Publications: Weapons Cleanup Monitor

The Department of Energy prime for the Savannah River Site in South Carolina is shopping around for subcontractors interested in building a new emergency operations center. The request for information and expressions of interest by Fluor-led Savannah River Nuclear Solutions was published online Wednesday.   Responses are due by 5 p.m. Eastern Time on Feb. 5 […]

Congressional leaders on Jan. 7 announced they had reached an agreement in principle to fund the federal government for the nine months that remain in fiscal year 2024. Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) and Speaker of the House Rep. Michael Johnson (R-La.) agreed to limit federal spending in the fiscal year that runs through […]

The Department of Energy plans to extend its contract with CDM Smith for technical support services at the Santa Susana Field Laboratory in Ventura County, Calif., into August, increasing the value of the deal by $3 million. The notice announcing the justification for departure from normal competitive bidding was posted Jan. 3 in the government’s […]

The New Mexico Environment Department and the Department of Energy are getting three more months to work on reaching a new deal for legacy cleanup at the Los Alamos National Laboratory. U.S. Magistrate Judge John Robbenhaar agreed to the extension in an order Tuesday. The magistrate judge had issued the most recent  90-day extension in […]

A joint venture of APTIM and North Wind Group failed to properly train laborers on use of a circular saw prior to a November 2022 accident, which caused a worker to lose a finger at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge Site in Tennessee, the agency said last week. “While cutting, a kickback occurred, which […]

In coming weeks, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency will review hundreds more documents in response to a Freedom of Information Act request about a new low-level radioactive waste landfill at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge Site in Tennessee, according to a Jan. 5 court filing. In addition, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the […]

The Jacobs-led remediation contractor at the West Valley Demonstration Project in western New York state announced this week Jason Casper is its new president and general manager, succeeding the recently-retired John Rendall. Rendall led CH2M HILL BWXT West Valley since February 2020 and worked with Department of Energy contractor CH2M, now part of Jacobs, since […]

Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board Chair Joyce Connery repeatedly “undermined” the first board’s executive director of operations in ways “inconsistent” with federal law, according to a report from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s Office of Inspector General. The 15-page report on “actions inconsistent with the delegation of functions required by the Atomic Energy Act,” and dated […]

Physicians for Social Responsibility and other groups sued the U.S. Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg, Secretary of Interior Deb Haaland and other federal agencies Monday, claiming radioactive contaminants still linger along the former grounds of the Department of Energy’s Rocky Flats Plant in Colorado. “Although this facility is no longer in operation, the radioactive contaminants, […]

This week the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission approved construction of a near-surface disposal facility at the Chalk River Laboratories site in Deep River, Ontario after finding the facility would not cause significant ill effects to a nearby river or traditional land of indigenous peoples. The quasi-judicial tribunal announced the decision in a Jan. 9 press […]

The final solicitation for a new remediation contract at the West Valley Demonstration Project in New York state, potentially worth $3 billion over a decade, was issued Thursday by the Department of Energy. The DOE Office of Environmental Management announced the request for proposals (RFP) for what it calls Phase 1B cleanup in a press […]

Over the winter holidays, the Department of Energy revealed it will raise the value of the $4-billion landlord contract held by Leidos-led Hanford Mission Integration Solutions at the Hanford Site in Washington state to more than $5.3 billion. Without the modification the current contract ceiling “is insufficient to enable the contractor to continue full operations […]

Following a 60-day transition, Virginia-based Inomedic Health Applications took over Monday as the new occupational medical services contractor at the Department of Energy’s Hanford Site in Washington state, an agency spokesperson confirmed Wednesday. The contractor will provide medical services to Hanford’s 10,000-person federal and contractor workforce. There are two clinics at Hanford.  In October DOE […]

Over the holidays, the Department of Energy’s cleanup contractor at the Oak Ridge site in Tennessee and a former employee there filed summary judgment motions in a COVID-19-related wrongful termination lawsuit. The prime, Amentum-led United Cleanup Oak Ridge (UCOR), argues that as a government contractor, it has sovereign immunity from the lawsuit filed by Yolonda […]

