Department of Energy

Current and former executives with connections to the nuclear industry are among the eight members announced Wednesday to the U.S. Secretary of Energy Advisory Board (SEAB). “I am pleased to announce the Secretary of @ENERGY Advisory Board members and I look forward to working with this team to enhance energy security, innovation, and the nuclear […]

Idaho’s Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) on Feb. 15 expressed no misgivings about a preliminary federal finding that there would be no major impact in renewing the license for continued in-state storage of waste from the Three Mile Island nuclear power plant in Pennsylvania. The state agency, though, reminded the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission that […]

Current and former executives with connections to the nuclear industry are among the eight members announced Wednesday to the U.S. Secretary of Energy Advisory Board (SEAB). Former EnergySolutions Chairman and CEO David Lockwood and Edison International President and CEO Pedro Pizarro joined leaders from the energy industry, defense establishment, and other sectors on the panel’s […]

Three of four members of the Defense Nuclear Facility Safety Board (DNFSB) concurred with a recently published in-house legal opinion that the small, independent federal nuclear watchdog has the right to make safety recommendations for Department of Energy workers. The sole holdout was board Chairman Bruce Hamilton. The two agencies have disagreed on the point for nearly […]

The Energy Department’s Carlsbad Field Office has approved a plan by contractor Nuclear Waste Partnership (NWP) to gradually improve underground air quality at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico. The contractor must take small steps because it won’t be ready to meet much tougher underground air quality standards, by the Jan. 17 compliance […]

A trio of companies involved in nuclear waste management or remediation are set to discuss their latest earnings results this week. Fluor, based near Dallas, has scheduled its quarterly and annual earnings conference call with financial analysts at 5:30 p.m. ET Thursday. The company, a major player in the Energy Department weapons complex, will release […]

The U.S. Department of Justice and Washington state have agreed that a federal lawsuit over a new state law easing workers’ compensation requirements for ill Hanford Site workers likely can be resolved without a trial. Both have told the court they plan to file motions for summary judgment in the case. Judge Stanley Bastian, of […]

Leidos on Tuesday posted higher sales and earnings due to top line growth across its business segments and higher operating income in its Health and Civil segments. Net income increased 65 percent to $188 million, $1.25 earnings per share (EPS), from $114 million (74 cents EPS) a year ago. The strong earnings were driven by […]

The Energy Department’s Office of Environmental Management is seeking vendor feedback on a potential new contract to provide infrastructure support services at the Portsmouth Site in Ohio and the Paducah Site in Kentucky. The request for information/sources sought notice was issued Tuesday by DOE’s Cincinnati-based Environmental Management Consolidated Business Center. The Energy Department is in […]

Idaho’s Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) on Friday expressed no misgivings about a preliminary federal finding that there would be no major impact in renewing the license for continued in-state storage of waste from the Three Mile Island nuclear power plant in Pennsylvania. The state agency, though, reminded the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission that the […]

The New Mexico Senate on Monday unanimously confirmed former U.S. Environmental Protection Agency manager James Kenney as secretary of the state Environment Department. New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham (D) named Kenney as secretary-designate to NMED on Jan. 7. Along with enforcing environmental laws, the department oversees hazardous waste and radioactive sources at U.S. Department […]

As part of its efforts to put its house in order, the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board (DNFSB) intends hire a high-profile staff management position, Chairman Bruce Hamilton said Thursday during a meeting in Washington, D.C. “We need to hire this executive secretary, or chief of staff, or whatever you want to call it,” Hamilton […]

U.S. Rep. Tom Reed (R-N.Y.) last week again introduced legislation to reauthorize the Department of Energy’s West Valley Demonstration Project in New York. The measure, co-sponsored by Rep. Brian Higgins (D-N.Y.), was filed Feb. 11 and assigned to the House Energy and Commerce Committee. As of this morning, the text has not been received for […]

A lawsuit filed by local landowners claims negligence by Boeing and Southern California Edison is partly to blame for a wildfire that charred almost 100,000 acres of land in Los Angeles and Ventura counties in California. The complaint against the airplane manufacturer and the electric power company was filed Feb. 5 in California Superior Court […]

The U.S. Justice Department and the contractor that manages the Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site in South Carolina hope a civilian board will soon offer an opinion on whether the company overcharged the federal government by $5 million. Before a decision can be made, the two sides must wrap up a weeks-long hearing in […]

