Publications: Weapons Cleanup Monitor

Trials on the slate for this winter will follow-up successful tests, announced last week by the Department of Energy, of the first melter at the Hanford Site’s Waste Treatment and Immobilization Plant. Conducted on Oct. 26 and Oct. 30, the tests consisted of melting glass beads together to be poured into a cylindrical canister. The […]

The Department of Energy is taking public comment until Dec. 12 on its draft finding that certain radioactive waste at the Idaho National Laboratory can be disposed of there as low- rather than high-level waste. The draft document “demonstrates that the Calcined Solids Storage Facility (CSSF) at closure after waste retrieval is not high-level radioactive […]

William (Bill) Badger, director of nuclear and environmental business development at Department of Energy contractor Amentum, drowned in Richland, Wash., after the car he was driving went into a local marina, according to the coroner in Benton County, Wash. The fatal accident was first reported Wednesday by the Tri-City Herald newspaper, which said the accident […]

A federal district judge in East Tennessee ruled this week that employees fired after refusing COVID-19 vaccinations by the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge Site cleanup prime, cannot pursue their litigation as a class action suit. “Given the number of individualized inquiries necessary to resolve each plaintiff’s claim, a class action would quickly devolve into […]

Contractor North Wind Portage has now removed 14 million tons of uranium mill tailings from the Moab, Utah site near the Colorado River, the Department of Energy announced this week. Removing 14 million of the 16 million tons of tailings from the Moab Uranium Mill Tailings Remedial Action Project is a big step toward remediation […]

Earnings rose at BWXT Technologies,  Lynchburg, Va., in the third quarter, which the nuclear services company attributed mostly to its commercial business, offset by staffing up its government business in preparation for future work and an increase in corporate expenses.  BWX Technologies Chief Executive Rex Gevenden said the company’s quarterly performance was “slightly ahead of […]

The Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board, currently lacking a quorum, said Wednesday it has filled one of three big staff vacancies by hiring a U.S. Export Import Bank manager as its new executive director of operations. Mary Jean Buhler, chief financial officer at the Export Import Bank, will become the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board […]

Three long-serving feds at the Department of Energy’s Office of Environmental Management have been formally appointed to key management roles on a permanent basis, the No. 2 official at the nuclear cleanup branch said recently. Greg Sosson will become associate principal deputy assistant secretary for field operations effective immediately, said Jeff Avery, DOE Environmental Management […]

A Virginia-based, woman-owned company started its 60-day transition Thursday to become the new provider of occupational medical services at the Department of Energy’s Hanford Site in Washington state, DOE said. DOE’s Richland Operations Office said Wednesday it is giving Inomedic Health Applications (IHA) a notice to proceed with the transition, which should be completed on […]

Having been skipped the first time around, the Government Accountability Office was asked to consider a challenge by an Atkins-led team over a $45-billion Department of Energy contract for liquid waste management. The bid protest, dated Friday, arrived after DOE called upon losing bidder Hanford Tank Disposition Alliance and the winning bidder, BWX-Technologies-led Hanford Tank […]

Bechtel National this week pushed back against a Department of Energy Office of Inspector General audit report that questioned the reliability of the contractor’s cost estimates for the Waste Treatment and Immobilization Plant at the Hanford Site in Washington state. “We believe that the report overlooks relevant factual data that is essential for consideration prior […]

Earnings rose at Fluor, Irving, Texas, in the third quarter, which the engineering and construction company attributed in part Friday to metals and mining projects as well as a steady stream of government contracts. Net earnings attributable to Fluor for the third quarter ended Sept. 30 were $206 million, or $1.15 a share, up from […]

Teams seeking to land a major Department of Energy contract that includes running depleted uranium hexafluoride conversion facilities at former gaseous diffusion plants in Ohio and Kentucky have been asked to keep their bids open through Nov. 17, sources said this week. Two DOE weapons complex contractor executives and one municipal government official told Exchange […]

