Weapons Complex Monitor took its annual summer recess in mid-August, but we kept track of the nuke news during the publishing holiday and have compiled it here for you.
Ninth Court Upholds State Law on Hanford Worker Compensation
A Washington state law that makes it easier for workers at the Energy Department’s Hanford Site to qualify for certain compensation benefits has been upheld by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit.
Washington Attorney General Bob Ferguson announced in a press release Aug. 19 that earlier in the day a three-judge panel for the Ninth Circuit unanimously upheld the law that was passed in 2018 and last year withstood a federal legal challenge in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Washington.
The Ninth Circuit held that Washington has the right to create laws giving workers easier access to the benefits if they become ill because of their work at Hanford, a former plutonium production complex that is now home to a massive cleanup program, Ferguson said. The panel ruled Congress gave states authority to provide workers’ compensation benefits to injured contractors on federal lands. Judge Milan Smith, appointed by President George W. Bush, wrote the opinion.
“Hanford workers are cleaning up one of the most contaminated sites on the planet, and they deserve these protections,” Ferguson said in the release.
Under the state law, when a worker who had least one shift at Hanford develops one of several illnesses linked to exposure to volatile chemical gases at the site, there is an assumption the individual became ill because of an exposure at work. These illnesses include chronic beryllium disease, respiratory diseases, and neurological problems.
Before this bill was passed, Hanford workers had to prove their illness was not caused by factors outside of their work at the site.
The U.S. Department of Justice argued that HB 1723 wrongly restricted the federal government’s “doctrine of intergovernmental immunity” at Hanford. The doctrine is meant to keep the states and federal government from encroaching on each other’s sovereignty. But the panel said the Washington law falls under a waiver that authorizes states to apply their workers’ compensation laws to federal lands as if the property were under the “exclusive jurisdiction” of a state.
Washington State, DOE Could Seek to Mediate Dispute Over Data Access
The Washington state Department of Ecology and the Energy Department have agreed to mediate their dispute over access to certain records from the Hanford Site.
“The data access case is still pending, but the parties have agreed to try to mediate the dispute,” Ecology spokesman Randy Bradbury said in an Aug. 11 email. The mediation will likely be scheduled early this fall, he added.
In January, the state assessed the DOE Office of Environmental Management a $1 million penalty for denying access to certain records that Ecology inspectors might need to determine if the federal agency is adequately protecting land and water from hazards such as the 56 million gallons of radioactive and chemical waste stored at Hanford.
The state said it is taking action under a provision of the 1989 Tri-Party Agreement on Hanford cleanup that specifies what type of information should be shared. Ecology said DOE has increasingly restricted access to certain records over the years, and past talks with federal managers at Hanford failed to resolve the situation.
The state is seeking sampling data on radioactive waste and various types of information that supports the Tri-Party Agreement.
The Energy Department says it does share information, but the state is not entitled to 24/7 access to a database that would include some confidential corporate information protected by federal privacy law. In addition, DOE argues the proposed $1 million penalty does not fit the alleged offense.
The Energy Department appealed the fine to the Washington state Pollution Control Hearings Board. The agency filed a motion to stay the proceedings in March, which was rejected, according to a search on the hearings board’s website. If the two parties don’t mediate the dispute, it could take a significant amount of time to resolve. The primary hearing in the case is not scheduled until July 2021, according to the website.
WIPP Shipments Down During First Seven Months of 2020
The Energy Department’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) in New Mexico received 23 shipments of transuranic waste in July, bringing the total to 109 for the first seven months of 2020.
That is down significantly from 194 recorded during the first seven months of 2019.
Nuclear Waste Partnership, the Amentum-led prime contractor for the underground waste disposal site, has attributed the drop-off to three circumstances: rough winter weather that slowed delivery of waste shipments; a prolonged maintenance outage during the first quarter of 2020; and dramatically scaled-back operations from late March to late May due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
The July shipments encompassed 13 from the Idaho National Laboratory, eight from the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico, and two from the Sandia National Laboratories in New Mexico. The two transuranic waste shipments on July 24 were the first to make the 275-mile trip from Sandia since 2012, WIPP management said in a July 30 press release.
The two shipments from Sandia involved remote-handled waste, which has a higher radioactivity level than the contact-handled material that accounts for the vast majority of TRU waste that goes into the WIPP underground.