With federal courts already involved, the Government Accountability Office will not consider an Atkins-led group’s challenge of a $45-billion Department of Energy award to manage liquid radioactive waste at the Hanford Site in Washington state. “We dismiss the protest because the matter involved is the subject of litigation before a court of competent jurisdiction,” the […]

While the Department of Energy is increasingly interested in using grout to solidify some low-level radioactive waste left from decades of plutonium production at its Hanford Site in Washington, operation of such a facility would not begin before the 2030s, according to a recent report. Various scenarios from DOE and its state regulator, the Washington […]

A proposed merger of two industry heavyweights, already partners on about $37 billion worth of Department of Energy nuclear-cleanup contracts, will be among the most-watched issues in 2024 for Weapons Complex Monitor. Virginia-based Amentum plans to merge with the government contracting and cyber wings Dallas-based Jacobs, the two companies announced in October. If the deal […]

The Department of Energy’s National Nuclear Security Administration is taking comments between now and Jan. 17 on plans for a new 14-mile electric power transmission line serving the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico. A draft environmental assessment was published and public comment period commenced Dec. 19 on the Los Alamos National Laboratory Electrical […]

Current and former Department of Energy contractors must reply by Feb. 5 to the latest lawsuit accusing them of not properly controlling off-site contamination from work at the Portsmouth Site in Piketon, Ohio. Plaintiff Joshua Shaw filed suit in federal district court in southern Ohio Nov. 27 accusing the Portsmouth Site contractors of violating the […]

The Department of Energy plans to extend its deal with Waste Control Specialists through late 2026 for ongoing storage of stranded transuranic waste, stuck at the West Texas site for about a decade. In June 2023, DOE told the Texas attorney general’s office it plans to move its 74 containers of transuranic waste out of […]

With the award of a follow-on contract taking longer than expected, the Department of Energy will extend major cleanup contracts at shuttered gaseous diffusion plants in Ohio and Kentucky for up to six months, the agency said after Christmas DOE’s Office of Environmental Management intends to extend Fluor-BWXT Portsmouth’s Decontamination and Decommissioning contract at the […]

Connie Flohr, the Department of Energy’s nuclear cleanup manager at the Idaho National Laboratory will retire from the federal government and take an industry job, a top executive at DOE’s Office of Environmental Management told staff Wednesday. The pending departure of Flohr, a career fed and former budget official who became Idaho cleanup manager in […]

A federal court wants to know more, by Jan. 5, about a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit brought by a citizens group seeking access to some U.S. Environmental Protection Agency documents about a radioactive waste landfill at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge Site in Tennessee. U.S. District Court Judge Ana Reyes ordered a status […]

The looming departure of Los Alamos National Laboratory federal field manager Michael Mikolanis will mark the second swap of Environmental Management field bosses across the Department of Energy’s old weapons complex in a little more than a year. These days, most site feds have a tenure of fewer than six years. These people are the […]

After its waste shipment rate declined briefly due to staffing, the Department of Energy’s Idaho National Laboratory is again sending about 12 shipments most weeks to the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico, according to a recent report. After bosses at the Idaho National Laboratory cut the number of weekly shipments during October to […]

The Department of Energy’s nuclear cleanup branch could issue a trio of final solicitations for new contracts during the first six months of 2024, according to a notice issued Monday. In a notice posted online Monday, DOE’s Office of Environmental Management said final request for proposals (RFP) for Phase 1B of cleanup of the West […]

With 2023 winding down, the Department of Energy’s nuclear cleanup office this week offered a broad overview of how most of its nuclear-weapons cleanup contractors performed during the year. In a widely distributed statement on Tuesday, the Office of Environmental Management shared contractor performance ratings that mostly spanned fiscal year 2023, which ended Sept. 30. […]