Publications: Weapons Cleanup Monitor

Environmental Management (EM) missions at the Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site in South Carolina are in line to receive $287 million more in the next federal budget than they received in fiscal 2017, with a strong emphasis on liquid waste cleanup. President Donald Trump’s fiscal 2019 budget proposal, released Monday, would provide $1.66 billion […]

The Trump administration is again proposing to increase the budget for the Energy Department’s nuclear cleanup office, to $6.6 billion for fiscal 2019. That would be $182 million above the fiscal 2017 enacted level and $100 million above the amount proposed for the current budget year for DOE’s Office of Environmental Management (EM). Two industry […]

The Energy Department’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico would get a funding spike to $403 million in the Trump administration fiscal 2019 budget request, which envisions the underground disposal site taking 10 shipments weekly. The budget proposal for the Carlsbad Field Office would be $79 million over the 2017 enacted level of spending […]

President Donald Trump’s defense-heavy budget request would have mixed effects at the Oak Ridge Reservation in Tennessee. Trump has made no secret of his desire to increase military-related spending. Toward that, the White House proposal for fiscal 2019 would provide $15.1 million for the U.S. National Nuclear Security Administration, the Department of Energy’s stockpile steward, […]

South Carolina stakeholders for the Savannah River Site denounced Monday a potential plan to process 34 metric tons of plutonium and ship it to the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) near Carlsbad, N.M., for permanent storage. That “dilute and dispose” option is the Department of Energy’s preferred approach for eliminating the plutonium, rather than continuing forward with construction and […]

The U.S. Department of Energy has as of Tuesday incurred $3.2 million in fines from the state of Idaho for failure to successfully start operating the Integrated Waste Treatment Unit (IWTU) at the Idaho National Laboratory. The federal agency has paid part of that amount, primarily through environmental cleanup projects in the state, but the […]

It might take until March for the U.S. Government Accountability Office to explain its recent rulings in two protests against a $4.7 billion liquid waste management contract at the Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site in South Carolina. The agency on Feb. 8 upheld one protest and rejected another, but has not released the decisions. […]

The Energy Department expects in April to file a permit application for storage of radioactive and chemically hazardous waste at its Separations Process Research Unit (SPRU) cleanup in upstate New York. A total of 22 containers are expected to hold waste generated by ongoing environmental remediation at the site, according to a recent DOE notice. […]

Members of the Pacific Northwest congressional delegation are prepared to fight a $230 million budget cut for the Department of Energy’s Hanford Site in Washington state. If approved by Congress, funding for cleanup of the former plutonium production complex would drop to roughly $2.185 billion in the DOE fiscal 2019 budget proposal issued Monday. The […]

The number of workers with positive bioassay results has increased to seven since the spread of radioactive contamination was discovered in mid-December at the Hanford Site Plutonium Finishing Plant demolition zone. The seven workers are in addition to 31 workers discovered to have ingested or inhaled radioactive particles after a June spread of contamination during […]

A pair of public meetings have been scheduled in March on proposed changes in the New Mexico hazardous waste facility permit for the U.S. Energy Department’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant. The meetings, scheduled in Carlsbad and Santa Fe, will focus on clarifying transuranic “Mixed Waste Disposal Volume Reporting,” according to a recent notice posted online […]

Incumbent Navarro Research and Engineering was among a large crowd of firms registered with the U.S. Energy Department’s Office of Environmental Management for presolicitation meetings last month on the Nevada Environmental Services Program at the Nevada National Security Site (NNSS). The registration document posted on the Environmental Management Consolidated Business Center website included a four-page […]

A former Hanford Site building, now within the city limits of Richland, Wash., is being torn down under an $11.4 million contract held by CH2M Hill Plateau Remediation Co. The contract is separate from CH2M’s cleanup contract at Hanford for work such as excavating contaminated waste sites and tearing down contaminated buildings. The Richland building, […]

Jacobs Engineering Group reported $2 million in net earnings for its latest financial quarter, a steep year-over-year dive from $61 million linked to its recent acquisition of CH2M. Earnings for Jacobs’ fiscal 2018 first quarter ended Dec. 31, 2017, took a hit from the $3.27 billion CH2M acquisition and a one-time tax charge, the company […]

