Department of Energy

A panel of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine will make a second visit to the Hanford Site area this week for a public meeting on supplemental treatment of low-activity radioactive waste. It will meet from 1:30 p.m. to 6:30 p.m. Monday and 8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. Tuesday at the Red Lion […]

Total penalties assessed by Idaho against the Energy Department for failing to start treating sodium-bearing waste at the Idaho National Laboratory (INL) hit $4.16 million earlier this month, according to the state’s Department of Environmental Quality. The Idaho DEQ on June 20 approved DOE’s latest round of proposed supplemental environmental projects, which will allow the […]

The public has until Sept. 14 to request an adjudicatory hearing before the Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s Atomic Safety and Licensing Board Panel on a proposed facility for interim storage of spent nuclear reactor fuel in southeastern New Mexico. The NRC is reviewing Holtec International’s license application for storage of 8,680 metric tons of used nuclear fuel […]

Bob McQuinn, an AECOM senior executive who, among other things, led the prime contractor team for the Energy Department’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP), for about a year following a 2014 accident, has announced he will retire at the end of August. McQuinn is vice president of the company’s performance assurance and high-level waste sector. […]

A federal judge has placed a South Carolina lawsuit against the Department of Energy on hold until an appeals court decides if she was right to block the agency from stopping work at the Savannah River Site’s Mixed Oxide Fuel Fabrication Facility (MFFF). It would not make sense to address other issues in the high stakes […]

The Energy Department is seeking feedback from small business contractors who might be interested in cleaning up the F-Building Storage Yard (F-Yard) at the Separations Process Research Unit (SPRU) facility near Schenectady, N.Y. The department’s Office of Environmental Management said Tuesday it is issuing a request for information (RFI)/sources sought, in order to connect with […]

A dozen current and former fire captains or platoon sergeants at the Hanford site in Washington state are seeking overtime back pay and damages in a federal lawsuit filed against site-wide services contractor Mission Support Alliance (MSA). The plaintiffs say MSA owes them overtime pay, equal to one-and-a-half times their normal hourly wage, for time […]

A new project baseline proposal for the Savannah River Site’s Salt Waste Processing Facility (SWPF) was recently submitted by Parsons and is currently under review by the U.S. Department of Energy, an agency spokesperson confirmed this week in an email. Parsons submitted the plan last month. The Department of Energy (DOE) spokesperson said SWPF will […]

Nearly a week after a technically bipartisan delegation of House members and staff visited Yucca Mountain in Nye County, Nev., lawmakers still have not set a date to begin final negotiations on a 2019 budget bill that, technically, could include funding for the proposed waste-repository. Those negotiations, a bicameral conference committee of lawmakers from the […]

Nuclear Watch New Mexico (NukeWatch) can continue to pursue its lawsuit against the Energy Department and its former Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) contractor for failing to do certain tasks spelled out in a 2005 consent order, but a federal judge won’t throw out a revised 2016 settlement between DOE and the state of New […]

The Department of Energy delayed the release of a draft request for proposals for further cleanup of the Hanford Site’s central plateau until sometime between now and Sept. 30, the agency announced this week. The draft solicitation won’t be issued until after the department discusses the planned procurement in August with prospective vendors. “The Central […]

Having already shifted the Energy Department’s Cold War cleanup office to a different undersecretary, the Donald Trump administration isn’t finished yet in remodeling DOE, the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee was told Thursday. The administration wants to make the Energy Department more efficient and better able to carry out core missions, including “addressing the […]

A sinkhole discovered last month near the 2H Evaporator at the Energy Department’s Savannah River Site in South Carolina has been fixed, a DOE spokesperson said Friday by email. The sinkhole, about 4 feet long, 3 feet wide, and more than 3 feet deep, was discovered in asphalt on the east side of the evaporator […]

The Energy Department and its prime contractor received 169 shipments of transuranic waste for disposal at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) in New Mexico during the first six months of 2018. That averages out to 6.5 shipments per week for the first 26 weeks of the year. By comparison, there were 133 shipments, or […]

To prevent it from collapsing, the Department of Energy wants to start filling a second PUREX plant waste storage tunnel at the Hanford site with concrete-like grout in August — before the end of a scheduled public comment period about the effort. The Washington State Department of Ecology, lead state regulator at Hanford, plans a […]

