Weapons Complex Monitor Vol. 36 No. 25
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Weapons Complex Monitor
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June 26, 2025

WRPS to pay $6.5M to settle federal whistleblower fraud claim

By Staff Reports

The Department of Energy’s former tank waste contractor at the Hanford Site in Washington state this week agreed to pay $6.5 million to the feds to settle a fraud case brought by a whistleblower.

The Justice Department settlement with Amentum-led contractor Washington River Protection Solutions (WRPS) was announced Tuesday in a press release by Acting United States Attorney for Eastern Washington Richard Barker.

The Justice Department said $3 million of the $6.5 million being paid by WRPS represents restitution to DOE. In addition, a whistleblower employee who alerted the government will receive $1.4 million, according to the release.

Under the settlement agreement, WRPS admitted that between Oct. 1, 2017, and Dec. 31, 2024, it sought and received reimbursement from DOE for labor hours made up of “unallowable excessive idle time,” according to Justice.

A whistleblower WRPS employee, unidentified in the news release, alerted the government about the practice in December 2022.

Amentum, the lead partner in the WRPS team, which also includes Atkins, declined comment on the settlement agreement. BWX Technologies-led Tank Waste Operations & Closure (H2C) took over as the new multi-billion-dollar tank waste contractor 

“This individual came forward with serious and credible allegations of fraud that were then investigated for years,” Barker said. “We are able to uncover fraud and hold fraudsters accountable only when good people come forward and report it to law enforcement, whether that’s through the filing of an under seal qui tam complaint or stepping forward as a witness,” Barker added.

The Justice Department investigated the allegations under the False Claims Act and eventually filed a complaint against WRPS under seal in federal court for the Easter District of Washington.

The tank contractor allegedly “inflated reimbursable costs by failing to provide its employees with work assignments sufficient to fill an entire shift” and then instructed workers to record their time as if they had worked the full shift, according to the release.

“This is unfortunately not the first time that WRPS has settled allegations of committing fraud on the Tank Farms Contract,” Barker said in the release. He cited a 2017 False Claims Act settlement with WRPS where it paid nearly $5.3 million to resolve allegations it knowingly submitted false claims to DOE for overtime and premium pay.

Hanford has about 56 million gallons of liquid radioactive and hazardous waste held in 177 underground tanks. The waste is the residue of decades of plutonium production for the government. The Bechtel-built Waste Treatment and Immobilization Plant is supposed to start turning some of the less-radioactive waste into a solid glass form starting in August. 

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