Publications: ExchangeMonitor Morning Briefing

WASHINGTON — With a shutdown deadline fast approaching, Democrats not showing their cards, and no vote scheduled for the stopgap bill, Sen. Roger Wicker (R-Miss.) expressed frustration in a subcommittee meeting and to reporters Wednesday. Wicker, chair of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said at the beginning of a hearing Wednesday morning in the readiness […]

Contractor Bechtel announced Monday it appointed Dena Volovar as the new president of its Nuclear, Security & Energy business.  Volovar succeeds John Howanitz, who will retire in April after 42 years at Bechtel, according to the company press release.  Volovar’s tenure at Bechtel extends 26 years, most recently as executive vice president and manager of […]

It is official: Brian Stickney, deputy manager for the Department of Energy’s Hanford Site in Washington state, is retiring from the federal government, according to a memo viewed by Exchange Monitor. “After more than 15 years with the U.S. Department of Energy and over 30 years with the federal government, HFO [Hanford Field Office] Deputy […]

President Donald Trump’s nominee to head the Department of Energy’s multibillion-dollar Office of Environmental Management, is founder of a real estate development business in Golden, Colo. Tim Walsh founded Confluence Companies in 2006 and the business has 15 developments, including apartment complex, condominiums and hotels, according to the company’s website. Walsh is an Army veteran […]

PHOENIX—— The Department of Energy could ultimately solidify between 20 million and 30 million gallons of lower-level radioactive liquid waste at the Hanford Site into a concrete-like grout form, a senior manager at the nuclear cleanup site said here Wednesday. DOE managers at the Hanford Site in Washington state are talking with commercial providers on […]

PHOENIX — The Department of Energy’s Hanford Site in Richland, Wash., lost 51 employees to federal job cuts so far, a senior manager at the nuclear cleanup complex said here Wednesday. At the same time, Delmar Noyes, a senior DOE manager at the former plutonium production site, said having a single Hanford Field Office helps […]

WASHINGTON — The House passed Speaker Mike Johnson’s (R-La.) continuing resolution Tuesday evening 217-213, a measure that would fund the government until Sept. 30. There was one Democrat that voted “yes,” despite party wishes, and one Republican holdout in the vote.  Senators will vote on the bill at earliest Wednesday morning to avert the government […]

PHOENIX – Expediting nuclear cleanup and making it less expensive is vital to the Department of Energy’s Office of Environmental Management, a senior adviser to Secretary of Energy Chris Wright said here Monday. Current projections indicate the Hanford Site in Washington state, which once produced plutonium for the government, won’t be fully cleaned up until […]

PHOENIX —With remediation of an old uranium tailings pile along the Colorado River in Utah entering the home stretch, a Department of Energy Office of Environmental Management executive said Monday that closure plans are already being discussed. With only one million tons left to be removed from a tailings pile near the Colorado River, Environmental […]

The Donald Trump administration is nominating Timothy John Walsh of Colorado to become the Assistant Secretary of Energy for Environmental Management, according to an entry in Monday’s Congressional Record. Secretary of Energy Chris Wright is also from Colorado. If confirmed, Walsh would be the first Senate-confirmed assistant secretary for environmental management (EM-1) since Anne Marie […]

A bipartisan group of four Senators last week urged Nuclear Regulatory Commission Chair David Wright to prioritize streamlining the agency’s environmental reviews as called for under 2023 legislation. “We encourage the Commission to vote in a manner that fully reflects congressional intent to streamline the NRC’s licensing process, as directed in the Accelerating Deployment of […]

Over the weekend, House Republicans Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) released a seven-month funding patch that would cut non-defense spending, including programs in the Department of Energy, by about $13 billion. The bill could reach the House floor as soon as Tuesday. The 100-page stopgap funding bill, which would need to pass both chambers of Congress […]

