Publications: Weapons Cleanup Monitor

Cleanup plans for the Hanford Site in Washington state, along with remediation milestones established under the Tri-Party Agreement, are in “serious jeopardy,” the Hanford Advisory Board said Wednesday in its annual budget advice letter to the Department of Energy. “The HAB views the combined lack of compliant budget appropriations, the unanticipated problems at Hanford, and […]

With the addition of Darcey Bolin as her chief of staff, Assistant Energy Secretary for Environmental Management Anne Marie White filled one of the few remaining openings in her organizational brain trust. Now five of the top six management posts under White are filled with permanent rather than “acting” officials, according to the April 1 […]

WASHINGTON — The Department of Energy locked Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board (DNFSB) staff out of meetings at least one defense nuclear site, a member of the independent federal nuclear health-and-safety watchdog said here Tuesday. At a public meeting, board member Joyce Connery said DNFSB staff at a site she did not identify were denied access […]

By the end of April, the state of Idaho will have assessed $5.86 million in total penalties against the Department of Energy for failure to start operating the Integrated Waste Treatment Unit (IWTU) at the Idaho National Laboratory years ago. But DOE and contractor Fluor Idaho are doing their third extended test run of the […]

An advocacy group has asked the New Mexico Environment Department (NMED) to hold public meetings soon on the Energy Department’s plan to build a new underground multi-use shaft into the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant near Carlsbad, N.M. In an April 15 letter to NMED, Southwest Research and Information Center Administrator Don Hancock said the state […]

A Department of Justice civil lawsuit alleging past fraud and kickbacks under the Mission Support Alliance contract at the Hanford Site in Washington state should be dismissed, plaintiffs said in motions filed Wednesday with a federal court. A hearing on their motions is set for Oct. 3 in U.S. District Court for Eastern Washington. The […]

Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.) said Wednesday she will ask for a briefing on the Department of Energy’s new end-state contracting model for nuclear cleanup projects, which will be used for the first time at the Hanford Site in Washington state. Cantwell announced her intention after hearing concerns following a tour of the Hanford Site. The […]

The Department of Energy on Tuesday gave Bechtel National a rating of “satisfactory,” and 47.9% of the maximum performance fee available for 2018, for its work on the Waste Treatment Plant at the Hanford Site in Washington state. That performance evaluation was good for $3.77 million out of a total available $7.87 million in the […]

The Energy Department’s growing environmental liability will be the subject of a May 1 hearing before the House Energy and Commerce oversight and investigations subcommittee. “The Department of Energy faces nearly $500 billion in environmental liabilities related to cleaning up nuclear and hazardous waste left over from Cold War weapons production and federal energy research,” […]

WASHINGTON — While more than three months have passed since the public comment period closed, the Energy Communities Alliance (ECA) is “trying to keep this conversation going” on reinterpreting what material should be deemed high-level radioactive waste (HLW) by the Department of Energy. That was the word Wednesday from the ECA’s director of nuclear energy […]

Assistant Energy Secretary for Environmental Management Anne Marie White says 90% of remediation at the East Tennessee Technology Park at the Oak Ridge Site in Tennessee should be finished in the upcoming federal budget year. The ETTP site enriched uranium for the U.S. nuclear deterrent, and later for commercial nuclear power plants, from 1945 through […]

Maryland-based Centrus Energy will hold its annual stockholders online meeting at 10 a.m. ET on June 6. “You will be able to participate in the meeting, vote, and submit questions during the meeting by visiting www.virtualshareholdermeeting.com/LEU2019,” and entering a control number mailed to shareholders, Centrus President and CEO Daniel Poneman and Board Chairman Mikel Williams […]

The Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) expects in October to solicit bids for design and construction of a facility to treat liquid transuranic waste generated by future production of fissile nuclear-weapon cores, called plutonium pits, according to a recent procurement note. Triad National Security, which since November has managed the New Mexico facility for the National Nuclear […]

The National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) this week revealed new details about its proposed dilute-and-dispose plan to eliminate 34 metric tons of weapon-usable plutonium — including that the agency is close to beginning a yearlong environmental review of its new approach. The agency will release its draft dilute-and-dispose supplemental environmental impact statement “in the very […]