A draft solicitation for a carbon-free power project at the Hanford Site in Washington state could be released within a month, a senior adviser with the Department of Energy’s nuclear cleanup office said during an online presentation Tuesday. Hanford was the first DOE Office of Environmental Management property to hold a “Cleanup to Clean Energy” […]

The Senate Armed Services Committee in a voice vote Thursday advanced the White House’s nomination of Patricia Lee to be a member of the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board, a panel designed for five people that’s currently down to two.  The nomination of Lee, a manager at the Department of Energy’s Savannah River National Laboratory […]

The prime environmental contractor at the Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site in South Carolina expects the Salt Waste Processing Facility to treat roughly six million gallons of waste during fiscal 2024, after doing more than 4 million in fiscal 2023. That was the assessment BWX Technologies-led Savannah River Mission Completion President Dave Olson provided […]

On Thursday, after a two-week squabble about who to elect as speaker, the House of Representatives passed a bill to fund defense and civilian nuclear nuclear programs for the rest of fiscal year 2024, including $8.3-billion for the Department of Energy’s nuclear cleanup branch.  Civilian nuclear programs at DOE and elsewhere would essentially remain flat […]

The Department of Energy’s contention that the state of Washington lacks authority to order installation of decontamination showers at a waste disposal site won’t block a larger permit modification for the facility, state and federal agencies agreed last week. “Due to the critical need for the timely execution of Direct-Feed Low Activity Waste at Hanford,” […]

The long-planned new air-intake shaft at the Department of Energy’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico has been excavated to its final depth of 2,275 feet, the agency said Tuesday. Completion of the 26-feet-wide shaft is a 2023 priority for DOE’s Office of Environmental Management at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) 26 miles […]

The head of the Department of Energy’s Office of Nuclear Energy hopes the agency can select its first clean power project at the Idaho National Laboratory within a year. “A year from today” is the target, Kathryn Huff, DOE’s assistant secretary for nuclear energy, told reporters on the sidelines of the Idaho lab’s Cleanup to […]

Shipments of transuranic waste to the Department of Energy’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico from Idaho National Laboratory could decline in 2024, according to a recent federal safety board update. The Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) near Carlsbad receives waste drums from the Idaho National Laboratory’s Advanced Mixed Waste Treatment Project (AMWTP), as […]

A first-of-its kind facility to convert sodium-bearing waste at the Department of Energy’s Idaho National Laboratory into a solid form, is likely to stay offline for maintenance at least a few more weeks, an advisory board heard Wednesday. The Integrated Waste Treatment Unit (IWTU) is using a maintenance outage that began in September to replace […]

An advocacy group has gone to federal court in Washington, D.C., seeking to force the Environmental Protection Agency to hand over documents that led to approval of a new low-level radioactive waste landfill at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge Site in Tennessee. Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER) filed suit Oct. 19 in the […]

Two teams fighting over the prized $45-billion Integrated Tank Contract at the Hanford Site in Washington state, filed updated proposals with the Department of Energy during the past week, according to legal filings Thursday. BWX-Technologies-led Hanford Tank Waste Operations & Closure as well as AtkinsRéalis Nuclear-led Hanford Tank Disposition Alliance filed their revised contract proposals […]

In a return to pre-pandemic practice, the Department of Energy said last week it will vet management teams in person for the next $3 billion cleanup contract at the West Valley Demonstration Project in western New York. In a special notice, DOE’s Office of Environmental Management said it would hold its oral interviews and problem […]

The APTIM-Amentum Alaska Decommissioning joint venture has won a U.S. Army Corps of Engineers contract worth $95.5 million over six years to take down an old reactor at Fort Greely, Alaska, Amentum said last week. The Army Corps Baltimore District awarded the contract to decommission and dismantle the SM-1A Reactor Facility, Amentum said in a […]

Inés Triay, a former Department of Energy assistant secretary for environmental management, was appointed interim dean of Florida International University’s College of Engineering and Computing and the executive director of the university’s Applied Research Center. The university announced Triay’s appointment in a Tuesday press release. She has been at Florida International and a top manager […]