Publications: Weapons Cleanup Monitor

Key testing has wrapped up for the Salt Waste Processing Facility (SWPF) at the Savannah River Site in South Carolina, bringing the $2.3 billion plant closer to its anticipated startup in the first quarter of 2020. Parsons, the U.S. Department of Energy contractor that built the SWPF and is readying it for operations, announced Wednesday […]

The U.S. Energy Department said Monday it plans to retain a Richland, Wash., firm via a no-bid contract to provide technical expertise on treatment of nuclear tank waste at the Hanford Site. The agency’s Office of River Protection (ORP) plans to issue a sole-source time and materials contract potentially worth $870,000 to Jeffery L. Bird, […]

President Donald Trump on Thursday officially nominated Deputy Secretary of Energy Dan Brouillette to replace Rick Perry, who will resign as secretary of energy on Dec. 1. Brouillette, a former auto-insurance lobbyist with some turn-of-the-millennium Washington experience on his rapidly expanding resume, must be confirmed by the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee before he […]

The liquid waste contractor for the U.S. Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site double-stacked 191 canisters of treated liquid radioactive waste in fiscal 2019, and plans to stack another 300 containers in the current 2020 federal budget year. Savannah River Remediation (SRR) says the project costs about $3 million annually and is freeing up space […]

BWX Technologies President and CEO Rex Geveden said Tuesday the U.S. Energy Department should soon issue one multibillion-dollar contract at the Hanford Site in Washington state, while another probably won’t arrive until mid-2020. “In the coming weeks we expect to hear about the Hanford Plateau Central Cleanup contract for which we are competing,” Geveden said […]

Washington River Protection Solutions is looking for a subcontractor to fabricate, test, and deliver a replacement melter for low-activity radioactive waste at the Waste Treatment Plant being built at the U.S. Energy Department’s Hanford Site in Washington state. The AECOM-led contractor, which manages storage of 56 million gallons of radioactive and chemical waste in 117 […]

The Idaho Department of Environmental Quality is considering a permit modification sought by a U.S. Energy Department contractor preparing to start repackaging radioactive waste at a new location within the Idaho National Laboratory following an April 2018 accident. The waste was generated decades ago at the Rocky Flats nuclear weapons plant in Colorado and was […]

With members of the House out of town this week, Congress made little progress on authorizing and appropriating government funding, including measures covering the Department of Energy and Nuclear Regulatory Commission. However, Armed Services Committee staffers worked behind the scenes this week to hash out differences in the House and Senate versions of the 2020 […]

Unionized metal workers for most major vendors at the U.S. Energy Department’s Hanford Site in Washington state on Wednesday approved a one-year extension to their current labor contracts. The Hanford Atomic Metal Trades Council (HAMTC) said in a Facebook post that workers at Mission Support Alliance, Jacobs subsidiary CH2M Hill Plateau Remediation, Veolia, and Washington […]

A Jacobs subsidiary this week is commencing the final phase of tearing down the Plutonium Finishing Plant at the Energy Department’s Hanford Site in Washington state. “I am proud to report that our team has safely completed lower-risk demolition of the Plutonium Finishing Plant’s (PFP) Main Processing Facility,” CH2M Hill Plateau Remediation President and CEO […]

The U.S. Energy Department on Monday issued a request for information kicking off market research for the next cleanup contract at the Moab Uranium Mill Tailings Remedial Action (UMTRA) project in Utah. The current contract, held by North Wind Portage, expires after September 2021. The work involves moving tailings from the old Atlas Mineral Corp. […]

U.S. Energy Department contractor Atkins Nuclear Secured Holdings has promoted Jack Craig as its new chief operating officer (COO). Craig, who joined the SNC-Lavalin Group company in 2018 as vice president of strategic programs, assumed the new post on Nov. 1, according to a press release. He succeeds Robert Frost, who continues to serve as […]

The U.S. Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board (DNFSB) still suffers from flagging morale and could stand to improve communication between its staff and its politically appointed leadership, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s inspector general wrote in an annual report on the board’s biggest challenges. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s inspector general, which also serves that role for […]

