Publications: Weapons Cleanup Monitor

A long-awaited report released Monday from the National Academies finds a “strong technical case” for using concrete-like grout to augment operation of the Waste Treatment and Immobilization Plant at the Department of Energy’s Hanford Site in Washington state. The report from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine lauded a study by DOE’s Savannah […]

Crews at the Department of Energy’s Hanford Site in Washington state are doing electrical testing, setting the stage to again start heating up the first melter at the Waste Treatment and Immobilization Plant, the agency’s acting nuclear cleanup boss said this week. “At Hanford we resumed our electrical testing for the vitrification plant,” William (Ike) […]

Jessie Hill Roberson, a fixture in the public and private sectors of the nuclear field for more than 30 years, plans to exit the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board this October when her latest term expires, a board spokesperson said Monday. The exit of the longtime nuclear hand could, temporarily at least, leave only two […]

A $1.4-billion facility to convert sodium-bearing waste into a solid granular form at the Department of Energy’s Idaho National Laboratory is now running with 100% radioactive waste, the head of the $8-billion nuclear cleanup office said Monday. The Integrated Waste Treatment Unit (IWTU) at the Idaho National Lab is now “at 100% waste feed,” William […]

Butte County, Idaho has already tried and failed to convince federal courts the locality is entitled to “impact payments” because of ongoing storage of spent nuclear fuel at the Department of Energy’s Idaho National Laboratory, according to Justice Department legal papers filed Monday. “Plaintiff already tested—and lost—its theory that it was entitled to impact assistance […]

With the head of field operations at the Department of Energy’s $8-billion nuclear remediation branch recently announcing departure plans, more of the Cold War and Manhattan Project cleanup sites will start reporting directly to the No. 2 boss at headquarters in Washington, D.C., officials said Monday. “We are making a change in a couple of […]

A Sunday fire near the Department of Energy’s Hanford Site in Washington state has been extinguished but not before it burned 1,300 acres, according to a Hanford announcement on Facebook. “Wind gusts fanned the flames, but the Hanford Fire Department, managed by Hanford Mission Integration Solutions, got it under control within a few hours with […]

Oklo, a California-based developer of small modular reactors, announced plans to build two new nuclear units near the Department of Energy’s Portsmouth Site in Ohio, according to a May 18 press release. Oklo’s commercial power plants will provide up to 30 megawatts of non-carbon emitting electric power, and more than 50 megawatts of heating, with […]

Bechtel National has turned to a senior vice president and longtime company manager, Brian Hartman, as it’s next project director for the Waste Treatment and Immobilization Plant at the Department of Energy’s Hanford Site in Washington state. Bechtel, which has a $15-billion contact that started in 2000 to build the plant to convert radioactive tank […]

A judge will hear arguments Tuesday on whether a BWX Technologies-led team should be stripped, on a technicality, of perhaps the biggest nuclear-weapons-cleanup contract ever issued by the Department of Energy. Judge Marian Horn on Thursday scheduled a hearing for May 30 in the U.S. Court of Federal Claims in Washington, specifically to deal with […]

The Department of Energy’s Cincinnati-based Environmental Management Consolidated Business Center is in the market for small companies to support upcoming procurements in the weapons complex. The Environmental Management Consolidated Business Center (EMCBC) on Tuesday published a combined sources sought and request for information for small businesses designated as an Indian Tribe or Alaska Native Corporation […]

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission said Thursday it found no significant environmental impact from allowing Waste Control Specialists to move containers of long-stranded Department of Energy transuranic waste to another location within the company’s Andrews County, Texas property. The move, sought by Waste Control Specialists (WCS) 11 months ago, would allow relocation of 74 containers of […]

The Department of Energy will not begin transition to a new BWX Technologies-led contractor at the Hanford Site in Washington state until a legal challenge of the $45-billion liquid-waste contract is resolved in court, according to a May 12 court filing. The Department of Justice confirmed May 8 that DOE would stay performance of the […]

The Department of Energy’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico appears headed for its busiest calendar year since the disposal site reopened in 2017.  The Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) received 47 shipments of defense-related transuranic waste during the month of April, based upon a search of DOE’s public website for the facility this […]

