The Department of Energy now expects to replace an aging electrical substation on the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant grounds near Carlsbad, N.M., in 2023, a spokesperson said this week.
The substation replacement project is now planned for “the spring time frame,” a spokesperson for the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) said in a Tuesday email reply to an inquiry from ExchangeMonitor. The federal agency previously said the project was penciled in for this month, but the agency’s plans changed.
Earlier this year DOE estimated carrying out a maintenance outage of possibly 80 days to replace the 30-year old surface Substation 3 at WIPP. The new substation unit, weighing about 46,000 pounds, arrived at the transuranic waste disposal complex early this year.
Operations at the underground salt mine need to be idled when the $1.5-million replacement project occurs, according to DOE and contractor Nuclear Waste Partnership. The substations at WIPP reduce the voltage received from power company Xcel Energy into usable voltages for WIPP’s electric machinery.
After DOE selected a Bechtel entity to become the new prime contractor for WIPP in July, there have been two challenges to the 10-year, potentially $3-billion follow-on contract filed with the Government Accountability Office. There is a Nov. 9 deadline for a decision in the protests.