The Australian government published a new submarine strategy March 7 that called for investing $19 billion over 30 years to support future AUKUS nuclear-powered submarines with a domestic industrial base. “The scale, complexity and technology requirements of the program also mean the Australian Submarine Industrial Base will need to work with trusted United Kingdom and […]

PHOENIX — The Department of Energy during President Donald Trump’s second term hasn’t focused on a Joe Biden administration effort to tap underused land at federal nuclear sites for carbon-free power projects, an Environmental Management official said Monday. With the administration being “new,” less than two months old, no decisions on the Cleanup to Clean […]

PHOENIX – After federal layoffs and buyouts and the looming prospect of a possible government shutdown, the Department of Energy presence is lighter than usual at the kickoff of the annual Waste Management Symposia here. Although no official figures were immediately available, the buzz at a Sunday night reception here was that while DOE and […]

PHOENIX —— Canada is one of the first but won’t be the last nation to successfully use “consent-based siting” to select a deep underground repository location for used nuclear fuel, the CEO of Canada’s Nuclear Waste Management Organization, said here Monday. A “decade of engagement” was key to Canada’s Nuclear Waste Management Organization (NWMO) being […]

The U.S. Air Force said that the service and Northrop Grumman conducted “a full-scale qualification static fire test of the Sentinel intercontinental ballistic missile stage-one solid rocket motor” on Thursday at the company’s site in Promontory, Utah.  Northrop Grumman is building the LGM-35A Sentinel intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) to replace the Minuteman III ICBM as […]

The National Nuclear Security Administration partnered with other government agencies to conduct an exercise on how a team would gather evidence to support the president make decisions in a nuclear attack scenario. The Prominent Hunt exercise series, which the recent exercise was part of, took place Jan. 26 to 31 around Schenectady, N.Y., the Pentagon […]

The member of Congress whose district includes the Department of Energy’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico has received written assurance from the General Services Administration that the lease for the DOE Carlsbad Field Office won’t be terminated. A spokesperson for Rep. Gabe Vasquez (D-N.M.) said Friday the lawmaker has received written word from […]

A report the Energy Communities Alliance is rolling out this week at the Waste Management Symposia in Phoenix says existing Department of Energy nuclear installations and other electric power sites are increasingly being targeted for new reactors. The Energy Communities Alliance (ECA) report is titled “From the Atomic Age to New Nuclear: Energy Communities Ready […]

PHOENIX — Executives from Canada’s Nuclear Waste Management Organization as well as the International Atomic Energy Agency are scheduled to help kick off the 2025 Waste Management Symposia here Monday. Canada is this year’s featured nation at the conference for nuclear waste professionals held annually in Downtown Phoenix. Canada’s Nuclear Waste Management Organization President and […]

Here are events related to nuclear matters that Exchange Monitor staff are tracking this week: 10-13 – WM Symposia, Inc. 2025 Waste Management Symposium. Phoenix Convention Center, 100 North Third Street, Phoenix, Ariz. Register online. 11-13: NRC Regulatory Information Conference from Rockville, Md. starts at 8 a.m. Eastern Time. The conference is being webcast. 

The Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site could see completion of its Advanced Manufacturing Collaborative this June at the nearby University of South Carolina-Aiken, a spokesperson said recently.  Construction of the Advanced Manufacturing Collaborative was 85% completed  in November 2024. Contractor North Wind Group started building it in March 2023 and will wrap up this […]

Whether Texas and Fasken Land and Minerals Co. waited too late to fight the Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s authority to license interim offsite private facilities for spent fuel, took up much of a hearing before the U.S. Supreme Court. During the Wednesday NRC versus Texas hearing webcast from Washington, D.C., Deputy Solicitor General Malcolm Stewart argued […]

Kevin Dressman, a longtime federal manager who heads the Department of Energy’s Office of Health and Safety, said this week he has accepted a deferred resignation buyout and will leave government after more than 30 years. Dressman announced his departure Tuesday on his LinkedIn profile page. “After 33 years of federal service, I have elected […]