Savannah River Nuclear Solutions (SRNS) has cleaned up a small mercury and tritium spill at the Savannah River Site’s Solid Waste Management Facility and is preparing the waste for disposition, a spokesperson for the Energy Department’s contractor said Friday.
The spill was discovered by SRNS personnel during a routine walk of the Solid Waste Management facility on May 23, the company spokesperson wrote. The spill was first disclosed in a public report by the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board dated May 27 and published in June.
The leak was small, about 10 ounces of liquid, and came from a drum that had been stored in the Solid Waste facilities for more than 30 years, the SRNS spokesperson told Weapons Complex Monitor.
“SRNS continues to work on identifying the cause of the leak, including conducting extensive historical research to include understanding of the conditions at the time the equipment was packaged,” the spokesperson wrote.
The spilled material was radioactive enough that workers who helped secure the area after the leak had to wear protective suits, DNFSB wrote in its report. Workers who were exposed to the spill apparently were not contaminated, according to DNFSB.
“Subsequent bioassays of personnel who were near the spill did not identify any tritium uptakes,” the board’s report reads.
NuVision Engineering of Pittsburgh, a supplier for San Francisco-based Bechtel National on the multibillion-dollar Waste Treatment Plant (WTP) facility under construction at the Energy Department’s Hanford Site, is suing the prime in federal court for almost $2 million in costs the smaller company alleges it incurred because of delays building the enormous facility.
The equipment at issue are the power manipulators for WTP, which Bechtel ordered from NuVision in 2004, when the Pittsburgh company was known as AEA Technology Engineering Services. Power manipulators are hand-like clamps that can be affixed to the end of robotic arms so workers can remotely handle dangerous material.
NuVision’s original firm-fixed-price subcontract with Bechtel was worth just under $4 million and covered four power manipulators, a control system, and a hydraulic interface unit, court documents show.
A combination of factors, including DOE’s decision to stop work on WTP in 2012 and a flurry of change orders and tighter quality standards handed down by Bechtel, pushed the cost of the power manipulators up by about $1.5 million, according to NuVision’s complaint. On top of that went more than $200,000 in labor NuVision spent assessing its cost increases and communicating them to Bechtel in hopes of getting paid for what the company, in court documents, characterized as design changes from its prime. The total tab rose to about $1.8 million, court papers show.
The dispute wound up in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Washington after NuVision exhausted other methods, the company wrote in its complaint. The first of these was a request for equitable adjustment delivered to Bechtel in January 2015, according to the complaint. Bechtel acknowledged receipt of the document, but never made the requested payments to NuVision, the company alleged.
Subsequently, on Aug. 25, 2015, Bechtel ordered NuVision to stop work on the power manipulators, court documents show. In February, NuVision tried again to recoup its costs, this time by filing a claim under the Contract Disputes Act of 1978, according to the company’s complaint. When that went unanswered, the company sued.
A Bechtel spokesperson declined to comment Wednesday on pending litigation. NuVision did not reply to a request for comment. No documents have been filed in the case since NuVision filed its complaint April 28.
The Ohio Environmental Protection Agency will continue its oversight of the Department of Energy’s cleanup of the former Portsmouth Gaseous Diffusion Plant Site in south central Ohio, under a five-year, $3 million grant from DOE.
The deal will be worth up to about $616,000 a year and will support ongoing activities funded under a previous grant that expired on June 30, DOE said in a press release.
The department said the financial assistance “helps the State of Ohio recover costs and supports a framework for successful cooperation between DOE, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency … and Ohio EPA in addressing environmental impacts associated with past and present activities at the site.”
The grant allows Ohio, among other things, to provide “information on preferred regulatory and technical approaches to ongoing cleanup and related decisions, including future site uses,” according to DOE’s press release.
The Portsmouth Site enriched uranium for defense and civilian programs from the early 1950s through 2001. Fluor-BWXT Portsmouth is DOE’s prime cleanup contractor at the site, under a 10-year pact that expires in 2021 and is worth up to $2.6 billion.
An iPad burst into flames for about 30 seconds at the Energy Department’s Hanford Site near Richland, Wash., after a technician with contractor Mission Support Alliance attempted to remove the device’s lithium ion battery, according to an accident report posted online June 30.
“While a technician was attempting to remove batteries from an iPad, one of the batteries began to smoke and caught fire and then self-extinguished after about 30 seconds,” Mission Support Alliance wrote in the report posted to DOE’s Operating Experience Lessons Learned, Best Practices website: a social hub where workers share their experiences with close calls at various DOE jobs.
The iPad in the incident was broken and being prepared for disposal, a spokesperson for Mission Support Alliance wrote in a Wednesday email. As part of that process “hard drives and memory cards are removed and destroyed,” the spokesperson wrote. The batteries are then recycled after they are separated from the iPad’s chassis.
No one was hurt, the report says. The workbench where the attempted servicing took place did not catch fire, although it could have, Mission Support Alliance warned in the report. The support services contractor also cautioned readers to “be aware of the potential hazards associated with recycling of lithium ion batteries.”
SRR Avengers Walk Off EM Ops in 12th Annual SRS Charity Softball Tournament
By Dan Leone
The Savannah River Remediation (SRR) Avengers clinched the championship in the 12th annual Savannah River Site (SRS) Softball Tournament last month at Citizens Park in Aiken, S.C., with a dramatic walk-off win against the Environmental Management Ops team, according to a July 5 press release from Savannah River Nuclear Solutions.
The walk-off RBI hit in the bottom of the seventh that capped the Avengers’ seven-year chase for top honors in the annual charity tournament was the fourth of the day for third baseman Tim Rumley, who swung a red-hot bat in the 17-16 summer slugfest.
Also raking for the Avengers was shortstop Luke Key, who homered and put up nine RBIs in his 4-4 game.
But EM Ops fought back hard in the barnburner finale, flashing power at the plate and aggression on the basepaths.
Box score courtesy of Savannah River Nuclear Solutions
Aiding his own cause, EM Ops pitcher Dan Billings homered, as did teammate Blake White, the first baseman. Five EM Ops players swiped bags in the championship game, with extra hitter Keith Welsh taking two for a total of six stolen bases in the finale. The Avengers stole three.
Both pitchers were knocked around in their complete-game outings, with EM Ops’ Billings taking the loss. Billings coughed up 28 hits and two walks, boosting his ERA to an unsightly 9.39, and going 3-1 for the tournament. Bill Ferguson fared little better on the bump for the Avengers, surrendering 22 hits that worsened his ERA to an even 10.00. Ferguson’s control appeared on the money, as he walked none and struck out one, good for a 2-0 record in the tournament.
The bracket for the two-night tournament, held June 20 and June 22, was filled with 18 teams that included employees of four major SRS contractors: Savannah River Nuclear Solutions; Savannah River Remediation; Centerra Group; and CB&I AREVA MOX Services.
The winning SRR Avengers sponsored Children’s Place, Inc., a United Way of Aiken County member agency that provides a therapeutic and behavioral health childcare center, according to Savannah River Nuclear Solutions’ press release.
“This team was full of not only good players, but good teammates who encouraged one another,” Ferguson said in his capacity as Avengers skipper in the July 5 press release. “We won for each other and for Children’s Place.”
All told, SRS raised more than $18,000 for charity through team fundraising efforts and the concession stand, which was a joint effort among volunteers from Savannah River Nuclear Solutions, Savannah River Remediation, United Way of the CSRA, and United Way of Aiken County, according to the press release. Savannah River Nuclear Solutions coordinated the event.
The volunteers, players, and spectators who showed up for the tournament numbered in the hundreds, according to the press release.