Updated safety documents for a ventilation tunnel at the Savannah River Site’s H Canyon facility are expected to be approved this summer and implemented in the fall, according to the Department of Energy. The documents should reflect a different approach to how the 310-square-mile site will handle incidents at the facility during an earthquake or […]

Department of Energy contractor Parsons recently completed construction of a $13 million facility that will expedite treatment of liquid salt waste at the Savannah River Site in South Carolina. Parsons announced Monday it has finished building the Next Generation Solvent (NGS) facility and has it in operational standby, awaiting startup of the site’s Salt Waste […]

The manager of the Department of Energy Office of River Protection at the Hanford Site, Brian Vance, has been selected as acting manager of the Hanford Richland Operations Office. This is the first time since the Office of River Protection (ORP) was established in 1998 that there has been one top manager for the entire […]

The U.S. Department of Justice on Feb. 8 filed a civil lawsuit against Hanford Site contractor Mission Support Alliance (MSA), accusing it of fraud through false claims and kickbacks from 2010 to 2015. The lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court for Eastern Washington also names Lockheed Martin Services Inc., Lockheed Martin Corp., and Lockheed executive […]

AECOM-led Savannah River Remediation (SRR) hired 378 new workers in 2018, and expects to bring on a similar number of employees this year under its liquid waste management contract at the Energy Department’s Savannah River Site near Aiken, S.C. Energy Department cleanup sites such as Savannah River have been pushing hiring programs in recent years […]

The Department of Energy’s nuclear cleanup office sent a valentine to prospective contractors Thursday, issuing two major requests for proposals at the Hanford Site in Washington state. In releasing final procurement notices for the Central Plateau Cleanup Contract and the Tank Closure Contract, DOE’s Office of Environmental Management (EM) met a 45-day deadline it set […]

The need to develop and win regulatory approval for new “oversized boxes” to move radioactive waste to the Idaho National Laboratory was central to the Energy Department’s decision against keeping the Advanced Mixed Waste Treatment Project (AMWTP) open past this year. After considering sustaining operations at the facility open after it finishes its mission to […]

The Hanford Site’s occupational medicine contractor has been awarded 90.1 percent of the fee available for the last full fiscal year under its expiring contract. HPM Corp. (HPMC), of Kennewick, Wash., earned $315,350 of $350,000 available for fiscal 2018, according to a Department of Energy performance scorecard released Wednesday. HPM Corp. was awarded a six-year […]

The Department of Energy needs to be more realistic in tracking and reporting progress toward environmental milestones at its nuclear cleanup sites, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) said Thursday. “We found that DOE didn’t accurately track or report whether milestones were met, missed, or postponed. We also found that sites continually renegotiate milestones they are […]

ARLINGTON, Va. — The head of Savannah River Nuclear Solutions (SRNS) hazarded an educated guess here Wednesday that the Department of Energy will soon extend his team’s contract to manage the Savannah River Site in Aiken, S.C. After a one-year, $1-billion extension awarded in 2018 by DOE’s Office of Environmental Management, SRNS is slated to […]

The state of New York plans to accept public input later this year on a draft permit for the U.S. Department of Energy to keep transuranic waste up to 10 years at the Separations Process Research Unit (SPRU) cleanup site in Schenectady County. After the state Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) last year decided the […]

A motorist who died in an automobile crash inside the Savannah River Site in South Carolina on Feb. 7 was not an employee of the Department of Energy or its contractors. “It wasn’t connected to our work,” a DOE spokesperson said by email. “It does appear that it was just a tragic accident — one […]

Fewer workers than Fluor-BWXT Portsmouth (FBP) hoped took advantage of a voluntary separation package offered for contractor personnel at the Energy Department’s Portsmouth Site in Ohio. After offering the package in December for up to 75 employees at the former gaseous diffusion plant, the decommissioning vendor said this week less than two-thirds of that number […]

The Energy Department and its contractor for the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) are seeking to preserve their recently won change to the way in which transuranic waste volume is recorded at the New Mexico disposal facility. Both DOE and AECOM-led Nuclear Waste Partnership have been authorized to intervene in the legal challenge brought last […]

The trade group for the U.S. casino industry this month, in a letter to Congress, reaffirmed its opposition to development of a nuclear waste repository under Yucca Mountain, Nev. Addressing all members of the 116th Congress, the American Gaming Association noted that the long-planned underground repository would be built 90 miles from the nation’s mecca […]