DOE wants dismissal from Hanford whistleblower case - Mid-Columbia News | Tri-City Herald : Mid-Columbia news

DOE wants dismissal from Hanford whistleblower case - Mid-Columbia News | Tri-City Herald : Mid-Columbia news

Report: Hanford vessels fail to meet requirements

The Energy Department and a contractor building a waste treatment plant at the nation's most contaminated nuclear site procured and installed tanks that did not always meet requirements of a quality assurance program or the contract, a federal audit concluded Monday. 

Published: 04/30/12 2:56 pm | Updated: 04/30/12 5:16 pmBY SHANNON DININNY; ASSOCIATED PRESS

The Energy Department and a contractor building a waste treatment plant at the nation's most contaminated nuclear site procured and installed tanks that did not always meet requirements of a quality assurance program or the contract, a federal audit concluded Monday.

Critics say new Hanford Nuclear Reservation waste permit has big holes

Washington's new blueprint for dealing with dangerous waste at the Hanford Nuclear Reservation tops 16,000 pages, covering the maze of polluted land and water at the former nuclear weapons production site. But Hanford activists say it leaves crucial issues unaddressed; namely, imports of new radioactive waste and the ultimate cleanup plan for leaking storage tanks and much of 43 miles of contaminated ditches. Washington's Department of Ecologyissued a draft of the 10-year"dangerous waste permit" Tuesday. It's now up for public comment, including a hearing scheduled for May 16 in Portland. Activists, led by Heart of America Northwest, say Washington regulators are giving a free pass to the U.S. Department of Energy, which operates the nation's largest nuclear cleanup site. The department wants to bury and cap most of the contamination instead of removing it, they say, and to bring more nuclear waste to Hanford. The state permit does nothing to stop that, said Gerry Pollet, executive director of the Hanford watchdog group.  "They're saying, 'We're going to give you a permit even though this is a non-compliant facility and there's no closure plan,'" Pollet said. "The public doesn't have anything to look at." 

H.R. 5325: Making appropriations for energy and water development and related agencies for the fiscal year ending September 30, 2013, and for other purposes.

May 02, 2012 — Introduced

H.R. 5325: Making appropriations for energy and water development and related agencies for the fiscal year ending September 30, 2013, and for other purposes.

Sponsor: Rep. Rodney Frelinghuysen [R-NJ11]

This bill or resolution is in the first stage of the legislative process. It was introduced into Congress on May 2, 2012. It will typically be considered by committee next. http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/112/hr5325

Mark Whitney to be DOE's environmental chief in Oak Ridge

Knoxville News May 1, 2012 Mark Whitney will be the U.S. Department of Energy's new cleanup chief chief in Oak Ridge, effective in August, DOE announced today. Whitney currently serves as the National Nuclear Security Administration's acting principal assistant deputy administrator for defense nuclear nonproliferation. He's held that job since July 2011. He's been a member of the government's Senior Executive Service since 2005. In a statement, David Huizenga, DOE's senior advisor for EM, said: "Mark is an engaging leader with a broad understanding of DOE-wide programs and policies and has a history of proven success developing and implementing strategies to improve organizational performance. I am pleased Mark has agreed to take on this important role and devote his talents to the nuclear waste cleanup mission in his home state of Tennessee." Sue Cange currently serves as acting assistant manager for EM and DOE said she would return to her role as deputy assistant manager.