The White House has ended remaining COVID-19 federal jobsite vaccination rules triggered by two 2021 executive orders but attorneys for 315 workers at the Department of Energy’s Hanford Site say the legal fight should go on. The administration of President Joe Biden (D) and other defendants in David Donovan versus Brian Vance “have not relinquished […]

The Department of Energy aims to use an advanced new solvent by the end of fiscal 2025 to improve the numbers at the Salt Waste Processing Facility at the Savannah River Site in South Carolina, a cleanup contractor boss told a federal advisory board Tuesday. Other glitches at the Salt Waste Processing Facility (SWPF) should […]

The prime contractor for the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee has made its “last, best and final’ offer to settle with a handful of employees who sued over COVID-19 vaccination policy, according to recently-filed federal court papers. UT-Battelle, the University of Tennessee-Battelle venture that runs the Oak Ridge lab for DOE, […]

Savannah River citizen panel updated on NNSA transition, saltstone disposal, security, changes in state regulator Federal officials next month could rough out the plan for handing over the Savannah River Site in South Carolina to the Department of Energy’s nuclear weapons branch from the agency’s cleanup office, a local fed told an advisory board Monday. […]

In court papers filed this week, current and past contractors at the Department of Energy’s Portsmouth Site in Ohio deny their work led to the cancer suffered by a former student at a now-closed middle school near the nuclear cleanup property. In a 12-page document filed Monday in U.S. District Court for Southern Ohio, the […]

The Department of Energy’s Office of Environmental Management is looking to beef up its staff devoted to procurement through what it calls the Environmental Management Career Acquisition Program, DOE said Friday. “Given how integral acquisition and contracting is to how we conduct our work, ensuring continuity in the procurement function is essential to the [Environmental […]

An Atkins-led team’s decision to bypass the Government Accountability Office and take a Department of Energy bid protest straight to the Court of Federal Claims is rare but not shocking given that $45 billion hangs in the balance, industry people told Exchange Monitor this week. Hanford Tank Disposition Alliance, which also includes Jacobs and Westinghouse […]

The Government Accountability Office this week denied a bid protest challenging the Department of Energy’s award to Centerra of a new security contract at the Savannah River Site in South Carolina. In a redacted version of the decision posted online Thursday, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) dismissed Securitas-led SRS Critical Infrastructure Security’s (SCIS) argument that […]

A contractor for the Department of Energy has removed 13.4 million tons at the Moab uranium tailings site in Utah and transported the debris to a disposal facility near Crescent Junction, a local advisory panel heard recently. “Approximately 96,991 tons of tailings and mill debris were moved in March 2023,” Jessica Thacker, a liaison for […]

The Department of Energy’s final solicitation for small business nuclear deactivation and demolition contractors has hit the streets. Responses to the DOE Office of Environmental Management final request for proposals (RFP) is June 26 for the Small Business Nationwide Deactivation, Decommissioning and Removal procurement, the agency said in the cover letter published Friday. The DOE […]

Earnings rose at BWX Technologies, Lynchburg, Va., in the first quarter, which the nuclear services and manufacturing company attributed largely to its government operations. Net earnings for the first quarter ended March 31 were $61 million or $0.67 per share up from $59.1 million, or $0.64 a share, in the year-ago quarter. Quarterly revenue was […]

The U.S. Department of Labor invited both current and former nuclear-weapons workers to Richland, Wash., near the Department of Energy’s Hanford Site, to discuss eligibility for occupational illness benefits. The Energy Employees Occupational Illness Compensation Program Act outreach session will be held at 9 a.m. Pacific Time at the Holiday Inn Richland, according to a […]

Washington state, the Department of Energy and the public interest group Heart of America Northwest, have reached a settlement on how the government agencies should respond to leaks of underground radioactive waste tanks at the Hanford Site. The formal settlement agreement was filed with the Washington’s Pollution Control Hearings Board Wednesday, the parties announced. This […]

Jacobs Solutions, Dallas, announced Tuesday it will spin off its Critical Mission Solutions business, which coordinates business with the Department of Energy, late next year. The DOE business, accounted by the parent company as an equity share from the joint venture companies that manage DOE sites, is only a small part of Critical Mission Solutions […]