Department of Energy

Connie Flohr, the Department of Energy’s nuclear cleanup manager at the Idaho National Laboratory will retire from the federal government and take an industry job, a top executive at DOE’s Office of Environmental Management told staff Wednesday. The pending departure of Flohr, a career fed and former budget official who became Idaho cleanup manager in […]

Several inches of snowfall are expected between now and Friday at the Department of Energy’s Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico, according to the National Weather Service. Snow flurries accounting for less than an inch of accumulation were forecast Wednesday night in Los Alamos followed by new snowfall of four-to-eight inches on Thursday, according […]

Following a 60-day transition, Virginia-based Inomedic Health Applications took over Monday as the new occupational medical services contractor at the Department of Energy’s Hanford Site in Washington state, an agency spokesperson confirmed Wednesday. The contractor will provide medical services to Hanford’s 10,000-person federal and contractor workforce. There are two clinics at Hanford.  In October DOE […]

Connie Flohr, the Department of Energy’s nuclear cleanup manager at the Idaho National Laboratory will retire from the federal government and take an industry job, a top executive at DOE’s Office of Environmental Management told staff Wednesday. The pending departure of Flohr, a career fed and former budget official who became Idaho cleanup manager in […]

The Department of Energy’s National Nuclear Security Administration is taking comments between now and Jan. 17 on plans for a new 14-mile electric power transmission line serving the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico. A draft environmental assessment was published and public comment period commenced Dec. 19 on the Los Alamos National Laboratory Electrical […]

Current and former Department of Energy contractors must reply by Feb. 5 to the latest lawsuit accusing them of not properly controlling off-site contamination from work at the Portsmouth Site in Piketon, Ohio. Plaintiff Joshua Shaw filed suit in federal district court in southern Ohio Nov. 27 accusing the Portsmouth Site contractors of violating the […]

With federal courts already involved, the Government Accountability Office will not consider an Atkins-led group’s challenge of a $45-billion Department of Energy award to manage liquid radioactive waste at the Hanford Site in Washington state. “We dismiss the protest because the matter involved is the subject of litigation before a court of competent jurisdiction,” the […]

Over the holidays, the Department of Energy’s cleanup contractor at the Oak Ridge site in Tennessee and a former employee there filed summary judgment motions in a COVID-19-related wrongful termination lawsuit. The prime, Amentum-led United Cleanup Oak Ridge (UCOR), argues that as a government contractor, it has sovereign immunity from the lawsuit filed by Yolonda […]

With the award of a follow-on contract taking longer than expected, the Department of Energy will extend major cleanup contracts at shuttered gaseous diffusion plants in Ohio and Kentucky for up to six months, the agency said after Christmas DOE’s Office of Environmental Management intends to extend Fluor-BWXT Portsmouth’s Decontamination and Decommissioning contract at the […]

The Government Accountability Office on Dec. 21 dismissed an Atkins-led team’s protest of the $45-billion liquid waste cleanup contract the Department of Energy awarded in April to a BWX Technologies-led team. However, the BWX Technologies team, Hanford Tank Waste Operations & Closure, is still blocked from taking over the cleanup because of a federal lawsuit […]

A federal court wants to know more, by Jan. 5, about a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit brought by a citizens group seeking access to some U.S. Environmental Protection Agency documents about a radioactive waste landfill at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge Site in Tennessee. U.S. District Court Judge Ana Reyes ordered a status […]

The looming departure of Los Alamos National Laboratory federal field manager Michael Mikolanis will mark the second swap of Environmental Management field bosses across the Department of Energy’s old weapons complex in a little more than a year. These days, most site feds have a tenure of fewer than six years. These people are the […]

After its waste shipment rate declined briefly due to staffing, the Department of Energy’s Idaho National Laboratory is again sending about 12 shipments most weeks to the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico, according to a recent report. After bosses at the Idaho National Laboratory cut the number of weekly shipments during October to […]

The Department of Energy’s nuclear cleanup branch could issue a trio of final solicitations for new contracts during the first six months of 2024, according to a notice issued Monday. In a notice posted online Monday, DOE’s Office of Environmental Management said final request for proposals (RFP) for Phase 1B of cleanup of the West […]

With 2023 winding down, the Department of Energy’s nuclear cleanup office this week offered a broad overview of how most of its nuclear-weapons cleanup contractors performed during the year. In a widely distributed statement on Tuesday, the Office of Environmental Management shared contractor performance ratings that mostly spanned fiscal year 2023, which ended Sept. 30. […]

