The Department of Energy, contractor United Cleanup Oak Ridge and various state and local officials broke ground Wednesday on a new $550-million low-level radioactive waste landfill at the Oak Ridge Site in Tennessee, DOE said in a press release.
The new Environmental Management Disposal Facility will provide onsite disposal of debris generated as DOE continues to dismantle old deteriorating and mercury-laden structures at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory and the Y-12 National Security Complex. The existing 2.2-million cubic yard landfill, the Environmental Management Waste Management Facility, is expected to reach its capacity around 2028.
“Because of what we are doing here today, legacy cleanup will continue in Oak Ridge for the next 30 or 40 years until it’s complete”, said Rep. Chuck Fleischmann (R-Tenn.), who heads the energy and water subcommittee for the House Appropriation Committee. The new landfill should be completed by 2029 in three phases: rerouting of Bear Creek Road and the Haul Road; a groundwater field demonstration study along with design and construction of the first two of four disposal cells.
Stephen Streiffer, currently the interim director of a national laboratory in California, will become the new director of the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee in October, Battelle announced last week.
Streiffer is currently the interim head of SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, formerly known as the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center, in Menlo Park, Calif., Battelle said in a press release. UT-Battelle, a joint venture of Battelle and the University of Tennessee, runs Oak Ridge National Laboratory for DOE’s Office of Science.
From March 2020 through May 2022, Streiffer was also co-director of DOE’s National Virtual Biotechnology Laboratory, a consortium that included Oak Ridge, devoted to national labs efforts to address testing, treatment and other issues associated with the COVID-19 pandemic, according to the press release. Jeff Smith, who served 21 years and Oak Ridge National Lab’s deputy for operations before retiring in April 2021, is currently the facility’s interim director.
Perma-Fix Environmental Services and a union local in Washington state have reached an agreement providing the company with workers needed for a project to solidify 2,000 gallons of low-level radioactive tank waste at the Department of Energy’s Hanford Site into a concrete-like grout form.
The nuclear waste services company and the United Association (UA) Plumbers & Steamfitters Local 598 announced the project labor agreement in a July 10 press release and signed it July 14 at the union hall in Pasco, Wash., said the union’s public affairs director Seth Worley by pone this week. The press release did not say exactly what role the 598 workforce, which has been supporting the Hanford Site since the 1940s, would fill.
DOE has sought a special state permit to transport 2,000 gallons of liquid waste to commercial facilities at Waste Control Specialists in Texas and EnergySolutions in Utah for grouting and disposal of the treated low activity waste. DOE Office of Environmental Management senior adviser William (Ike) White said in June.
Workers have completed construction of a new emergency operations center at the Department of Energy’s Paducah Site in Kentucky, the agency said Tuesday.
Built with steel-reinforced concrete walls, the new 3,500-square-foot emergency building should withstand tornado-scale winds, according to a press release from DOE’s Office of Environmental Management. It replaces the old center located inside the 1950s-era site’s C-300 Central Control Building. During power outages, the new emergency center can use a 980-gallon backup diesel generator to produce electricity for up to 72 hours without refueling, according to DOE.
Paducah’s DOE cleanup contractor, Jacobs-led Four Rivers Nuclear Partnership, built the center and is in charge of emergency operations, including fire and security and medical emergencies. DOE signed off on a $5.4-million task order for the new emergency center in April 2022.
Department of Energy contractor Newport News Nuclear BWXT Los Alamos (N3B) has revamped its communication shop, the joint venture’s president and general manager Brad Smith said in a Wednesday statement distributed to employees.
Effective this week, Mike Nartker who is communications head for N3B subcontractor Longenecker & Associates becomes acting communications director for N3B. Nartker, previously communications director and chief of staff for DOE’s Office of Environmental Management, has also worked as a reporter and editor for Exchange Monitor. Kristin Henderson will serve as stakeholder relations lead and Deborah Kerrigan will serve as internal communications lead, Smith said.
In April, DOE extended the legacy cleanup contract at Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico with Huntington Ingalls-led N3B. N3B started work under the contract, now valued at $1.8-billion, in April 2018. The deal runs through April 2026.