Publications: Weapons Cleanup Monitor

DOE FY’15 Budget Request Would Cut RL Funding by Approx. $93 Million Kenneth Fletcher WC Monitor 5/2/2014 As many as seven cleanup milestones at Hanford are at risk of being missed in Fiscal Year 2015 due to funding issues, a DOE official said this week. DOE’s Richland Operations Office faced one of the largest cuts […]

D&D Work May be Broken Out for Small Businesses Kenneth Fletcher WC Monitor 5/2/2014 As the Department of Energy moves forward with planning for a procurement for cleanup work at the Idaho site post-Fiscal Year 2015, DOE is considering combining the site’s two current cleanup contracts and separating out D&D work for small businesses, a […]

Mike Nartker WC Monitor 5/2/2014 Transportation, Operations and Professional Services (TOPS), which was raided by federal law enforcement agents earlier this year, has sold the waste transportation subcontract it had with URS-CH2M Oak Ridge, LLC (UCOR). UCOR spokesman Allen Schubert confirmed this week that Oak Ridge, Tenn.-based TFE Inc. had acquired the subcontract. “This acquisition […]

Kenneth Fletcher WC Monitor 5/2/2014 Moving ahead with potentially processing German experimental spent fuel at the Savannah River Site’s H-Canyon, the Department of Energy recently signed a statement of intent with the German government to examine the idea. The highly enriched uranium comes in the form of graphite spheres from the pebble bed AVR gas-cooled […]

Kenneth Fletcher WC Monitor 5/2/2014 As the Department of Energy considers its options for disposing of surplus plutonium, a new study released this week suggests that downblending the material and disposing of it at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant may be the least expensive alternative. While DOE’s current plans calls for the material to be […]

Kenneth Fletcher WC Monitor 5/2/2014 EnergySolutions Sues NDA for Damages in Magnox Award Incumbent contractor EnergySolutions this week filed a claim for damages against the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority in a challenge to the recent award of the Magnox/RSRL contract to the Cavendish Fluor Partnership. Bechtel, EnergySolutions’ teaming partner in the Reactor Site Solutions bid for […]

Mike Nartker WC Monitor 5/2/2014 A draft Request for Proposals for the new Paducah infrastructure services contract is set to be issued within the next 15 to 45 days, the Department of Energy said in a notice issued April 30.  The new contract is being set-aside for small businesses, with the procurement to use a […]

WCS, DOE Look to Change Acceptance Criteria Kenneth Fletcher WC Monitor 5/2/2014 More than 75 of the transuranic waste containers slated for shipment from Los Alamos National Laboratory to Waste Control Specialists may not meet the current WCS acceptance criteria, complicating a high-profile push to remove all aboveground LANL transuranic waste by the end of […]

Mike Nartker WC Monitor 5/2/2014 Leo Sain is stepping down as President and Project Manager of Oak Ridge cleanup contractor URS-CH2M Oak Ridge, LLC to return to a corporate role at URS. In his new position, announced this week, Sain will head up URS Global Management and Operations Services’  Decontamination and Decommissioning and Waste Management […]

WC Monitor 5/2/2014 IN THE DNFSB House lawmakers are looking to lower the maximum number of employees the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board can have by 20 percent. A provision in the House version of the FY 2015 defense authorization bill, which was reported out of subcommittee this week, would limit the number of full-time […]

Kenneth Fletcher WC Monitor 4/25/2014  The  “preventable” Feb. 14 radiation release at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant was preceded by poor maintenance, safety culture issues by contractor Nuclear Waste Partnership and lax oversight by Department of Energy headquarters and the Carlsbad Field Office, according to a DOE Accident Investigation Board report released this week. While […]

Mike Nartker WC Monitor 4/25/2014 The Department of Energy has asked the two teams bidding on the new Paducah deactivation contract to submit best-and-final offers, with responses due in early May. DOE is believed to be seeking “final proposal revisions” from the teams of Fluor-CB&I-LATA and AECOM-Stoller-Newport News to help resolve discrepancies between the two […]

Kenneth Fletcher WC Monitor 4/25/2014 Though budget cuts to Savannah River’s liquid waste program raised concerns last year about missed high-level waste tank milestones, a funding boost and efficiencies developed by contractor Savannah River Remediation will allow for closure of two tanks in the near future. SRR so far has closed four of the site’s […]

Kenneth Fletcher WC Monitor 4/25/2014 Alternatives to commissioning the Salt Waste Processing Facility the Department of Energy has studied include use of the existing processing capability combined with a new in-tank treatment technology called small column ion exchange, WC Monitor has learned. The Department originally undertook the study last year when it was in talks […]

Survey Shows Workers Satisfied With Their Jobs, EM Leadership Mike Nartker WC Monitor 4/25/2014 A survey of employees within the Department of Energy’s Office of Environmental Management has found that workers appear to have significant concerns with how their performance—good or bad—is addressed. EM recently provided to WC Monitor specific data on the views of […]

