Department of Energy

The New Mexico Environment Department wants the Department of Energy and its prime contractor for Los Alamos National Laboratory to take more precautions before it repackages four containers of tritium waste. At the same time, the state Environment Department is angry at how Los Alamos National Laboratory has handled the tritium waste over time and […]

The New Mexico Environment Department wants the Department of Energy and its prime contractor for Los Alamos National Laboratory to take more precautions before it repackages four containers of tritium waste. At the same time, the state Environment Department is angry at how Los Alamos National Laboratory has handled the tritium waste over time and […]

Amentum-led Southern Ohio Cleanup Co. has unveiled a website laying out its transition to become remediation contractor at the Department of Energy’s Portsmouth Site. DOE’s Office of Environmental Management awarded the contract, potentially worth about $5.9 billion over a decade, in June 2023. But it only greenlighted the start of transition this month following the […]

WASHINGTON, D.C. – Members of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee expressed their disapproval Wednesday to Secretary of Energy Chris Wright on a proposed 11% cut in the Department of Energy’s budget for the labs. “I love the national labs, they deliver tremendous value to us in our history, and they will in the […]

The Department of Energy’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) in New Mexico received 53 defense-related transuranic waste shipments in May, based on revised figures. DOE revised the figures on its public website for WIPP around June 27 after learning the website initially failed to update and record the 24 shipments that took place between May […]

Interest groups and nuclear policy insiders have started to weigh in on a Wednesday decision by the U.S. Supreme Court effectively upholding a Nuclear Regulatory Commission license for a private interim waste storage facility in Texas. When asked for a comment the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) simply said via email: “The Supreme Court decision upholds […]

Utah-based EnergySolutions has finished grouting and disposing of 1,000 gallons of liquid tank waste from the Department of Energy’s Hanford Site in Washington state. EnergySolutions said in a Wednesday news release it had completed solidification and disposal of 1,000 gallons of mixed low-level waste from Hanford as part of the much-anticipated Test Bed Initiative demonstration. […]

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled 6-to-3 Wednesday that the state of Texas and Fasken Land and Minerals are not eligible to seek legal review of a Nuclear Regulatory Commission license issued to Interim Storage Partners for a private spent fuel facility in West Texas. “Because Texas and Fasken were not parties to the Commission’s licensing […]

The Department of Energy has announced a new pilot program to expedite the testing of advanced nuclear reactor designs at the department’s national laboratories. The DOE intends to streamline the nuclear reactor testing and hopes to have “at least three reactors achieve criticality by July 4, 2026,” according to its Wednesday press release. Created in […]

WASHINGTON, D.C. – Members of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee expressed their disapproval Wednesday to Secretary of Energy Chris Wright on a proposed 11% cut in the Department of Energy’s budget for the labs. “I love the national labs, they deliver tremendous value to us in our history, and they will in the […]

Oklo’s subsidiary Atomic Alchemy has begun site characterization work for a potential radioisotope production facility at the Department of Energy’s Idaho National Laboratory. The Santa Clara, Calif. based advanced nuclear technology company Oklo made the announcement in a Tuesday press release. Its subsidiary, Atomic Alchemy, is based in Idaho Falls, Idaho and focuses on providing […]

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled 6-to-3 Wednesday that the state of Texas and Fasken Land and Minerals are not eligible to seek legal review of a Nuclear Regulatory Commission license issued to Interim Storage Partners for a private spent fuel facility in West Texas. “Because Texas and Fasken were not parties to the Commission’s licensing […]

The Department of Energy’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) in New Mexico received 53 defense-related transuranic waste shipments in May, based on revised figures. DOE revised the figures on its public website for WIPP around June 27 after learning the website initially failed to update and record the 24 shipments that took place between May […]

Amentum-led Southern Ohio Cleanup Co. has unveiled a website laying out its transition to become remediation contractor at the Department of Energy’s Portsmouth Site. DOE’s Office of Environmental Management awarded the contract, potentially worth about $5.9 billion over a decade, in June 2023. But it only greenlighted the start of transition this month following the […]

Waste Control Specialists (WCS) received a lot of radioactive waste by train at its West Texas site during 2024, company president David Carlson told Exchange Monitor’s Radwaste Summit last week in Savannah, Ga. During 2024, WCS received 600 shipments of waste by rail. This included 5,000 canisters and 3 million cubic feet of waste, according […]

