National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA)

The Department of Energy said in a Nov. 18 posting there will be a 120-day transition period for the winner of the potential $45-billion Integrated Tank Disposition Contract, at the Hanford Site in Washington state, to take over from the existing contractors. The final Request for Proposals issued last month included some incorrect references to […]

The top federal manager at the Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site in South Carolina said COVID-19 infection rates are falling around the complex near the Georgia line. “The good news is for the first time in some time we have no one in the hospital,” Michael Budney, manager of the DOE Office of Environmental […]

ARLINGTON, VA. — The head of Naval Reactors this week invited defense industry executives here to think about how they’d contribute to a three-way effort to transfer nuclear submarine propulsion to Australia — but he didn’t invite any contributions. “We have 18 months to go and figure out how to deliver a platform, a capability, […]

Australia is not planning to create a domestic nuclear industry to support the highly enriched uranium-powered submarines the country hopes to build using U.S. and U.K. technology, Canberra’s ambassador said this week. “The subs will be using HEU [highly enriched uranium] and we’re just working out now the arrangements for what that will mean in […]

A Sandia National Laboratories building that hosts the labs’ power sources technology programs has mostly reopened after being damaged by a fire last month, though the room where the fire started remained closed as of Wednesday, a spokesperson said. The Oct. 11 fire involved a lithium battery and forced the evacuation of the aging Building […]

The National Nuclear Security Administration is almost finished with a proof-of-concept unit that will kick off mass production of the homogenized version of the B61 nuclear gravity bomb, an agency spokesperson said this week. “The B61-12 program is nearing the completion of the FPU [first production unit] milestone, and we expect to make an announcement […]

The top federal manager at the Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site in South Carolina said COVID-19 infection rates are falling around the complex near the Georgia line. “The good news is for the first time in some time we have no one in the hospital,” Michael Budney, manager of the DOE Office of Environmental […]

President Biden on Wednesday announced his intention to nominate Dimitri Kusnezov, a scientist and Energy Department official helping with international partnerships on artificial intelligence at the department, to head the Science and Technology Directorate at the Department of Homeland Security. Kathryn Coulter Mitchell is the current acting under secretary for Science and Technology (S&T) at […]

A Sandia National Laboratories building that hosts the labs’ power sources technology programs has mostly reopened after being damaged by a fire last month, though the room where the fire started remained closed as of Wednesday, a spokesperson said. The Oct. 11 fire involved a lithium battery and forced the evacuation of the aging Building […]

The National Nuclear Security Administration is almost finished with a proof-of-concept unit that will kick off mass production of the homogenized version of the B61 nuclear gravity bomb, an agency spokesperson said Monday. “The B61-12 program is nearing the completion of the FPU [first production unit] milestone, and we expect to make an announcement later […]

Before it even started, the Department of Energy this week cancelled a competition for a Savannah River Site management and operations contract worth billions, citing an increase of National Nuclear Security Administration nuclear weapons work at the site. “The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) is indefinitely delaying the Final Request for Proposal (RFP) for the […]

Before it even started, the Department of Energy this week cancelled a competition for a Savannah River Site management and operations contract worth billions, citing an increase of National Nuclear Security Administration nuclear weapons work at the site. “The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) is indefinitely delaying the Final Request for Proposal (RFP) for the […]

The Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board is still hammering the Department of Energy about a nearly decade-old recommendation to stiffen safety requirements at Savannah River Site’s Building 235-F to avoid a plutonium release from the aging structure. In a Nov. 2 letter to Secretary of Energy Jennifer Granholm, Joyce Connery, the board chair, praised DOE […]

Declining to block the lab’s COVID-19 vaccine mandate, a judge ruled Monday that Los Alamos National Laboratory Employees who will not take a required COVID-19 vaccine and are unsatisfied with receiving unpaid leave as their religious exemption from the shot must hash things out with the lab in arbitration. Pending the outcomes of other lawsuits […]

A major subproject to clear out space for new pit-manufacturing equipment at the Los Alamos National Laboratory will cost about $530 million and finish ripping up old glove boxes and equipment by 2025 or so, a lab spokesperson said. In the decontamination and decommissioning of Los Alamos’ PF-4 Plutonium Facility, which is being expanded to […]

The volume of low-level radioactive waste shipped to the Nevada National Security Site from Department of Energy cleanup sites is picking up again after dipping to half of its normal level of more than 1 million cubic feet per year during the pandemic, an agency official at the site told the Nevada Site Specific Advisory […]

