Publications: Weapons Cleanup Monitor

The Department of Energy’s Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico is drafting its formal response to public comments filed on the Electrical Power Capacity Upgrade Project, the head of the National Nuclear Security Administration field office said last week. The environmental assessment public comment period ended Feb. 20 on the upgrade project for the […]

An electric company serving New Mexico, representatives of a nearby uranium enrichment plant and various consulting, engineering and government groups showed up for the clean power information day at the Department of Energy’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant this week.  More than a dozen groups participated in Wednesday’s event at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) […]

A team led by AtkinsRéalis Nuclear was back in federal court this week arguing that the Department of Energy improperly re-awarded a $45-billion liquid-waste-cleanup contract to a BWX Technologies-led joint venture. In a new complaint with the Court of Federal Claims, Atkins-led Hanford Tank Disposition Alliance said DOE’s court-ordered re-competition of the Hanford Integrated Tank […]

The Amentum-led environmental prime at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge Site in Tennessee has until April 2 to respond to a lawsuit by a former employee who claims he was fired in 2019 because of disability and whistleblower retaliation. Lawyers for plaintiff Christopher Hicks and defendant United Cleanup Oak Ridge (UCOR) agreed to the […]

The Leidos-led landlord at the Department of Energy’s Hanford Site asked a federal court in Washington state Monday to throw out litigation by the Department of Justice and a whistleblower alleging the contractor padded its fire safety bills to the government by millions of dollars. The contractor, which has a 10-year contract now worth $4 […]

A former radiation technician fired after refusing to take the COVID-19 vaccine told a federal appeals court last week the Department of Energy’s environmental prime at Oak Ridge Site in Tennessee is not entitled to sovereign immunity. In a legal brief filed March 19, lawyers for Yolonda Riggs, told the Sixth U.S. Court of Appeals […]

New Mexico wants assurance transuranic waste, held 10 years at a commercial storage facility in Texas, won’t pose an ignition threat before signing off on shipment to the Department of Energy’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant near Carlsbad, N.M. As a result, DOE is now facing pressure from both Texas and New Mexico. The Texas attorney […]

Speed cameras will soon be installed to help curb speeding and aggressive driving along the truck route at the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico, the National Nuclear Security Administration’s top local fed told county officials last week. The laboratory is “finding ways to try and better manage traffic flow,” National Nuclear Security Administration […]

The Department of Energy and contractor Bechtel National at the Hanford Site in Washington state have heated up the second melter at the vitrification plant to its operating temperature of 2,100 degrees Fahrenheit. The agency announced the heat up of the second melter in a Tuesday press release, calling it a big step toward operation […]

The Tri-City Development Council thinks the best way to spur carbon-free power at the Hanford Site in Washington state is for the Department of Energy to transfer a chunk of buffer land there to local control, a vice president with the organization, David Reeploeg, told Exchange Monitor by phone last week. Reeploeg responded to the […]

President Joe Biden requested $47.2 million for the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board for the 2025 fiscal year starting Oct, 1, or $5.2 million than the $42 million recently appropriated by congress for the small watchdog agency in fiscal 2024. The White House requested the $47.2 million and the equivalent of 128 full-time staff positions, […]

The Department of Energy’s Office of Environmental Management expects to issue at most two final solicitations between now and September, according to a quarterly notice published Wednesday. The final request for proposals (RFP) for Consolidated Technical Support Services would be released no sooner than June and the Paducah Infrastructure Support Services contract no sooner than […]

The Waste Isolation Pilot Plant should have reported a Jan. 23 incident, where two miners were stuck up to 30 minutes in a waste hoist lowering them underground, to the Department of Energy’s accident reporting system, a federal safety watchdog says. “Site personnel determined that an erroneous digital signal caused a breaker to trip, resulting […]

A plaintiff who grew up within two miles of the Department of Energy’s Portsmouth Site in Ohio, filed an amended federal court complaint last week against contractors he claims violated the Price Anderson Act and caused his acute myeloid leukemia. Joshua Shaw, now in his early 50s, was diagnosed with leukemia in 2008 and even […]