Mike Nartker WC Monitor 4/25/2014 URS has come under criticism for a lack of cooperation in an investigation now underway into the termination of a nuclear safety manager at the Hanford Waste Treatment Plant, WC Monitor has learned. The Department of Energy Inspector General’s Office expressed concern over URS’ lack of cooperation in a letter […]

Kenneth Fletcher WC Monitor 4/25/2014 Procurement of equipment to remove contaminated sludge from at Hanford’s K-Basin near the Columbia River begins later  this year in a major project that received $31.6 million in the Department of Energy’s Fiscal Year 2015 budget request. Extensive preparations are now underway for the actual transfer of the material, including […]

State, DOE Can’t Reach Agreement on Modification Staff Reports WC Monitor 4/25/2014 Washington state has triggered a formal dispute resolution process for Hanford’s court-enforced consent decree following the Department of Energy’s rejection late last week of the state’s proposal for new deadlines and other requirements. State attorneys sent a brief letter April 23 to the […]

Staff Reports WC Monitor 4/25/2014 The Department of Energy has filed an appeal to halt to a Washington state order requiring it to begin emptying waste from Hanford’s double-shell Tank AY-102 because of its interior leak by Sept. 1. DOE filed the appeal late last week with the State Pollution Control Hearing Board over the order […]

Todd Jacobson WC Monitor 4/25/2014 The Department of Energy’s directives revision process is “too cumbersome” and creates confusion, Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board Chairman Peter Winokur said in a letter earlier this month to Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz. In his April 4 letter, which was recently made public, Winokur urged Moniz to review the directives […]

Kenneth Fletcher WC Monitor 4/25/2014 The Department of Energy could potentially save more than $2.3 million over the next three years by increasing efficiency  in acquisition and management of mobile devices such as phones, tablets and air cards, according to a DOE Inspector General report released this week. The IG’s review covered 10 sites in […]

IWTU Enters Planned Outage Period WC Monitor 4/25/2014 The Idaho Integrated Waste Treatment Unit has entered into a planned outage period as the Department of Energy and contractor CH2M-WG Idaho get ready for the next stage of getting the facility ready to begin actual waste treatment. The outage period is expected to last approximately a […]

DUF6 Plant Manager Leaves WC Monitor 4/25/2014 Tom Robinson has stepped down as B&W Conversion Services, LLC’s plant manager of the Paducah depleted uranium hexafluoride conversion plant. Robinson had served as manager of the Paducah plant since BWCS took over as managing contractor for the Department of Energy’s two DUF6 conversion plants (located at the […]

Judge Blocks FBP from Hiring Pro2Serve Workers WC Monitor 4/25/2014 A federal judge late last week blocked Fluor-B&W Portsmouth, LLC, from hiring employees of Professional Project Services (Pro2Serve) at the Portsmouth D&D project. The judge partially granted a request from Pro2Serve for a temporary restraining order as it moves forward in its recently filed lawsuit […]

WC Monitor 4/25/2014 IN DOE The Department of Energy is gearing up for an inquiry into an allegation of a hostile work environment within the DOE Office of Acquisition and Project Management. DOE issued a solicitation this week seeking a contractor to provide “fact finder services” to look into a “recent allegation” of a hostile […]

DOE Conducts Market Research for Performance Assessments WC Monitor 4/25/2014 The Department of Energy is looking to see if small businesses are available that could perform probabilistic performance assessments and apply decision analysis tools to D&D work at the West Valley Demonstration Project, according to a sources sought notice released this week. DOE has begun […]

Readiness Assessment Delay for New H-Canyon Mission WC Monitor 4/25/2014 After delays last year due to conduct of operations issues, the Department of Energy has now pushed to May a planned readiness assessment for a new mission at Savannah River’s HB-Line to produce plutonium oxide for feedstock for the Mixed Oxide Fuel Fabrication Facility, WC […]

Mike Nartker WC Monitor 4/18/2014      Washington state late this week rejected a proposal put forward by the Department of Energy to modify the 2010 consent decree that governs the cleanup of Hanford’s tank waste. DOE had proposed employing a phased approach to getting the Hanford Waste Treatment Plant in operation that would entail […]

DOE Appoints Senderling, Teynor to Head Federal Recovery Team Kenneth Fletcher WC Monitor 4/18/2014 While this week marked two months since the Feb. 14 radiation release at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant, teams entering the mine still have not identified the source of the incident. In the past week, the two recovery teams entered the […]

Kenneth Fletcher WC Monitor 4/18/2014 The Department of Energy is reportedly examining alternatives to commissioning the Savannah River Site’s Salt Waste Processing Facility as startup talks for the project with facility contractor Parsons have gone on for more than six months without resolution. Parsons submitted a “best and final offer” in late March for commissioning […]