Hastings worries about key DOE jobs being vacant

May 02, 2012  By Annette Cary, Herald staff writer

Letting the key Department of Energy headquarters position responsible for overseeing Hanford cleanup remain vacant since July 15 is unacceptable, said Rep. Doc Hastings, R-Wash., in a letter to President Obama this week. He also made his wishes clear in a separate letter to DOE on another key position that soon will be vacant, the federal project director for the Hanford vitrification plant. Ines Triay, the last DOE assistant secretary of environmental management, resigned from the position in July. It's the top position for DOE environmental cleanup with responsibility for an approximately $5 billion annual budget. David Huizenga was named to fill in as acting assistant secretary, but that expired after 210 days, the maximum time allowed by law. He's now serving as senior adviser for environmental management. "It's unacceptable that after nearly a year this administration has failed to even nominate a new leader for this program," Hastings said in the letter. "I request that an assistant secretary be nominated without further delay." No explanation has been given for the delay in nominating someone. Naming Huizenga a senior adviser does not provide the DOE environmental cleanup program with any level of certainty or sense of continuity, Hastings said. It also does not provide Huizenga with the authority and accountability needed to meet challenges in the DOE cleanup program, he said. "I believe that having an assistant secretary in place would help strengthen the environmental management program and put the federal government in a better position to meet its legal cleanup obligations," Hastings said.

In a letter to Huizenga, Hastings advised DOE headquarters to work closely with the DOE Hanford Office of River Protection manager to select a new federal project director. Dale Knutson has been on loan from Pacific Northwest National Laboratory since May 2010 to fill the position, but DOE does not plan to renew the contract when it expires at the end of the month. It plans to put a federal employee in the position. "I am hopeful that in determining the types of candidates to consider the department will seek to do everything possible to ensure continuity in this key position," he said. Hastings told Huizenga he is concerned that not having a federal project director in place as Bechtel National prepares a proposed new cost and schedule for the $12.2 billion vitrification plant would harm or delay the process. Hastings also reminded DOE that he inserted language into the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2012 saying DOE must notify Congress of any changes to the Office of River Protection responsibility or reporting structure. The law is clear that the Office of River Protection manager, now Scott Samuelson, is in charge of the vitrification plant and reports directly to the assistant secretary for environmental management, Hastings said. "Attempts to circumvent this law have resulted in confusion and uncertainty that are ultimately detrimental" to the vitrification plant project, he said. Shortly before Knutson was named project director, DOE changed the reporting structure for the position, giving the project director a direct line to officials at DOE headquarters, apparently catching Congress by surprise. The reporting structure was clarified three months ago to indicate that the manager of the Office of River Protection is responsible for the vit plant.

-- Annette Cary: 582-1533; acary@tricityherald.com; more Hanford news at hanfordnews.com

Read more here: http://www.tri-cityherald.com/2012/05/02/1924702/hastings-worries-about-key-doe.html#storylink=cpy

Senate follows House with more questions about construction of Savannah River Site's MOX plant

By Rob Pavey, The Augusta Chronicle, Ga. | 30 April 2012

April 30--U.S. Senate budget writers followed their House counterparts this week with questions about the rising costs of the mixed oxide fuel plant under construction at Savannah River Site.

In particular, the projected annual cost of operating the facility -- after it is completed -- has risen from $156 million to $499 million in just two budget years, according to a new draft of the 2013 Senate Energy & Water De­velopment Appropriations bill.

The National Nuclear Security Administration, an arm of the Energy Department that manages nuclear weapons programs, "has failed to provide a sufficient justification for this increase," the report said.

The $4.8 billion MOX plant is the centerpiece of a plan to dispose of 34 metric tons of plutonium from dismantled nuclear warheads by blending the material with uranium to make commercial reactor fuel. The facility is 60 percent complete and scheduled to open in 2016, with fuel production under way by 2018.The Senate Appropriations Committee also wrote that it supports NNSA's proposal to abandon plans for a standalone facility to disassemble plutonium "pits" from surplus warheads but questioned the costs that went into planning a facility that NNSA now says is not needed.