The state of Idaho and the U.S. Department of Energy have negotiated a deal that opens to the door to resumption of some spent nuclear fuel shipments to the Idaho National Laboratory. The agreement, announced in a Thursday press release from Idaho Gov. Brad Little and Attorney General Lawrence Wasden, specifically covers a one-time waiver […]

Less than a month after being awarded $1.5 million from a federal jury for discrimination during a rehiring process, a former employee of the Savannah River Site’s liquid waste contractor is seeking an additional $1 million in compensation. That amount represents the pay she would have received from the time she was terminated in 2013 […]

The White House on Wednesday nominated a new inspector general for the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Robert Feitel is currently a trial attorney for the section of the Department of Justice that assists with federal death penalty cases. He would succeed Hubert Bell, who retired on Dec. 31, 2018, after more than 22 years as […]

The U.S. Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board (DNFSB) wants information from the Energy Department by mid-November on potentially flammable radioactive waste storage drums at sites other than the Idaho National Laboratory. To date, DOE has only partly provided the federal nuclear health-and-safety watchdog with requested information regarding its review of an April 2018 incident in […]

Two regulatory agencies in California stress the U.S. Department of Energy must receive state approval before it can legally tear down 18 buildings within Area IV of the Santa Susana Field Laboratory cleanup site in Ventura County. The Energy Department last month issued a record of decision formalizing its intention to demolish the remaining structures […]

U.S. Rep. Greg Walden (R-Ore.), a longtime supporter of cleaning up the U.S. Energy Department’s Hanford Site in Washington state, said Monday he would not run for re-election in 2020. “So, I will not seek re-election to the U.S. House of Representatives, nor election to any other office, but instead I will close the public […]

Prospects for timely passage of a full 2020 budget for the Department of Energy and other agencies dimmed a little this week, when most Senate Democrats refused to curtail debate on spending legislation that includes funding for President Donald Trump’s proposed southern border wall. The Senate failed Thursday to invoke cloture on a basket of […]

Bruce Stanski, the Fluor finance chief who stepped down in June as the company prepared to shed its government services business, is still consulting with the foundering construction giant as it seeks to right the ship, according to a regulatory filing. Stanski left the company in June but late last week signed an agreement to […]

U.S. Rep. Katie Hill (D-Calif.), who represents the congressional district that borders the Santa Susana Field Laboratory cleanup site, resigned from Congress on Sunday, only days after the House Ethics Committee launched an investigation into whether she violated congressional rules. The panel announced plans Oct. 23 to investigate allegations that the first-term lawmaker engaged in […]

The planned release of a draft record of decision (ROD) for a new 2.2-million-cubic yard landfill for the Oak Ridge Site in Tennessee has been delayed again, with the new target release date set for Dec. 19, a U.S. Energy Department spokesperson said Monday by email. The document had most recently been scheduled to drop […]

Leidos on Tuesday reported strong increases in its top and bottom lines in the third quarter, driven by growth across its operating segments and receipt of a payment going back to the 2004 Olympics in Greece. The company also reported record bookings and backlog, tallying $5.2 billion in orders that were nearly double sales that drove […]

The U.S. Government Accountability Office said Tuesday the Department of Energy should provide better documentation of how it manages the payments in lieu of taxes (PILT) program for communities around nuclear facilities. The Energy Department handed out $23 million in PILT revenue to communities near a dozen nuclear laboratory and cleanup sites in fiscal 2017. […]

Engineering, construction, and procurement giant Fluor continues to experience rough waters a month after announcing plans to sell its government services branch, which includes its U.S. Department of Energy contracts. For its third quarter ended Sept. 30, Fluor reported a net loss from continuing operations of $782 million, or $5.57 per diluted share, compared to […]

Mechanical and industrial contractor Intermech will build a dry storage area for highly radioactive cesium and strontium now stored underwater at the U.S. Energy Department’s Hanford Site in Washington state. The North Carolina-based company on Oct. 17 received a $5.5 million subcontract from Hanford cleanup contractor CH2M Hill Plateau Remediation Co. Construction of the dry […]