Publications: Weapons Cleanup Monitor

The Southwest Experimental Fast-Oxide Reactor (SEFOR) in Arkansas moved closer to final remediation this week when contractor EnergySolutions removed the reactor from the containment building and placed it into a shipping container. Moving the roughly 90,000-pound reactor with a large crane took less than 30 minutes Monday, EnergySolutions spokesman Mark Walker said by telephone Wednesday. […]

The contractor for legacy cleanup at the Energy Department’s Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico, Newport News Nuclear BWXT-Los Alamos (N3B), has hired a subcontractor to remove telephone poles, old fences, and tons of concrete from Technical Area 21. The $1.5 million contract was awarded to a team of Montana-based Envirocon and Los Alamos-based […]

A combustive mixture of oxygen and substances within radioactive waste sludge being processed at the at the Energy Department’s Idaho National Laboratory is believed to be behind the April 11 rupture of four storage drums, according to site cleanup contractor Fluor Idaho. At a briefing Tuesday with officials from the Idaho Department of Environmental Quality, […]

The contractor in charge of decommissioning and decontamination of the Energy Department’s Portsmouth Site in Piketon, Ohio, earned $24.3 million of a potential fee of almost $33 million for the 16-month period ended Sept. 30, 2017. The Energy Department’s recent release of the performance scorecard for Fluor-BWXT Portsmouth comes a couple weeks after the agency […]

The Energy Department’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) near Carlsbad, N.M., had through Oct. 3 received 254 shipments of defense-related transuranic (TRU) waste in 2018. At least one more has come in since then — a shipment from Area G of DOE’s Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) in New Mexico. The Energy Department and its LANL […]

The Energy Department’s prime contractor for the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) near Carlsbad, N.M., should improve certain practices to ensure safe operation of its underground ventilation, according to a recent DOE report. Nuclear Waste Partnership (NWP) should also communicate more with union labor at the waste disposal facility, particularly regarding to expectations for work […]

Two contractors in the Department of Energy nuclear complex have both named chief financial officers in recent days. In a Monday news release, Bechtel said it has promoted Catherine Hunt Ryan to the position. Hunt Ryan previously served as CFO at Bechtel’s Oil, Gas & Chemicals business for more than two years and has been […]

The Department of Energy is offering prospective bidders for the upcoming $6.5 billion Hanford Central Plateau Cleanup Contract the opportunity to discuss remediation goals with state and federal regulators for the Washington state facility. Following the Sept. 27 draft request for proposals, DOE’s Office of Environmental Management is asking potential Central Plateau bidders about their […]

The Energy Department has clarified what it means by the “Notice to Proceed” in its Hanford Site Mission Essential Services Contract, and answered other questions posed by bidders for the business, which could be worth $6 billion over 10 years. After releasing the final request for proposals on Sept. 20 on the contract, DOE posted […]

A federal judge has approved a request to push back the deadlines for extraction of radioactive tank waste set in the court-enforced consent decree governing cleanup of the Hanford Site. Extending the two milestones was a condition of a settlement agreement reached in September in a separate lawsuit in U.S. District Court for Eastern Washington […]

Two assistant managers at one of the Department of Energy offices at the Hanford Site in Washington state have switched positions as part of a plan to build up its capabilities by providing opportunities for professional development. Glyn Trenchard, previously Office of River Protection (ORP) assistant manager for tank farms, has been named assistant manager […]

The state of Washington has issued the permits needed for Bechtel National to complete construction of the final support facility at the Hanford Site’s Waste Treatment Plant to allow treatment of low-activity radioactive waste by a federal court deadline of 2023. Construction of the plant has advanced significantly, with the concrete walls of the 18,400-square-foot […]

The federal government has lifted spending restrictions placed on Bechtel National purchasing after it addressed issues raised in a routine audit by the Pentagon’s Defense Contract Management Agency. In an Oct. 5 announcement, Bechtel said it received notification on Oct. 1 that its purchasing system had been reapproved for subcontracting activities, including at the Waste […]

A new legally binding deadline requires cesium and strontium capsules at the Hanford Site in Washington state to be moved to dry storage by August 2025, though some key stakeholders argued the work should done sooner. The Department of Energy and its regulators, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the Washington state Department of Ecology, […]

