Publications: Weapons Cleanup Monitor

The final paperwork is being filed to declare the Department of Energy’s X-326 building at Portsmouth, Ohio, “cold and dark” and ready for demolition, Robert Edwards, manager of DOE’s Portsmouth/Paducah Project Office, said Wednesday. The cold and dark designation could come in early 2018, Edwards and Dennis Carr, site director for Portsmouth cleanup contractor Fluor-BWXT […]

The Energy Department’s Environmental Management Field Office at the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico is studying potential strategies for dealing with combustible radioactive waste held at a private facility in West Texas. Between 300 and 400 drums of waste from Los Alamos have been kept at Waste Control Specialists storage complex in Andrews […]

The Environmental Protection Agency has not made a permanent plan for management of its office at the Energy Department’s Hanford Site in Washington state. Instead, the EPA on Monday assigned two staffers at its Hanford Project Office to fill in as acting manager over the next eight months. The move came after Dennis Faulk, who […]

Perma-Fix Environmental Services President and CEO Lou Centofanti on Monday formally stepped down from the top spot he has held for more than two decades, replaced by the company’s chief operating officer. Centofanti founded the Atlanta-based nuclear services and waste management provider in 1991, and served two extended stints as president and chief executive officer: […]

A number of major policy questions must be addressed before the federal government drops the mixed-oxide fuel (MOX) project in South Carolina in favor of a “dilute and dispose” approach to disposal of 34 metric tons of surplus weapon-grade plutonium, House Appropriations energy and water subcommittee Chairman Mike Simpson (R-Idaho) said Thursday. “There are a […]

When ENERCON Federal Services last year became one of four teams bidding to dig a 16,000-foot deep borehole as a test for a potential means of radioactive waste disposal, Outreach Manager Francis “Chip” Cameron thought of it as a mere research effort. “We made the mistake of walking into this, thinking it was going to […]

Damage at the Energy Department’s Savannah River Site in South Carolina this week from Hurricane Irma was limited to downed trees, with no reported issues at any facilities. Wind gusts reached up to 76 mph at the site near Aiken, S.C., with sustained winds of 35 mph on Monday when Irma did most of its damage in […]

Within recent days, the Waste Isolation Pilot Project (WIPP) in New Mexico has received its 60th shipment since it resumed receiving radioactive waste from other Department of Energy sites in April. WIPP is the nation’s sole permanent repository for transuranic waste, and its nearly three-year closure following a February 2014 radiation release left shipments stranded […]

With a large budget request, a programmatic review process encompassing top officials at Department of Energy headquarters and sites, and political appointees who seem to share a “bias for action,” there is cause for optimism about increasing the pace of cleanup of DOE’s nuclear legacy, officials said Wednesday. That was the sense that emerged following […]

Acting Assistant Energy Secretary for Environmental Management James Owendoff said Wednesday not to expect a major formal “list” of objectives to be published from his recently completed 45-day review of the Department of Energy’s nuclear cleanup office. “There is not a list out there per se,” he said during DOE’s National Cleanup Workshop in Alexandria, […]

The general manager of Waste Treatment Completion Co., the new subcontractor for the Waste Treatment Plant at the Hanford Site in Washington state, is on medical leave. Acting general manager Mike Costas is filling in for general manager Scott Oxenford. Costas previously served as the manager of functions for the Waste Treatment Plant, which included […]

SUMMERLIN, Nev. — Plans for a new permanent ventilation system at the Energy Department’s Waste Isolation Pilot Project in New Mexico should not be held back by a continuing resolution that will keep the federal government running into December, DOE’s top official at the site said Wednesday. Carlsbad Field Office Manager Todd Shrader shared his prediction […]

The Energy Department’s Savannah River Site has lost about 900 jobs over the past five years, primarily due to attrition, according to a recent economic impact study. Released late last month, the study – The Savannah River Site: Economic Impact and Workforce Transition – was prepared by the SRS Community Reuse Organization (SRSCRO), a group tasked with working […]

The findings of a recent report questioning the cohesion of the bedrock on which a nuclear waste disposal facility is to be built in Ohio has not deterred the Energy Department from moving forward with the project. “Based on the intensive review of all the information provided in the Ferguson Group Report, DOE does not […]

