Publications: Weapons Cleanup Monitor

A joint venture led by an AtkinsRéalis Group company has received notice to proceed from the Department of Energy to start transition to running the uranium hexafluoride (DUF6) conversion plants at the Portsmouth Site in Ohio and the Paducah Site in Kentucky. The Operations & Site Mission Support Contract, potentially worth up to $2.3 billion […]

The Department of Energy earlier this month lifted several long-standing restrictions on recycling certain contaminated metals at DOE nuclear sites, including “volumetrically contaminated metals.” The rescissions were announced in a May 15 Federal Register notice. The changes could have big implications for the Paducah Site in Kentucky, said an industry source. Paducah has more than […]

As expected, President Donald Trump last week signed a set of executive orders designed to speed licensing of nuclear power reactors, both commercially and on federal installations, limit review by an independent nuclear regulator and beef up  the industry’s U.S. industrial base. Here is a thumbnail overview of each of the May 23 orders.  Overhauling […]

For the Department of Energy’s Office of Environmental Management to fully remediate 15 Cold War and Manhattan Project sites, it must dispose of over 11 million cubic meters of nuclear waste — and it needs a plan, according to a congressional watchdog. In a report made public Thursday, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) said Environmental […]

The Department of Energy could announce the first site for a data center to support artificial intelligence, which would be located on one of its federal installations, within 90 days, according to one of the nuclear executive orders Friday from President Donald Trump. Nuclear and non-nuclear support structures for such data centers on DOE installations […]

One of President Donald Trump’s May 23 executive orders instructs the secretary of energy to replace the surplus plutonium dilute and dispose program with one to process excess plutonium for fuel for advanced nuclear technologies. Trump’s executive order entitled “Reinvigorating the Nuclear Industrial Base,” one of four nuclear-themed executive orders released last week, said the […]

The Department of Energy and Bechtel National said Tuesday they have taken another incremental step in cold commissioning of a multi-billion-dollar plant to convert liquid radioactive tank waste into a solid glass form at the Hanford Site in Washington state. Ammonia and nitrous oxide-producing chemicals are being introduced into the melters for the Waste Treatment […]

The BWX Technologies-led joint venture doing liquid waste cleanup at the Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site in South Carolina said Wednesday its president is retiring and will be succeeded by the vice president. Savannah River Mission Completion (SRMC) President and Program Manager Dave Olson, who has held the top job since SRMC won the […]

North Augusta, S.C., a city near the Savannah River Site, recently opened its $2 million waste transfer station, a facility paid for with money from a $600 million settlement in South Carolina’s case against the Department of Energy.  The settlement stemmed from DOE cancelling of the SRS Mixed Oxide Fuel Fabrication (MOX) Facility, one that […]

The Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site near Aiken, S.C., has only 400-odd containers of legacy transuranic (TRU) waste left for shipment to DOE’s underground disposal site in New Mexico. The Savannah River Site has loaded and shipped more than 35,000 containers of the legacy waste to the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) near Carlsbad, […]

Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine offers a real-world example of military targeting of nuclear plants, and the issue requires more attention, a National Academies board heard last week in Washington, D.C. A war-gaming study to explore this threat was done recently by Henry Sokolski, who heads the Nonproliferation Policy Education Center. He discussed the issue […]

Dae Chung, head of corporate services for the Department of Energy’s $8-billion Office of Environmental Management, plans to retire at the end of the month. “Please join me in congratulating Dae Chung on 32+ years of distinguished federal service as he prepares to retire at the end of this month,” Roger Jarrell, principal deputy assistant […]

There is good news and bad news to report on staffing, the head of the Department of Energy’s nuclear cleanup field office at the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico told a federal advisory panel last week. “I am happy to report that no federal employees within the EMLA [Environmental Management Los Alamos] field […]

President Donald Trump is reportedly expected to sign executive orders on Friday meant to speed nuclear power reactor licensing through expedited regulatory reviews and other changes. According to a Thursday report by Reuters, Trump could sign the executive orders “as soon as” Friday. Reuters also reported Secretary of Energy Chris Wright said Trump will sign […]