Editor’s note, 11/10/2021, 1:44 p.m. Eastern time. The story was corrected to show that Los Alamos is scheduled to complete the PF-4 decontamination and demolition subproject in fiscal year 2025.   A major subproject to clear out space for new pit-manufacturing equipment at the Los Alamos National Laboratory will cost about $530 million and finish […]

Before it even started, the Department of Energy on Tuesday cancelled a competition for a Savannah River Site management and operations contract worth billions, citing an increase of National Nuclear Security Administration nuclear weapons work at the site. “The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) is indefinitely delaying the Final Request for Proposal (RFP) for the […]

This week, the Department of Energy will brief losing bidders about its rationale for awarding multi-billion-dollar nuclear-cleanup contracts to teams led by Amentum and BWX Technologies, a senior industry official said last week at the Radwaste Summit in Summerlin, Nev. The executive made the comments on the sidelines of the annual summit, sponsored by ExchangeMonitor […]

The Navy exercised a one-year, $1-billion option on Fluor Marine Propulsion’s Naval Reactors contract, which includes management of the National Nuclear Security Administration’s multi-site Naval Nuclear Laboratory in Idaho, New York and Pennsylvania, the parent company said this week. Fluor Marine Propulsion, Arlington, Va., snagged the naval labs business from Bechtel Marine Propulsion Corp. in 2018 as […]

Dozens of Savannah River Nuclear Solutions employees suing the Department of Energy contractor over a vaccine mandate got a two-week extension, to Nov. 17, to revise their complaint and respond to the company’s motion to dismiss the suit. The plaintiffs’ response to the motion to dismiss by Savannah River Nuclear Solutions (SRNS), the Fluor-led operations […]

Magistrate Judge Could Take Over Suit by ORNL Resisters Although a federal judge in Tennessee turned down a preliminary injunction for vaccine holdouts at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory, and contractor UT-Battelle has asked that the lawsuit be tossed, a federal magistrate could take over the case. On Tuesday, District Judge Charles […]

The Navy exercised a one-year, $1-billion option on Fluor Marine Propulsion’s Naval Reactors contract, which includes management of the National Nuclear Security Administration’s multi-site Naval Nuclear Laboratory in Idaho, New York and Pennsylvania, the parent company said Monday. Fluor Marine Propulsion, Arlington, Va., snagged the naval labs business from Bechtel Marine Propulsion Corp. in 2018 […]

A federal district judge in Tennessee has refused to issue a preliminary injunction against the Department of Energy’s management contractor for the Oak Ridge National Laboratory in a case brought by a small group of plaintiffs refusing to comply with a vaccine mandate. While contractor UT-Battelle’s treatment of employees seeking vaccine exemptions could have been […]

Iran must be prevented from fabricating nuclear weapons, the former leader of the National Nuclear Security Administration’s nonproliferation program said in a recent speech, as world powers attempt to revive a 2015 nuclear pact with the Middle Eastern country. “One thing that I need to emphasis is: Iran should not, and cannot, make nuclear weapons,” […]

David Huizenga, the Department of Energy’s defense-nuclear do-it-all, is stepping aside as the National Nuclear Security Administration’s top career civil servant to become a senior advisor to the nuclear-weapons sub-agency’s administrator, initially focusing on negotiations to return the U.S. to the Iran Nuclear Deal, according to an internal email. Huizenga will assume his new role […]

Environmental groups from California, New Mexico and South Carolina are fighting to keep their lawsuit to slow plutonium-pit production from being thrown out of court and claimed this week that Congress’ mandate to produce pits does not prevent further environmental review of the National Nuclear Security Administration’s planned pit complex. “[T]his lawsuit involves more than […]

Crews finished building the structure of the National Nuclear Security Administration’s next-generation, secondary-stage factory in September and the compound’s electrical hub is scheduled to be completed in around January, the site prime contractor said recently. The milestone for the Main Process Building, where the most important weapons work at the Y-12 National Security Site will […]

A former Sandia National Laboratories employee’s maneuvering for a lighter prison sentence has the government wondering whether the ex-Sandian should receive any sentencing leniency at all, according to a Friday court filing. Joshua Cordova has acted “shamelessly” since reading a plea agreement with the government, claiming that tens of thousands of dollars worth personal items […]

The National Nuclear Security Administration has maxed out the options on Consolidated Nuclear Security’s short-term extension to run the Pantex Plant and the Y-12 National Security complex, keeping the short-timer incumbent on the job through March while the agency finalizes the award of a follow-on deal. With an expected four-month transition period to the next […]