The Energy Department hopes to receive 400 shipments at WIPP during fiscal 2020, which started Oct. 1, 2019. The mine had received 147 as of July 31.
Summers Takes Place as DNFSB Board Member
Thomas Summers, a former Air Force officer confirmed last month by the U.S. Senate for a post at the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board (DNFSB), was sworn in on Aug. 17.
Summers will be vice chairman of the federal health-and-safety watchdog for defense-nuclear sites, DNFSB Manager of Board Operations Tara Tadlock said in a recent email.
Summers and a trio of incumbent DNFSB board members — Joyce Connery, Jessie Hill Roberson, and Chairman Bruce Hamilton — were all confirmed by the Senate July 2 via voice vote. Summers is a former vice commander of the 91st Missile Wing at Minot Air Force Base in North Dakota.
Summers won a double-barrel confirmation from the Senate — both to serve out a partial term that ends on Oct. 18 of this year, then serve a full term that runs into October 2024. He was first nominated to the partial term in January 2019, to fill a spot previously held by former DNFSB Chairman Sean Sullivan, who resigned in February 2018 after urging the Donald Trump administration to dismantle the board.
While DNFSB lacks actual regulatory-enforcement teeth, it makes health and safety recommendations that the secretary of energy must publicly accept or reject.
Matthew Moury, a former DNFSB staff member and Energy Department associate undersecretary for environment, health, safety, and security, was nominated for the remaining open spot on the board last month and referred to the Senate Armed Services Committee.
New Hanford Landlord Contractor to Include Familiar Faces
Robert Wilkinson and Amy Basche, the two top executives for the current support services contractor at the Energy Department’s Hanford Site in Washington state, will remain in charge of its successor.
A DOE hosting page for the Hanford Mission Integration Solutions (HMIS) website cites Wilkinson as president and general manager and Basche as chief operating officer – positions they currently hold for outgoing vendor Mission Support Alliance (MSA).
The 120-day transition from the incumbent, comprised of Leidos and Centerra, began Aug. 17. The incoming team is comprised of Leidos, Centerra, and Parsons. All joint venture members “have extensive experience at the Hanford Site, and other DOE programs,” according to the HMIS webpage.
In December, the new vendor team won a contract potentially worth $4.8 billion over 10 years, with a five-year base period and two option periods. In April, the Government Accountability Office dismissed a protest by a rival bidder team headed by Huntington Ingalls Industries. The Energy Department only earlier this month gave the green light for the transition to start, after delaying the process due to concerns over the COVID-19 pandemic.
Mission Support Alliance began working at the site in May 2009 under a contract currently valued at almost $5 billion. In May it received its final extension, worth $268 million, keeping it on the job from May 26 through Nov. 25.
The contractor team provides an assortment of landlord-type services, including emergency response, road upkeep, fleet management, telecommunications, and information technology support.
It appears other top managers listed on the Hanford Mission Integration Solutions page include a mixture of MSA holdovers and some new personnel.
Former South Carolina Official Joins Longenecker & Associates
David Wilson, a former official with the South Carolina Department of Health and Environmental Control (DHEC), joined Energy Department contractor Longenecker & Associates on Aug. 10 as a senior associate.
Wilson, who spent 37 years with the state agency before retiring as its acting director in 2019, will take over a newly created post and support regulatory assurance work for Las Vegas-based Longenecker & Associates, according to a Monday press release. He will work from Aiken, S.C., near DOE’s Savannah River Site.
At DHEC, which is the state regulator for the Savannah River Site, Wilson oversaw a workforce of 3,200 and a budget of $620 million. As part of his work at the health agency, Wilson at various times led its Bureau of Water, Division of Waste Management, hazardous waste permitting, and legislative affairs activities.
The Longenecker press release calls Wilson a nationally recognized strategist on high-level radioactive waste issues. “He is a proven regulatory problem-solver with a long track record leading South Carolina’s oversight of the Savannah River Site and we are excited to bring his expertise and insight to bear on our projects,” L&A CEO Bonnie Longenecker said in the release.
The firm provides services such as strategy, regulatory assistance, and support for high-hazard operations for Energy Department contractors serving DOE’s Office of Environmental Management and semiautonomous National Nuclear Security Administration.
Longenecker & Associates is a subcontractor to both SRS prime Savannah River Nuclear Solutions and liquid waste contractor Savannah River Remediation, but Wilson will support the company’s regulatory portfolio across the EM and NNSA complexes.