The Department of Energy's $12.2 Billion Waste Treatment and Immobilization Plant – Quality Assurance Issues – Black Cell Vessels

The Office of Inspector General received allegations concerning aspects of the quality assurance program at the Department of Energy's $12.2 billion Waste Treatment and Immobilization Plant (WTP) project in Hanford, Washington. The WTP is a key element in the Department's strategy for remediating its significant legacy inventory of high-level nuclear waste.
RESULTS OF AUDIT
Our review substantiated the allegation. In short, we found that the Department had procured and installed vessels in WTP that did not always meet quality assurance and/or contract requirements. For the vessels that we reviewed, we identified multiple instances where quality assurance records were either missing or were not traceable to the specific area or part of the vessel. We also found that the Department paid the WTP contractor a $15 million incentive fee for production of a vessel that was later determined to be defective.
Read report here.

Nuclear Waste Cleanup Continues The Public Opinion Tide Is Turning for Idaho National Laboratory

By Kimberlee Kruesi - kkruesi@magicvalley.com | Posted: Friday, April 27, 2012 2:00 am

IDAHO FALLS • As the Idaho National Laboratory prepares to take on another nuclear waste project, officials also hope they’re making just as much headway on gaining the public’s trust. Starting next month, contractors at the Idaho National Laboratory will begin treating 900,000 gallons of radioactive liquid waste, then shipping it out of the state. The project is the latest step in a multi-decade effort to remove nuclear waste from INL and the state, laid out in a 1995 court settlement involving the U.S. Department of Energy, the U.S. Navy and Idaho officials.

The liquid waste is currently being stored in underground tanks that were built during the Cold War for spent nuclear fuel reprocessing. The DOE received approval to open a new $570 million facility to treat the spent fuel, said Rick Craun, the project’s federal director. It matters to residents of the Magic Valley because the tanks are positioned a few hundred feet above the Eastern Snake Plain Aquifer, a major source of southern Idaho drinking water, said Brad Bugger, spokesman for DOE. “We’ve never had a leak in those tanks but now that we’re no longer reprocessing the spent fuel, we want to get it all out,” Bugger said.

The DOE has completed more than 950 milestones tracking the course of the cleanup, including unearthing almost three acres of buried waste and dismantling more than 2 million square feet of buildings contaminated with radioactivity. There’s still quite a bit of waste left to remove, but Bugger said spreading word of INL’s current accomplishments helps establish a certain amount of trust among regulators and the public. “We delivered on our commitments,” Bugger said. “We’ve done what we’ve said we would do and that’s helped change the attitude.”

INL has constantly followed through on its promises, said Susan Burke, INL coordinator for the Idaho Department of Environmental Quality. DEQ oversees INL’s activities for the state and monitors water and air quality near the facility. “It just seems logical that you’re going to build up confidence with the public if you do what you say you’re going to do,” she said.

DEQ will always be a regulator first when it comes to INL, Burke said. But she noted the two organizations have moved closer to a partnership. “I think it’s mostly been done in keeping us aware on how it’s going over there and what they’re thinking on how they’re approaching something,” Burke said. “There’s room for discussion on some things.” Beatrice Brailfford from the Snake River Alliance, a nuclear watchdog organization, praised DOE’s efforts. “In the early days of the cleanup, people had some wacky ideas on how to get rid of waste,” she said. “But they’ve remained vigilant in making progress and I’m pretty pleased with that.” 

Read more: http://magicvalley.com/news/local/state-and-regional/the-public-opinion-tide-is-turning-for-idaho-national-laboratory/article_d6e0a035-1710-58ba-815c-a33ef2919be1.html#ixzz1tXrdHMdk

At a Glance: INL Cleanup

The Idaho National Laboratory, managed by the U.S. Department of Energy, is now in its 17th year of nuclear waste cleanup following a court settlement with the state of Idaho. A look back:

1995 • Settlement agreement reached between the state of Idaho, U.S. Navy, and DOE that requires DOE to meet certain waste cleanup obligations. Among them:transuranic waste stored at INLmust leave the state of Idaho by 2018.

2006 • Amid a dispute over the terms of the agreement, a federal judge rules that the DOE must remove all buried waste from the INL site.

