National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA)

Two long standing government bosses, Jeffrey Allison and Randall Hendrickson, lead a joint team working out details of transferring responsibility for the Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site in South Carolina to the agency’s nuclear weapons branch from the nuclear cleanup office, feds said last week in Aiken, S.C. The group led by Allison, deputy […]

Two long standing government bosses, Jeffrey Allison and Randall Hendrickson, lead a joint team working out details of transferring responsibility for the Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site in South Carolina to the agency’s nuclear weapons branch from the nuclear cleanup office, feds said Thursday in Aiken, S.C. The group led by Allison, deputy manager […]

A group of four Democratic U.S. lawmakers want the National Nuclear Security Administration and the Navy for a report about using low-enriched uranium to fuel U.S. submarines. The three U.S. Representatives and one U.S. Senator made the request in a Jan. 27 letter to Jill Hruby, administrator of the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) and […]

Another small business protested the Department of Energy’s award of a new contract to manage the agency’s National Training Center in Albuquerque. Chenega Reliable Services, a San Antonio, Texas-based small business subsidiary of Chenega Corp., Anchorage, Alaska, lodged the protest with the Government Accountability Office on Feb. 3. Chenega is the second of two losing […]

The National Nuclear Security Administration on Monday published a draft solicitation for an indefinite-award, indefinite-quantity Counter Nuclear Smuggling System Deployment contract with an order ceiling of $800 million. “Contractors will be responsible for providing design, integration, construction, communications, logistics, training, and equipment procurement to support the deployment of counter nuclear smuggling systems,” the semiautonomous Department […]

Congressional leaders asked the Department of Energy to turn over by Feb. 16 its communications with three national labs reportedly targeted in January by Russian hackers. The Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California was among the labs the hackers targeted by, among other things, creating fake login pages and asking authorized users of the lab’s […]

The Los Alamos National Laboratory will install by 2030 the equipment needed to make at least 30 plutonium pits annually, according to a Jan. 19 memo from the deputy secretary of energy. Formally known as the Los Alamos Plutonium Pit Production Project 30 Base Equipment Installation subproject, the installation will provide the lab with “the […]

The National Nuclear Security Administration stonewalled some requests for classified information by Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board, the board said in a congressionally mandated report. The Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board (DNFSB) made a pair of classified-information requests with a Nov. 18 delivery date, but as of Jan. 19, “the board has not yet received […]

An entity called SRS Critical Infrastructure Security, which appeared to have the business in hand two years ago, filed a bid protest with the Government Accountability Office over the Department of Energy’s award of a new Savannah River Site security contract for incumbent Centerra. The award was announced earlier in January, and the bid protest […]

The Los Alamos National Laboratory will install by 2030 the equipment needed to make at least 30 plutonium pits annually, according to a Jan. 19 memo from the deputy secretary of energy. Formally known as the Los Alamos Plutonium Pit Production Project 30 Base Equipment Installation subproject, the installation will provide the lab with “the […]

The National Nuclear Security Administration stonewalled some requests for classified information by Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board, the board said in a congressionally mandated report. The Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board (DNFSB) made a pair of classified-information requests with a Nov. 18 delivery date, but as of Jan. 19, “the board has not yet received […]

The National Nuclear Security Administration submitted a plan to Congress detailing the agency’s needs over the next decade for new experimental capabilities to test nuclear weapons and materials, a scientist from the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory said Wednesday. Lasers, used at the Livermore’s National Ignition Facility (NIF) and the University of Rochester’s Omega Laser Facility, […]

The National Nuclear Security Administration on Friday sought industry input on the looming competition for a contract that will split management of the Pantex Plant in Amarillo, Texas, from the Y-12 National Security Complex in Tennessee. The agency expects to award the contract by March 2024 after a competition that it estimates will begin on […]

Feds at the Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site in South Carolina are busy planning to transfer responsibility for the complex to DOE’s nuclear weapons office from the cleanup branch in fiscal 2025, a top local boss said Monday. “As we discussed before, we have been charged to come up with a plan by June […]

Akima Systems Engineering, Herndon, Va., protested the award of a potentially $340-million operations and maintenance contract at the Department of Energy’s National Training Center in Albuquerque, N.M., which the agency in December awarded to Eagle Harbor, Manassas, Va. Akima lodged the protest on Jan. 17, just shy of a month after DOE awarded Eagle Harbor the work on […]