At least for now, the Department of Energy will not extend the April 9 proposal deadline for a solicitation for a new five-year Technical Support Services contract at the Portsmouth/Paducah Project Office. In a set of questions and answers posted last week, DOE turned down a questioner who asked the final request for proposals (RFP) […]

A federal district court judge in Tennessee has again refused to allow a group of more than 20 people to join a COVID-19 lawsuit filed by fired contractors at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge Site. U.S. District Judge Travis McDonough rejected a motion for reconsideration filed last month by prospective plaintiffs who say they […]

A 21-year-old who starts working at the Department of Energy’s Hanford Site in Washington state this year could have a 50-plus-year career and still retire before the former plutonium production facility is officially cleaned up. DOE currently projects, with between 50% and 80% confidence, the Hanford Site will be deemed clean sometime between 2078 and […]

The Department of Energy and its prime contractor at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant are conferring with stakeholders and generators to better define legacy transuranic waste, managers said during a public meeting Tuesday in Roswell, N.M. In addition, the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) should bring online two major infrastructure projects, the ventilation system and […]

PHOENIX — Hanford Site managers in Washington state intend to have their transuranic waste program certified by the Department of Energy in fiscal 2026 and start shipping to the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico in 2028, a contractor official said at a conference last week. Mike Douglas, waste projects manager for Amentum-led Central […]

Merging the Hanford Site’s two field offices in Washington state will not deprioritize cleanup of millions of gallons of radioactive tank waste, Secretary of Energy Jennifer Granholm told House appropriators Wednesday. DOE has for years planned to combine Hanford’s Office of River Protection with the Richland Operations Office in 2025, the same year the site […]

The Department of Energy’s Amentum-led environmental prime at the Oak Ridge Site in Tennessee on Wednesday signed a new contract affecting 550 members of North America’s Building Trades Unions at the nuclear property. United Cleanup Oak Ridge (UCOR) said in a press release the project labor agreement, which covers a quarter of its 2,200-person workforce, […]

Under a settlement with the state, the Department of Energy will install portable showers at the Integrated Disposal Facility once it starts receiving canisters of glass made from radioactive waste at the Hanford Site in Washington state. The agreement, dated March 4 and signed by attorneys for DOE and the Washington Department of Ecology, was […]

A federal nuclear liability shield would be extended for 40 years and quadruple the value of federal indemnity for nuclear incidents outside the U.S. if a 2024 appropriations bill passed by the House Friday becomes law. The language in the appropriations package that funds the Department of Defense and several other agencies would extend the […]

Subcontractors and small businesses should have benefitted more over time from Bechtel National’s multibillion-dollar contract to build the Waste Treatment and Immobilization Plant at the Department of Energy’s Hanford Site in Washington state, DOE’s Office of Inspector General said. By self-performing so much of the work, “Bechtel reduced subcontracting opportunities for small businesses and other […]

“Better contracting, better cleanup” is the big goal in the Department of Energy Office of Environmental Management’s new decade-long strategic vision, released this week. The cleanup branch spends about 95% of its $8-billion-plus annual budget on joint ventures and a contractor workforce of 25,000, the agency said in the 52-page document. “It remains critical that […]

PHOENIX — The Department of Energy has issued requests for qualifications at four of the initial five nuclear properties in the agency’s Cleanup to Clean Energy program, officials here said Tuesday at the Waste Management Symposia conference. As of this week, requests for qualifications (RFQ) have gone out at the Hanford Site in Washington state, […]

PHOENIX —With the Department of Energy’s Portsmouth Site in Ohio making headway in nuclear remediation, feds and locals around the Piketon, Ohio complex are working to attract new industry, including nuclear power. That was the takeaway from a Wednesday panel discussion on the former Portsmouth Gaseous Diffusion Plant site during the Waste Management Symposium conference. […]