A federal district judge in California has ruled President Donald Trump lacks authority to carry out mass layoffs and sweeping reorganization of U.S. government agencies without approval from Congress. As a result, U.S. District Judge Susan Illston on Thursday issued a preliminary injunction suspending more large-scale workforce reductions at the Departments of Defense, Energy, Interior […]

The Department of Energy’s Office of Environmental Management has formally made longtime DOE hand Brian Harkins the acting manager of its costliest nuclear cleanup site. DOE’s Environmental Management headquarters in Washington, D.C, Monday appointed Harkins its acting manager for the Hanford Site in Washington state. The move is no surprise, given Harkins has been the […]

The current head of the Department of Energy’s $8-billion Office of Environmental Management told a Senate Armed Services Committee panel this week progress is being made toward solidifying liquid radioactive waste left over from the Cold War and Manhattan Project. Roger Jarrell II, DOE’s principal deputy assistant secretary for Environmental Management (EM) also told the […]

Uncertainty over Department of Energy funding and guidance at the Hanford Site in Washington state threatens to bog down work at the nation’s largest nuclear cleanup site, Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash) told Secretary of Energy Chirs Wright Wednesday. “The Hanford Site is on the brink of having to lay off subcontractors and restart an entire […]

The Department of Energy received hundreds of responses to a request for information, which closed earlier this month, seeking stakeholder input on placing data centers on DOE nuclear sites, officials said this week. The request for information that went out in April closed May 7, not only drew hundreds of responses, but the comments were […]

EnergySolutions, Salt Lake City, said Tuesday it is planning to seek an Early Site Permit from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission at the shuttered Kewaunee nuclear power plant in Wisconsin. The company is collaborating with WEC Energy Group (WEC) to explore new nuclear generation in Wisconsin, EnergySolutions said in a press release. WEC is a Milwaukee-based […]

Shipments to the Department of Energy’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) appear to be back at a normal pace, with the facility receiving 49 waste shipments in April. The numbers, posted on the public WIPP website as of May 15, would represent the highest monthly total since the 50 shipments the disposal site received in […]

The Senate Tuesday voted 52-to-44 to confirm James Danly, a former member of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, to be deputy secretary of energy. The vote was along party lines with four senators, two Democrats and two Republicans, not voting. Danly, an attorney and U.S. Army veteran from Tennessee, was nominated to the position by […]

BWX Technologies, Lynchburg, Va., said this week that Rob LeMasters, who joined the company a decade ago as a board of directors’ member, has stepped down as chief financial officer and executive vice president. The current chief accounting officer, Mike Fitzgerald, becomes interim CFO, BWXT said in a Monday press release. Fitzgerald joined BWXT three […]

A federal appeals court has told the White House, and plaintiffs suing the government over mass layoffs, to file arguments next week on the Donald Trump administration’s “emergency motion” to block a lower court’s temporary restraining order. The Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals on Tuesday May 13 told plaintiffs, including the American Federation of […]

Earnings rose at AtkinsRéalis Group, Montreal, Canada, in the first quarter, which the engineering services and nuclear company attributed to various contracts for nuclear power, transportation and infrastructure. Net earnings for the first quarter ended March 31 were Cnd $69.1 million (US $.49.5 million) or Cnd $0.39 a share (US $0.28) up from Cnd $45.5 […]

Canada’s Nuclear Waste Management Organization has announced a multi-contractor team, including WSP Canada, to design the deep underground spent fuel repository planned for Ontario. In a Monday press release, the Nuclear Waste Management Organization (NWMO) said it has chosen a team of WSP Canada, Peter Kiewit Sons, Hatch Ltd., Thyssen Mining Construction of Canada Ltd. […]

A center for processing and storing transuranic waste could start up at the Hanford Site in 2033, Department of Energy and Washington state officials said during a public meeting last week. DOE and Washington state Department of Ecology managers on May 7 summarized plans to build and run a proposed Contact-Handled Waste Processing Treatment and […]