The Government Accountability Office last week recommended the National Nuclear Security Administration formalize plans for transitioning responsibilities for radiological safety in Ukraine to Ukrainian partner organizations. “While NNSA [National Nuclear Security Administration] took steps to manage fraud risk at the individual contract level, it did not conduct a program-level fraud risk assessment tailored to its […]

Pipe modifications in a tank farm at the Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site in South Carolina are winding down and should be complete in July, according to DOE.  The utility work at the 310-square-mile site near Aiken, S.C., comes  during a planned outage, which began on April 28 and is on track to finish […]

The Alliance for Nuclear Accountability (ANA), an umbrella organization of citizen groups active on nuclear weapons, cleanup and energy issues, wants the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board to have a quorum again. In a recent report, the alliance said Congress should protect the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board (DNFSB), which is down to two members […]

Work crews using heavy equipment have torn down a 1960s era train shed at the Department of Energy’s Nevada National Security Site, DOE announced last week. “We are pleased to get this structure to the ground as part of our long term cleanup mission,” DOE Office of Environmental Management Nevada Program Manager Robert Boehlecke said […]

SAVANNAH, GA. — Triso-X is targeting Dec. 6, 2027, for production of its first “pebble” of fabricated nuclear fuel at its facility located on land formerly owned by the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge Site in Tennessee, a company executive told a conference here Thursday. The 215,000-square-foot fuel fabrication facility, called TX-1, will employ about […]

Nano Nuclear Energy has recently appointed former Secretary of Energy Rick Perry as its Chairman of its executive advisory board. The startup nuclear company headquartered in New York, N.Y. made the announcement on June 10 in a press release. Nano Nuclear’s executive advisory board is made up of various governmental, military and science experts from […]

The National Transportation Stakeholders Forum will hold a webinar on June 18 to discuss the Department of Energy’s High Burnup Research Cask project. The DOE’s High Burnup Research Cask (HBURC) project centers around a container of spent nuclear fuel that holds high burnup fuel. High burnup fuel comes from nuclear fuel kept in a nuclear […]

The Department of Energy’s Office of Nuclear Energy announced on June 5 that it has awarded vouchers to three nuclear companies from its Gateway for Accelerated Innovation in Nuclear (GAIN) program to research nuclear fuel and materials. The DOE’s GAIN vouchers allow for companies to use research facilities and expertise through DOE’s national laboratories to […]

Secretary of Energy Chris Wright said in testimony at Congress Tuesday that there should be “clarity” on the reorganization and workforce shrinking at the Department of Energy. “The Department of Energy is filled with a bunch of tremendous, hardworking, committed men and women trying to better the direction for our country,” Wright said at a […]

SAVANNAH, GA — Here are a few takeaways from this week’s 19th Radwaste Summit held here this week. The mood conveyed by most speakers and many attendees was generally upbeat. There seems to be news of a proposed new small modular reactor or revival of a mothballed nuclear plant, such as Palisades in Michigan, every […]

The legacy waste cleanup contractor at the Department of Energy’s Los Alamos National Laboratory has sent its first shipment of transuranic waste derived from corrugated metal pipes to the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP), DOE said this week. Newport News Nuclear BWXT-Los Alamos (N3B) has completed the first shipment of transuranic waste to WIPP that […]

Secretary of Energy Chris Wright said in testimony at Congress Tuesday that there should be “clarity” soon on the reorganization and workforce shrinking at the Department of Energy. “The Department of Energy is filled with a bunch of tremendous, hardworking, committed men and women trying to better the direction for our country,” Wright said at […]

SAVANNAH, GA – The Supreme Court will probably rule by July 3 on whether the Nuclear Regulatory Commission has authority to license privately-held interim storage facilities, a leading industry lawyer said during the 19th Radwaste Summit. That was the assessment offered Tuesday by Michael McBride, a partner with Van Ness Feldman during the opening day […]

SAVANNAH, GA.—With interest in nuclear energy the highest it has been in years, attaining public trust is vital to development of new reactors and waste disposal projects. That was a recurring theme here during Exchange Monitor’s 19th Radwaste Summit. Only a few years ago, state legislatures across the country would propose a handful of nuclear-related […]

SAVANNAH, GA. — The Department of Energy’s Savannah River National Laboratory in South Carolina should receive a certificate of completion for the offsite Advanced Manufacturing Collaborative this summer, Edwin Deshong said Wednesday. During the Radwaste Summit, Deshong gave a brief update on the status of the new research and meeting facility being built a few […]