an attorney with deep New Mexico roots and endorsements […]

Nuclear fuel management specialist NAC International said Tuesday it has hired a longtime Duke Energy manager and executive as its director of fuel cycle consulting. David Culp will head the Peachtree Corners, Ga., company’s “consulting activities related to the nuclear fuel cycle,” according to a press release. He will report to Michael McMahon, NAC’s vice […]

Cold War nuclear waste will pile up at the Los Alamos National Laboratory under the National Nuclear Security Administration’s plan to make nuclear-weapon cores there, the New Mexico Environment Department told the agency last month. In six pages of comments about the plan, the state agency also challenged the National Nuclear Security Administration’s (NNSA) March […]

The Energy Department’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) in New Mexico has entered Phase 1 of its gradual return to normal operations, which have been reduced for months during the COVID-19 pandemic, officials said Tuesday. Like nearly all of the 16 nuclear cleanup sites overseen by DOE’s Office of Environmental Management, the transuranic waste disposal […]

A weekend wildfire on Gable Mountain in Washington state, near the Energy Department’s Hanford Site , been brought under control, officials said Monday. The fire was ignited Saturday night by a lightning strike and burned about 9,000 acres before being contained by 8 p.m. local time Sunday night, said Reneé Brooks, spokeswoman for contractor Mission […]

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission in April spent just $84 of its remaining balance from the federal fund intended to pay for a radioactive waste repository. As has been the case each month for more than a year, the agency used the money for unspecified “program planning and support.” The expenditure left it with a Nuclear […]

Department of Energy headquarters plans to partially reopen on June 8, when about 250 federal employees will be asked to return to the Forrestal Building in Washington and the agency’s Germantown facility in Maryland, Secretary of Energy Dan Brouillette said Monday. The initial reopening will apply only to federal employees doing mission-critical work at headquarters, […]

State and federal lawyers are dotting “i’s” and crossing “t’s” on a settlement that would end the lawsuit over the National Nuclear Security Administration’s (NNSA) 2018 shipment of weapon-usable plutonium to Nevada. In an order posted Friday, Judge Miranda Du of U.S. District Court for Nevada gave the parties until June 29 to tweak the […]

Energy Department documents addressing issues from research needs to employee benefits at the Savannah River National Laboratory have been added to a federal procurement website. The DOE Office of Environmental Management in April published a draft request for proposals (RFP) for the potential 10-year, $3.8 billion stand-alone lab contract. Comments on that draft RFP were […]

The Energy Department’s Savannah River Site in South Carolina as of Tuesday had confirmed 23 cases of COVID-19 among its workforce. That is up from 22 reported at the end of last week. Sixteen of those employees have recovered and returned to work, a spokeswoman for the DOE’s SRS operations said by email. Savannah River […]

Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, vendors to Columbia-class prime General Dynamics Electric Boat might be a few months late delivering missile tubes for the next-generation ballistic missile submarine, the Navy’s program executive officer said Monday. “[T]hat did hit us hard on the missile tubes, to the extent of probably a couple months delay in the […]

The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine is accepting nominations for experts to a new panel that will write reports on the nuclear fuel cycle and waste issues linked to advanced nuclear reactors. Nominations are due by June 11, according to the National Academies. The experts will “evaluate and assess (1) the merits and viability […]

The National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) last week gave the Y-12 National Security Complex in Tennessee the all-clear to start building a key piece of equipment needed to move uranium secondary-stage work out of the aging Building 9212 and into the under-construction Uranium Processing Facility. The new calciner, to be built in 9212, reached its […]

House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) on Friday released the House’s summer schedule, which shows the majority of June will be used for committee days for members to focus on major legislation to be passed before the end of the fiscal year. In a Dear Colleague note, Hoyer highlighted the fiscal 2021 National Defense Authorization […]

Some of the Energy Department’s largest nuclear cleanup sites are calling more employees back to the jobsite, but asking them to travel solo to help limit the potential spread of COVID-19. Officials for the Savannah River Site in South Carolina, along with the company building the Waste Treatment Plant at the Hanford Site in Washington […]

The National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) still has not received the nearly quarter-million personal respirators it ordered from a small business in Georgia, due to “order and shipping backlogs,” an agency spokesperson said Friday. Under a fixed-price contract, signed April 27 and now valued at $415,000, American Dream Builders LLC was by May 29 to […]

Some of the United States’ radioactive spent fuel could be recycled for use in advanced nuclear power reactors, but the nation still needs a long-term repository for the waste, according to the head of the industry policy organization. Used nuclear fuel retains 95% of its original energy, Nuclear Energy Institute President and CEO Maria Korsnick […]

The Energy Department’s Savannah River Site in South Carolina continued to do 22 “essential supporting activities” during a period of dramatically reduced operations forced by the COVID-19 pandemic during April and May, according to information provided to a local watchdog group. Savannah River Site Watch Director Tom Clements said he received the list from a […]

A new federal strategy for strengthening the United States’ nuclear energy industry will pay dividends in promoting global nonproliferation, Secretary of Energy Dan Brouillette said Friday. “Our nation’s credibility as a supporter of nonproliferation depends upon a robust civilian industry and our technological leadership in the global marketplace,” he said during a webinar organized by […]

The Department of Energy confirmed Friday three more cases of COVID-19 among the workforce at its Washington, D.C., headquarters. Two of those three people had not been in the Forrestal Building in downtown Washington since “early March,” and a third was last on-site on May 22, according to a notice from Secretary of Energy Dan Brouillette. […]