A two-time employee at CH2M is the new chief of staff for Energy Department Assistant Secretary for Environmental Management Anne Marie White. Darcey Bolin took the job in March, according to her LinkedIn profile and a new organizational chart posted April 1 on the Office of Environmental Management website. She has been with the Energy […]

The Department of Energy is seeking another five-year certification from the Environmental Protection Agency for its Waste Isolation Pilot Plant near Carlsbad, N.M. The WIPP Land Withdrawal Act requires EPA recertification every five years to ensure the site’s compliance with federal radioactive waste disposal requirements, according to an executive summary of the application. The package […]

Michael Graham, a principal vice president at Bechtel and general manager of its environmental, nuclear, security and environmental business line, is retiring this month. “After a distinguished, 40-year career, 23 of them with Bechtel, Michael Graham is retiring,” company spokesman Fred deSousa said by email Tuesday. “Michael has held senior environmental leadership roles at many […]

Watchers of the Department of Energy’s defense nuclear waste and weapons budgets will endure two more weeks of added uncertainty about those programs after Congress blew town for an extended spring break without making progress on a deal to avert automatic spending cuts that will kick in on Oct. 1. The House did make an […]

The newly reopened Radioactive Assay Nondestructive Testing (RANT) facility at the Energy Department’s Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico has made its first shipment of transuranic material to the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in nearly five years. Prior to last week, there had been no TRU waste loading at the facility since May 2014. […]

The Idaho Department of Environmental Quality is reviewing Fluor Idaho’s plan to restart sludge waste repackaging at the site where four drums of radioactive waste overheated and blew off their lids at the Energy Department’s Idaho National Laboratory a year ago. The state agency received formal submittal of the corrective action plan April 11, the […]

Mission Support Alliance (MSA) has asked a federal judge to dismiss on summary judgment a lawsuit brought by 13 current and former fire captains or platoon sergeants at Hanford who are seeking overtime pay for time routinely worked beyond 40 hours a week. The case was filed against the Hanford support services contractor in April […]

Idaho-based Energy Department contractor North Wind Group has appointed Jim Furr as its chief information officer. Furr will remain president of subsidiary North Wind Services, the company said in a March press release. North Wind said it is revamping information technology to support growth, data management, and cybersecurity. Furr has been with North Wind for […]

The Energy Department’s Office of Inspector General would not confirm or deny this week whether it is investigating a regional organization in New Mexico that advocates for local governments around the Los Alamos National Laboratory. The office does not comment on the existence of any “investigative matters,” the DOE IG’s Felicia Jones said by telephone […]

After a fraud case resulting in prison time for a subcontractor, the Energy Department’s Office of Inspector General recommended URS-CH2M Oak Ridge (UCOR) strengthen financial audits of firms employed to support cleanup of the Oak Ridge Site in Tennessee. The manager of the DOE Oak Ridge Office of Environmental Management, Jay Mullis, agreed more in-depth […]

Department of Energy contractor Honeywell on Thursday attributed a 15% drop in first-quarter revenue primarily to the spinoff of two business lines, saying organic growth was otherwise up by 8%. Company-wide sales dropped from $10.4 billion in the first quarter of 2018 to $8.9 billion in the same period of 2019. “The difference between reported […]

EnergySolutions said Thursday it has finished on-site remediation of the Southwest Experimental Fast Oxide Reactor (SEFOR) near Fayetteville, Ark. “The application of the EnergySolutions Decommissioning Management Model at SEFOR produced results that exceeded our expectations,” EnergySolutions Chief Nuclear Officer John Sauger said in a press release. “A site that pioneered research for reactivity control in […]

In a reversal, the current Energy Department contractor will start tearing down the Main Plant Process Building at the West Valley Demonstration Project in New York state. The Energy Department said earlier this year the demolition would be conducted under a successor to the current site cleanup contract held by CH2M HILL BWXT West Valley […]

A bipartisan pair of senators last week introduced a bill to tighten ethics and transparency requirements for members of federal advisory committees: expert groups that advise federal agencies including the Department of Energy. The bill from Sens. Rob Portman (R-Ohio) and Maggie Hassan (D-N.H.) would require, among other things, that agencies creating and maintaining such […]