SUMMERLIN, Nev. — The Energy Department’s Office of Environmental Management (EM) is establishing a new unit that will focus on completing the Hanford Site’s Waste Treatment Plant, Roger Jarrell, senior adviser to the secretary of energy for environmental management, said Tuesday. Efforts are being made to streamline management decisions at EM, a roughly $6 billion-per-year […]

The Energy Department is likely to extend the nearly expired contract for environmental management services at the Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) in New Mexico ahead of awarding a new deal, an observer said Thursday. Lab management and operations prime Los Alamos National Security holds a two-year, $230 million “bridge” legacy nuclear cleanup contract that ends […]

The Oak Ridge Site Specific Advisory Board (ORSSAB) has identified five priorities in fiscal 2019 for cleanup of the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge Reservation in Tennessee. The federally appointed advisory panel submitted a two-page list of remediation recommendations for consideration by DOE’s Oak Ridge Office of Environmental Management (EM) in preparing the funding request […]

The Department of Energy has officially acknowledged it will miss the Sept. 30 milestone set under the Tri-Party Agreement to have the Hanford Site’s Plutonium Finishing Plant torn down to slab on grade. The federal agency notified its regulators, the Environmental Protection Agency and the Washington state Department of Ecology, on Sept. 1.  “Tremendous progress […]

The Department of Energy should take a number of steps to ensure it comprehensively understands its transuranic waste management needs as it looks to dispose of 34 metric tons of diluted plutonium at its Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) in New Mexico, the Government Accountability Office said in a report Tuesday. WIPP is the nation’s sole permanent underground […]

Hanford Office of River Protection Manager Retiring Kevin Smith, the manager of the Department of Energy Office of River Protection at the Hanford Site in Washington state, plans to retire Sept. 30. He gave the word to Energy Secretary Rick Perry on Aug. 15 when the DOE chief visited Hanford. “The Department of Energy is […]

Waste Control Specialists has withdrawn a request for an exemption from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to store select radioactive waste from the Los Alamos National Laboratory. The exemption became unnecessary after all shipments of transuranic waste to Waste Control Specialists’ storage complex in West Texas were halted when a container of material from the Energy […]

A panel of experts studying options for stabilizing the second radioactive waste storage tunnel at the Hanford Site’s PUREX Plant is scheduled to meet in teleconference for a second time today. The group’s first meeting, held a week earlier, was largely organizational, with no decisions made or a firm schedule set for future meetings. The […]

A postgraduate student intern and an Oak Ridge Associated Universities researcher in Tennessee are working to replicate an infamous 1976 radiation accident at the Energy Department’s Hanford Site in Washington state. The event exposed Harold McCluskey, a chemical worker who would become known as “The Atomic Man,” to the highest known level of the radioactive isotope […]

A portion of the Savannah River Site’s security personnel with union representation are on the job this week even as nearly 300 of their colleagues remain on strike in the wake of failed labor negotiations. Of the 337 security employees represented by the United Professional Pro-Force of Savannah River (PPSR), 48 are currently working. That encompasses workers who […]

A system-wide liquid waste processing outage at the Savannah River Site (SRS) is still expected to last through the end of the year, as workers continue to make strides in other key areas of the Energy Department facility’s liquid waste mission. The site reported in February that it was halting all liquid waste processing due to […]

Don’t be surprised to see acting Assistant Energy Secretary for Environmental Management James Owendoff continue to lead the Energy Department’s nuclear cleanup program for several more months, a longtime industry observer told Weapons Complex Monitor this week. “I think they have got a clean slate at DOE on EM-1 candidates,” the source said. Owendoff, a longtime […]

Longenecker & Associates’ director of technology and international programs has been promoted to the new position of vice president for corporate programs, the consulting firm and Energy Department contractor said Tuesday. The Las Vegas-based company in 2015 hired Laurie Judd away from NuVision Engineering, where he was vice president for government programs. Judd will retain […]

The Washington state Department of Ecology on Thursday issued a $16,000 penalty against the Department of Energy and one of its contractors for failing to identify white powder found during the last two annual inspections of the Hanford Site’s PUREX Plant. The state requires annual detailed inspections of the plant, outlining specific routes through the […]