Tetra Tech has been awarded a contract valued at nearly $1.8 million to assist the Department of Energy’s National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) in developing federal environmental policy documents.
The work involves technical support services for National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) compliance for site-wide document development for NNSA’s Office of Environment, Safety, and Health, according to an award notice posted online Monday via the federal procurement website, SAM.gov.
The DOE contact person listed is Samantha Sartori, samantha.sartori@nnsa.doe.gov. DOE issued a solicitation earlier this spring and bids were due April 1. Based in Pasadena, Calif., Tetra Tech is a global consulting and engineering company focused on water and environmental work. Tetra Tech is publicly traded on NASDAQ. The company has worked on NEPA environmental studies for DOE before.
Stevan Pearce, a former Republican congressman who represented the area around the Department of Energy’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP), was confirmed by the Senate last month to be director of the Interior Department’s Bureau of Land Management (BLM).
Pearce was among a large bloc of GOP nominees narrowly confirmed by the Senate 46-to-43 on May 18. According to its website, “BLM manages one in every 10 acres of land in the United States, and approximately 30 percent of the Nation’s minerals.”
President Donald Trump nominated Pearce to the post on Jan. 13. Pearce represented New Mexico’s 2nd congressional district first from 2003 through 2009 and again from 2011 through 2019, according to the Ballotpedia website. Pearce also ran and lost the 2018 governor’s election in New Mexico to Michelle Lujan Grisham (D), who currently holds the office.
A multi-billion-dollar expansion is coming to Urenco USA’s National Enrichment Facility in Eunice, N.M., enlarging the capacity by nearly 50%, the company said Tuesday.
Urenco USA, an affiliate of the European Urenco Group, said in a press release it will install 2.1 million separative work units (SWU) of new enrichment capacity of low-enriched uranium at its new plant at the facility. During the expansion, up to 24 cascades of centrifuges will be installed, with the initial cascades starting production in 2032 and additional cascades installed through 2036. An exact value of the expansion was not provided in the release.
The new plant that will be constructed at the National Enrichment Facility is expected to bring 300 to 600 new jobs during the peak construction period and 70 jobs in the long-term, Urenco USA said.
A senior member of the House Armed Services Committee (HASC) said Wednesday that Congress needed the Pentagon’s Iran supplemental funding request “yesterday,” noting the ongoing lack of details from the department on its plan for replenishing munitions stockpiles.
Rep. Rob Wittman (R-Va.) offered the perspective a day ahead of HASC’s National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) markup, telling reporters he sees restoring weapons magazine depth as an urgent priority that requires a supplemental approach rather than relying completely on authorizing such efforts in the defense policy bill and waiting for funds through the traditional appropriations process.
“We’ve heard all kinds of figures there. I’ve been very vocal and adamant to say we needed that figure yesterday and we need the details of it. And we asked for it and we are being told it’s coming. But it needs to be here. It needed to be here yesterday,” Wittman said. “Maybe they’re waiting for the NDAA to get through the House to inform what they would do in a supplemental. I don’t know. I can’t speak for them, but I just know that there’s a timeliness element that’s incredibly important for the supplemental.”