Department of Energy contractor AECOM on Tuesday reported $4.9 billion in revenue for the first quarter of its fiscal year, ended Dec. 31, 2017. That was 12.7 percent higher than the $4.35 billion recorded in the quarter ended Dec. 31, 2016. The Los Angeles-based global infrastructure company reported quarterly net income and diluted earnings per […]

The U.S. Department of Energy’s record of policing itself is “mixed at best,” and the agency might benefit from independent oversight by an entity such as the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Rep. Frank Pallone (D-N.J.) said Tuesday. Pallone made his remarks during a House Energy and Commerce energy subcommittee hearing on U.S. nuclear infrastructure. “For example, […]

The Department of Energy will remain frozen at fiscal 2017 spending levels through at least late March, under the stopgap spending bill passed by Congress and signed by President Donald Trump on Friday morning after an overnight government shutdown — the second of fiscal 2018. The bill is the fifth continuing resolution of the fiscal […]

Workers at the Hanford Site in Washington state twice this week have reported smelling suspicious odors that could be chemical vapors. The two incidents are the first time since Nov. 28 that suspicious odors have been reported outside the radioactive waste storage tank farms at the Department of Energy facility. On Monday afternoon, five Hanford […]

The deputy director of the Department of Energy’s Environmental Management Consolidated Business Center has taken over as acting director. The vacancy newly filled on an interim basis by Jeffrey Kash Grimes was created by the December retirement of Ralph Holland following a 22-year management career at DOE. Holland had taken the reins at the EM […]

Strata-G LLC has won a $1 million contract from the Energy Department to conduct environmental sampling at the Oak Ridge Reservation in Tennessee. The sampling will support DOE plans for construction of an additional on-site disposal facility for hazardous and radioactive wastes at the Bear Creek Valley area of Oak Ridge, DOE said in a […]

Although details are being kept under wraps by a protective order, the U.S. Government Accountability Office on Friday sustained a protest brought by one losing bidding team against a $4.7 billion contract the Department of Energy awarded in October for liquid waste management at the Savannah River Site in South Carolina. The GAO indicated it has […]

Longenecker & Associates has hired a new executive to lead its mission assurance team as it increases its workload in that area at two Department of Energy sites. Energy Department and nuclear navy veteran Craig Ferguson is now Longenecker’s group vice president for mission assurance, according to a Jan. 26 press release. The Las Vegas-based […]

Appearing Tuesday on Capitol Hill, new Department of Energy Undersecretary for Science Paul Dabbar was asked whether a recent DOE reorganization put too much on his plate by having him oversee both nuclear cleanup and federal scientific research. “The Environmental Management portfolio has dominated the time and attention of whichever undersecretary has had it,” Rep. […]

The Department of Energy on Monday transferred management of the troubled Plutonium Finishing Plant demolition at the Hanford Site in Washington state to Jacobs Engineering Group, the new owner of cleanup contractor CH2M Hill Plateau Remediation Co. (CHPRC). The change came after another spread of radioactive contamination at the plant was identified on Jan. 26, […]

A new contract modification will enable the Department of Energy’s nuclear cleanup office in Oak Ridge, Tenn., to participate in a cancer research arrangement. The Oak Ridge Office of Environmental Management (OREM) said a third-party medical company – whose name was not disclosed – will “milk” thorium from uranium stores at the Oak Ridge National […]

An executive with a U.S. affiliate of French multinational Veolia on Jan. 25 said the waste management company’s acquisition of Piketon, Ohio-based Wastren Advantage is “a great fit,” according to slides for a presentation to the Energy, Technology and Environmental Business Association in Tennessee. The presentation by VNS Federal Services Senior Vice President for Business […]

During a visit by Energy Secretary Rick Perry, the Savannah River Site broke ground Thursday on a multimillion-dollar disposal unit for radioactive salt waste. Saltstone Disposal Unit (SDU) 7 will be a 32-million-gallon concrete structure designed and built by Savannah River Remediation (SRR), the liquid waste contractor for the Energy Depatrtment site near Aiken, S.C. […]

The town of Ashford, N.Y., hopes to eventually land federal payment in lieu of taxes funding to help offset the cost of the nuclear cleanup at the West Valley Demonstration Project site, which is within town limits. Town Supervisor Charles Davis said by telephone Wednesday he has been working with the office of Sen. Charles […]