2008 • Due to definition disputes of “all,” the state agrees to a new deal that allows DOE to seal and leave in place some waste in specific areas.

2012 • By the end of this year, 900,000 gallons of radioactive liquid waste stored at INL should be treated and removed.

Mishaps Pause Some INL Progress

The Idaho National Laboratory has attracted headlines this month for another matter — safety issues at its research and development facilities.

About 800 workers at the Materials and Fuels Complex are spending two weeks evaluating mistakes made during two accidents last week. Among them, a 3,000-pound piece of a metal shutter shield fell from a crane near an employee.

The mishaps weren’t on the cleanup side, but it has faced its own occasional setbacks. Also last week, retrieval of transuranic waste resumed after a nearly two-year hiatus. The work suspension came in 2010 after about 20 workers were exposed to radioactive waste when a plywood box broke open, though site managers said the doses were below acceptable levels. A new contractor, a consortium led by Babcock and Wilcox and URS Corp., has since taken over the contract for the transuranic waste from former contractor Bechtel BWXT Idaho.

— Wire reports

Read more: http://magicvalley.com/news/local/state-and-regional/the-public-opinion-tide-is-turning-for-idaho-national-laboratory/article_d6e0a035-1710-58ba-815c-a33ef2919be1.html#ixzz1tXrxHEiC

Congress Goes Nuclear

ENERGY  | 4/28/2012 @ 11:09PM |1,376 views

So much for the notion that Congress can’t do anything right.  The thoughtful and smart actions of Senators Murkowski and Landrieu, working with Senators Feinstein, Alexander and Bingaman, produced a bill out of the Senate Energy and Water Appropriations Subcommittee last Tuesday, approved Thursday by the full Committee, that took the first step to solving our nation’s nuclear waste problem. I’ve been waiting my entire career for this to happen. In fact, this first step is so significant that I’m having trouble catching my breath!

If you remember, the Yucca Mountain Project, the nation’s first selected nuclear disposal site, was recently scrapped for being not workable and the President’s Blue Ribbon Commission on America’s Nuclear Future was appointed to find another path forward. After reviewing the last 60 years of frustrated science and policy, in February the BRC released a number of very good recommendations addressing nuclear in general, but three specific ones were critical to actually dealing with high-level nuclear waste and managing spent nuclear fuel for the next hundred years. They were:

1) executing interim storage for spent nuclear fuel, 2) resuming the site selection process for a second repository (Yucca being the first, the massive salts being the best), and 3) forming a quasi-government entity, or FedCorp, to execute the program and take control of the Nuclear Waste Fund in order to do so.

The first recommendation separates fuel from real waste, allowing storage of still-usable spent nuclear fuel from reactor sites either to be used in future reactors or eventually disposed, without needing to retrieve it from deep in the earth as is presently the Law. The second recommendation allows us to choose the best geology for the permanent disposal of actual high-level waste that has no value since it is the waste from reprocessing old fuel. This real waste needs to be disposed of promptly, not just looked at for another few decades. It has cost billions to manage this waste in places that were always meant to be temporary. The third recommendation controls cost and administration, because, duh, we’re broke.

Tuesday’s bill starts the ball rolling by implementing the first recommendation, authorizing “the Secretary of Energy to site, construct, and operate consolidated storage facilities to provide storage as needed for spent nuclear fuel and high-level radioactive waste.” – IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES—112th Cong., 2d Sess.

The short version is this bill is consent-based, meaning the Feds can’t just pick a site and force it down a State’s throat, but have to wait for someone to bid for it and requires approval of the Governor, any affected Tribes, and the local representatives of that State. Plus, it authorizes the Nuclear Waste Fund to be used for what it always was intended. And DOE has only 120 days from passage to begin accepting proposals so it won’t languish for years. This bill breaks the nuclear waste logjam. It’s simple, it’s the right thing to do, it will save lots of money, it’s the best thing for the environment, and it’s a win-win, so how did the Senate do this? And so fast!