Feds at the Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site in South Carolina are busy planning to transfer responsibility for the complex to DOE’s nuclear weapons office from the cleanup branch in fiscal 2025, a top local boss said Monday. “As we discussed before, we have been charged to come up with a plan by June […]

A National Nuclear Security Administration plan bound for Congress will detail the agency’s needs over the next decade for new experimental capabilities to test nuclear weapons and materials, the agency said this week. Lasers, used at the Livermore’s National Ignition Facility (NIF) and the University of Rochester’s Omega Laser Facility, and pulsed power, used at […]

The National Nuclear Security Administration planned to award its next big facilities operations contract in December 2025, a Department of Energy official told the Government Accountability Office in a letter dated December 20. The Government Accountability Office (GAO) on Tuesday published the letter to Allison Bawden, director of the office’s Natural Resources and Environment team, […]

In a demonstration of its largest domestic program to reduce stocks of weaponizable nuclear material, the National Nuclear Security Administration in December shipped deweaponized plutonium out of South Carolina for permanent disposal, the agency said recently. It was a proof-of-concept run for the Surplus Plutonium Disposition Program, which began as a post-Cold-War plowshares effort with […]

In a little less than a month, the Department of Energy will start doling out fines for the unauthorized sharing of nuclear technology and know-how overseas, the agency said last week. On Thursday, the agency published its final rule in the Federal Register for implementing those penalties. They will go into effect Feb. 13, DOE said. The […]

Sandia National Laboratories’ Ion Beam Laboratory reopened late Wednesday after tritium levels spiked inside a glove bag on Monday and prompted an evacuation, the Albuquerque, N.M.-based lab said. “On Monday, Jan. 16, researchers at Sandia National Laboratories were performing work to characterize tritium samples inside of a confinement glovebag at the Ion Beam Laboratory. Workers […]

Sandia National Laboratories’ Ion Beam Laboratory reopened late Wednesday after tritium levels spiked inside a glove bag on Monday and prompted an evacuation, the Albuquerque, N.M.-based lab said. “On Monday, Jan. 16, researchers at Sandia National Laboratories were performing work to characterize tritium samples inside of a confinement glovebag at the Ion Beam Laboratory. Workers […]

The Ion Beam Laboratory and the Sandia National Laboratory’s Albuquerque, N.M., site remained off-limits to most lab employees Tuesday after being evacuated on Monday, according to the labs. “Continue to avoid Bldg. 720, the Ion Beam Laboratory, until further notice due to the ongoing incident response,” the labs wrote in an emergency alert issued around […]

Three employees who claim Consolidated Nuclear Security illegally withheld more than $10 million in wages from a big group of employees need new lawyers after their attorneys quit last week, citing a conflict of interest. “Due to a conflict that has arisen, Plaintiffs’ counsel, attorneys [Justin] Gilbert and [Ron] Rayson, have no choice but seek […]

In a little less than a month, the Department of Energy will start doling out fines for the unauthorized sharing of nuclear technology and know-how overseas, the agency said last week. On Thursday, the agency published its final rule in the Federal Register for implementing those penalties. They will go into effect Feb. 13, DOE […]

The National Nuclear Security Administration in December removed some surplus, weapon-usable plutonium from the Savannah River Site in South Carolina, the agency said Friday.  The agency did not say how much of the material it removed from the site near Aiken, S.C. The National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) has said the glove boxes and facilities […]

Incumbent Centerra Group has been awarded a new Security Services contract, potentially worth $1 billion over 10 years, at the Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site in South Carolina. The award, announced in a Thursday press release, is not a surprise. The DOE has been saying for many months it plans “corrective action” to its […]

The National Nuclear Security Administration backdated letters to the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board and claimed its own safety rules actually permitted safety deficiencies the rules were supposed to prevent, the board said. In a letter late last year to Secretary of Energy Jennifer Granholm, the board complained about “the recent practice of the National […]

The National Nuclear Security Administration plans by Oct. 31 to have permanent leadership for the three new procurement- and infrastructure-focused offices it created last year when it broke up the former Office of Acquisition and Project Management, according to a Government Accountability Office report published Tuesday. The agency “will establish specific outcome-oriented goals and performance […]

Amid the winter rainstorms pounding California, the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory has temporarily curtailed all but essential activity at its experimental test site in the San Francisco Bay Area, a spokesperson said this week. “Site 300 was in minimum safe configuration this week due to infrastructure conditions on roadways leading to the site,” a lab […]