Savannah River Site is moving beyond its traditional environmental cleanup mission as the Department of Energy and National Nuclear Security Administration prepare to expand nuclear-fuel, plutonium and other national-security activities at the South Carolina site.
The NNSA took over landlord responsibilities from DOE’s Environmental Management in October 2024. Edwin Deshong, manager of DOE Environmental Management’s Savannah River Operations Office, said during a National Cleanup Conference panel that the agency is shifting its focus from cleaning up SRS and leaning toward “revitalizing” the site for new missions.
DOE recently announced it currently expects to complete Savannah River tank waste cleanup between 2037 and 2041.
“We’re going to revitalize it. We’re going to be able to restart H Canyon,” Deshong said, adding that DOE is also examining HB-Line for mixed-oxide fuel, pursuing heavy-water opportunities and making plutonium available for new uses.
H Canyon, which Deshong called the only chemical-separations facility of its kind in the world, is a particular priority, he said. Deshong added the facility could process material for special reactors, representing a shift from treating nuclear materials primarily as waste toward viewing them as resources.
Lee Schifer, senior vice president for SRS prime Savannah River Nuclear Solutions, said the site also is preparing for expanded plutonium management and pit-production missions, including construction of processing capabilities and potential future use of HB-Line. But regional infrastructure could constrain that growth.
Chuck Smith, a former Aiken, S.C. county official, said the surrounding region could need 17,000 new homes over the next five years to accommodate the workforce associated with expanding projects. He also cited transportation, utilities, workforce development and subcontractor capacity as needs.
Schifer said “stable, adequate, predictable budgets” will be necessary to support both existing and planned projects in similar comments to Thomas Ashlock’s, associate administrator for congressional and intergovernmental affairs at NNSA.
Tom Burns, who heads environmental contractor Savannah River Mission Completion, said execution will ultimately determine whether the site’s revitalization plans become reality, arguing that projects must proceed at a commercial pace while maintaining nuclear safety.
The panel also highlighted Savannah River National Laboratory’s role in applying science, advanced manufacturing and AI to support both cleanup and future nuclear missions.