The Department of Energy is limiting options for future use of Hanford land with the cleanup decisions it is making now, according to a new Columbia Riverkeeper report. The Oregon-based group, which works to protect and restore the water quality of the Columbia River, released “Competing Visions for the Future of Hanford” on Tuesday. DOE […]

The Energy Department and contractor Fluor-BWXT Portsmouth expect soil excavation and installation of necessary infrastructure for a planned on-site radioactive waste disposal cell at the Portsmouth Site in Ohio should be completed in fiscal 2019. Recent progress includes setting up trailers for work crews, installing security fencing along the perimeter of the site, including sedimentation […]

After years of preparation, the Southern Ohio Diversification Initiative (SODI) will formally become the owner of an 80-acre tract of land being conveyed to it by the Energy Department’s Portsmouth Site on Friday. “We are thrilled to get this property … and eventually bring jobs to Southern Ohio,” SODI Executive Director Steve Shepherd said by […]

The Energy Department and its prime contractor for the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico will hold their next WIPP Town Hall update on Aug. 2 in Carlsbad, N.M. These public briefings on the underground transuranic waste disposal site are webcast. The Energy Department and contractor Nuclear Waste Partnership had initially planned to have […]

The Department of Energy delayed the release of a draft request for proposals for further cleanup of the Hanford Site’s central plateau until some time between now and Sept. 30, the agency announced Tuesday. “The Central Plateau Cleanup Contract (CPCC) Draft Request For Proposal is now anticipated to be released by the end of the […]

Nuclear Watch New Mexico (NukeWatch) can continue to pursue its lawsuit against the Energy Department and its former Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) contractor for failing to do certain tasks spelled out in a 2005 consent order, but a federal judge won’t throw out a revised 2016 settlement between DOE and the state of New […]

The Energy Department is seeking feedback from small business contractors who might be interested in cleaning up the F-Building Storage Yard (F-Yard) at the Separations Process Research Unit (SPRU) facility near Schenectady, N.Y. The department’s Office of Environmental Management said Tuesday it is issuing a request for information (RFI)/sources sought, in order to connect with […]

Las Vegas-based Longenecker & Associates has hired Teri Browdy, a senior executive with deep roots in the Energy Department’s contractor world, to the newly created job of group vice president for project delivery. The company said Monday Browdy will help oversee L&A’s project delivery for subcontractor work at Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico, […]

Bob McQuinn, an AECOM senior executive who, among other things, led the prime contractor team for the Energy Department’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP), for about a year following a 2014 accident, has announced he will retire at the end of August. McQuinn is vice president of the company’s performance assurance and high-level waste sector. […]

To prevent it from collapsing, the Department of Energy wants to start filling a second PUREX plant waste storage tunnel at the Hanford site with concrete-like grout in August — before the end of a scheduled public comment period about the effort. The Washington State Department of Ecology, lead state regulator at Hanford, plans a 45-day […]

The Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee has scheduled a hearing Thursday at 10 a.m. to consider modernization proposals for the Energy Department as well as the Department of Interior. While there were few details available as of Monday afternoon, the Executive Director of DOE’s Office of Policy, Bernard McNamee, is scheduled to testify. A […]

The Washington state Department of Ecology will kick off a 45-day public comment period in mid-August to take input on proposed changes by the Energy Department and CH2M Hill Plateau Remediation to the PUREX Storage Tunnels at the Hanford Site. There are two public hearings slated, one Aug. 27 at 5:30 p.m., at the Richland, […]

The Energy Department and contractor Fluor-BWXT Portsmouth expect soil excavation and installation of necessary infrastructure for a planned on-site radioactive waste disposal cell at the Portsmouth Site in Ohio should be completed in fiscal 2019. Recent progress includes setting up trailers for work crews, installing security fencing along the perimeter of the site, including sedimentation […]

All Savannah River National Laboratory (SRNL) operations resumed at the end of June, following a two-month pause on all missions considered not essential to maintaining safety.  Lab management initiated the pause due to growing concerns over the facility’s safety culture. The Department of Energy lab in South Carolina has been in management-controlled operations since June […]

The Washington state Department of Ecology has issued an operations permit for the analytical laboratory for the Waste Treatment and Immobilization Plant (WTP) at the Department of Energy’s Hanford Site. This permit, issued in the spring, is the state agency’s first operations approval for the plant being built by Bechtel to turn Hanford’s radioactive tank […]