The Department of Energy on Wednesday issued a request for information (RFI)/sources sought notice for the next stage in cleanup at the West Valley Demonstration Project in New York state. The DOE Office of Environmental Management is officially calling this “Phase 1B” of deactivating and tearing down buildings at West Valley, plus conducting soil remediation. […]

PacTec, a maker of industrial bags for radioactive and hazardous waste, this month reasserted its federal court patent-infringement claim against a rival and fought back against that company’s counterclaim of improper behavior. In an Oct. 1 filing in U.S. District Court, the Clinton, La.-based company acknowledged that an employee in early May photographed work being […]

Valve replacement at the Savannah River Site’s Salt Waste Processing Facility (SWPF) is expected to wrap up this month, according to the Department of Energy. Meanwhile, a new project baseline for the facility submitted earlier this year is still under DOE review. Parsons, the DOE contractor building and initially operating the facility, in April discovered […]

The Energy Department has apparently decided having two contractors running the 222-S Laboratory at the Hanford Site in Washington state is like having too many cooks in the kitchen. The department hopes to improve productivity by not having two contractors “competing for priorities because they are working on the same equipment,” Dawn MacDonald, DOE Office […]

The Idaho Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) is considering a 10-year permit renewal for the Advanced Mixed Waste Treatment Project (AMWTP) at the Energy Department’s Idaho National Laboratory. The current permit expired June 4. However, INL cleanup contractor Fluor Idaho filed its renewal application six month prior to that date so it is allowed to […]

The Department of Energy has paused rollout of a solicitation for a 10-year, $14-billion contract to manage the Savannah River Site for most of the next decade, pending an internal review that could radically reshape the nuclear-weapon mission at the South Carolina facility. The agency announced the move late on Oct. 5 in a post […]

The public has 60 days to weigh in on a proposal to modify the fashion in which the Department of Energy classifies “high-level radioactive waste” (HLW), following publication Wednesday of a formal notice in the Federal Register. The Energy Department announced Oct. 4 it would seek to classify HLW more on its radioactive traits and […]

Fluor on Wednesday said its revenue for the quarter ended Sept. 30 will be about $4.6 billion, down a bit from the $4.9 billion during the same quarter in 2017. The figures Fluor announced Thursday were preliminary and the regular, full earnings report will be released Nov. 1. Fluor said to expect its third-quarter 2018 […]

The Savannah River Site in South Carolina sustained minor impacts from Hurricane Michael late Thursday and early Friday, during a 24-hour workforce reduction activated as the storm approached. Effects included minimal damage to some administrative buildings at the 310-square-mile Department of Energy facility near the city of Aiken, along with some loss of power and […]

The Energy Department’s nuclear cleanup officials are optimistic an overhaul of the contracting process will enable some sites undergoing environmental remediation to “leapfrog the current life-cycle baseline, and get us to done-done quicker,” a senior official said Wednesday. The Office of Environmental Management (EM), with a current-year budget exceeding $7 billion, is responsible for remediation […]

The Savannah River Site’s Defense Waste Processing Facility (DWPF) resumed operations Tuesday following a nearly two-month outage for routine maintenance. Meanwhile, the site’s Modular Caustic Side Solvent Extraction Unit (MCU), which treats a different form of liquid waste, will remain offline until mid-October. Both facilities were shut down on Aug. 8 for maintenance, which meant liquid […]

The U.S. Energy Department’s Office of Environmental Management will within a few days formally propose to change the way it interprets the term “high-level radioactive waste” (HLW). A Federal Register notice, expected to be posted next week, will outline DOE’s plan to classify high-level waste more on its radioactive characteristics and less on its source […]

Contractor Savannah River Remediation (SRR) received more than 96 percent of its fee during the second half of 2017 for liquid waste management at the Energy Department’s Savannah River Site in South Carolina. Of an available $12.44 million for work performed between July 1 and Dec. 31, 2017, SRR earned $12 million, or 96.4 percent […]

The state of Washington and the Department of Energy have jointly asked a federal judge for an extension of two milestones for retrieval of radioactive tank waste set in the court-enforced consent decree governing cleanup of the Hanford Site. Washington state sued the federal agency in 2008, asking a federal judge to set new deadlines […]