The Department of Energy on Wednesday issued a draft call for companies interested in generating carbon-free electricity on unused land at the Hanford Site in Washington state to submit their qualifications. DOE released the draft request for qualifications (RFQ) Wednesday for parties interested in some type of lease or easement at the former plutonium production […]

Work is still suspended on a new underground utility shaft at the Department of Energy’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico following a Nov. 20 accident, in which no one was injured, where a container of equipment fell about 2,200 feet underground. A detailed inspection of the shaft and equipment will be performed, followed […]

Entities hoping to convert energy-dense uranium into a form suitable for powering advanced reactors have two more weeks to prepare the bids for the Department of Energy, the agency said last week. Bids for the High-Assay Low-Enriched Uranium (HALEU) Deconversion Acquisition are now due Feb. 13 instead of Jan. 30, the agency wrote in a procurement […]

The Los Alamos County Council in New Mexico voted unanimously last week to hire current deputy manager Anne Laurent, to become the new county manager effective March 3, 2024. The 7-0 vote during a Dec. 15 special meeting means Laurent will succeed her boss, Los Alamos County Manager Steven Lynne, who is retiring after more […]

The looming departure of Los Alamos National Laboratory federal field manager Michael Mikolanis will mark the second swap of Environmental Management field bosses across the Department of Energy’s old weapons complex in a little more than a year. These days, most site feds have a tenure of fewer than six years. These people are the […]

The Department of Energy on Wednesday issued a draft call for companies interested in generating carbon-free electricity on unused land at the Hanford Site in Washington state to submit their qualifications. DOE released the draft request for qualifications (RFQ) Wednesday for parties interested in some type of lease or easement at the former plutonium production […]

The Los Alamos County Council in New Mexico voted unanimously last week to hire current deputy manager Anne Laurent, to become the new county manager effective March 3, 2024. The 7-0 vote during a Dec. 15 special meeting means Laurent will succeed her boss, Los Alamos County Manager Steven Lynne, who is retiring. During the […]

With 2023 winding down, the Department of Energy’s nuclear cleanup office on Tuesday offered a broad overview of how most of its nuclear-weapons cleanup contractors performed during the year. Most results shared in the Office of Environmental Management’s house newsletter were for fiscal 2023, which ended Sept. 30. DOE had not published all the contractor […]

The Department of Energy’s nuclear cleanup branch could issue a trio of final solicitations for new contracts during the first six months of 2024, according to a notice issued Monday. In a notice posted online Monday, DOE’s Office of Environmental Management said final request for proposals (RFP) for Phase 1B of cleanup of the West […]

After its waste shipment rate declined briefly due to staffing, the Department of Energy’s Idaho National Laboratory is again sending about 12 shipments most weeks to the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico, according to a recent report. After bosses at the Idaho National Laboratory cut the number of weekly shipments during October to […]

A federal court wants to know more, by Jan. 5, about a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit brought by a citizens group seeking access to some U.S. Environmental Protection Agency documents about a radioactive waste landfill at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge Site in Tennessee. U.S. District Court Judge Ana Reyes ordered a status […]

Entities hoping to convert energy-dense uranium into a form suitable for powering advanced reactors have two more weeks to prepare the bids for the Department of Energy, the agency said last week.  Bids for the High-Assay Low-Enriched Uranium (HALEU) Deconversion Acquisition are now due Feb. 13 instead of Jan. 30, the agency wrote in a […]

Oak Ridge, Tenn.-based Boston Government Services this month announced a pair of management moves, appointing a vice president for energy and environmental work as well as a head of cybersecurity. Longtime Boston Government executive Karen Harris, who was chief executive of a small technical services business for a decade and has 25 years of experience […]

S&K Logistics, a tribally-owned government contractor, has won a potential three-year, $24-million award for support services at the Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site in South Carolina. The indefinite delivery, indefinite quantity contract for professional services, ranging from liquid waste cleanup to legal support, at Savannah River runs from Dec. 12, 2023 through Dec. 11, […]

A federal nuclear safety watchdog wants the National Nuclear Security Administration to respond to concerns over worker safety at the Savannah River Plutonium Processing Facility in just over a month. Three different NNSA safety assessments of the in-development plutonium facility have now found concerns with worker safety, specifically that project leaders are allowing workers to […]