Now it’s up to the House to maintain the do-nothing image of Congress, kill this bill, and let us get back to wasting billions of dollars looking at the problem for 30 more years.

House committee finds $8M more for Hanford tank farms

By Annette Cary, Tri-City Herald April 27, 2012

The House Appropriations Committee has found $8 million more for the latest version of its Hanford tank farms budget for next year. The committee also removed criticism of Hanford's Plutonium Finishing Plant from the report accompanying the appropriations bill. That puts the House version of the Hanford budget for the tank farms at $473 million, which is $6 million above the amount estimated to be needed to do work required by a court-enforced consent decree. It also brings it closer to the Senate version of the Hanford budget, as marked up by a Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Tuesday. That Senate version includes $482 million for the tank farms, matching the Obama administration's request for Congress. Although lower, the Republican-controlled House number still is about $28 million more than the current budget for the tank farms.

FY13 DOE EM Documents

FY 2013 DOE Budget Request to Congress 
FY 2013 EM Budget Rollout Presentation 
FY 2013 Environmental Management Budget Request to Congress 

New Approach to Assess Volatile Contamination in Vadose Zone Provides Path Forward for Site Closure

EM Technology Program Update | April 24 | RICHLAND, Wash. and LOS ALAMOS, N.M. – Through the Deep Vadose Zone-Applied Field Research Initiative (DVZ-AFRI), scientists and engineers from Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, CH2M HILL Plateau Remediation Company, federal agencies, and the scientific community are collaborating to develop effective, science-based solutions for remediating, characterizing, monitoring, and predicting the behavior and fate of deep vadose zone contamination. DVZ-AFRI is supported through a memorandum of understanding with EM’s Office of Soil and Groundwater Remediation and the Richland Operations Office. This partnership is maximizing resources to facilitate development of the scientific and technical foundation and technologies needed to make sound and defensible remedial decisions that will successfully meet target cleanup goals. Soil vapor extraction (SVE) is a baseline remediation approach applied at many sites to remove volatile contaminants from the vadose zone. While SVE generally removes contaminants from most parts of the vadose zone, many sites have low-permeability heterogeneities that limit the ability of SVE remediation and leave residual, persistent zones of contamination. Under these conditions, a risk informed evaluation of SVE performance should determine if the system needs to be optimized, terminated, or transitioned to another approach. See Deep Vadose Zone–
Applied Field Research Initiative Fiscal Year 2011 Annual Report at http://www.pnnl.gov/main/publications/external/technical_reports/PNNL-20757.pdf

NEI Commends Senate Appropriations Panel’s Used Fuel Management Proposal

For Release: April 24, 2012 WASHINGTON, D.C., April 24, 2012—The Senate Energy and Water Development Subcommittee marked up its appropriations bill for fiscal year 2013 today. The markup includes language supporting consolidation of used nuclear fuel at one or more storage sites. It also mimics the House by rejecting the administration’s attempt to impose new charges on nuclear energy for the Uranium Enrichment Decontamination and Decommissioning fund. Marvin Fertel, the Nuclear Energy Institute’s president and chief executive officer, made the following remarks in reaction to the markup.

“The Nuclear Energy Institute commends the subcommittee for taking seriously the recommendations of the Blue Ribbon Commission on America’s Nuclear Future to begin moving used nuclear fuel from nuclear plant sites into consolidated storage facilities. Doing so is an important first step to meet the federal government’s contractual obligation to remove used reactor fuel from decommissioned and operating nuclear power plants as the government was required to begin by 1998.

“The nuclear industry has long supported consolidated storage in a supportive community as part of a national used-fuel management program. While important, consolidated storage is only part of a comprehensive used fuel program.

“NEI urges others in Congress to consider broader legislation recommended by the Blue Ribbon Commission, including our continued need for geologic disposal. In that regard, NEI continues to support licensing work on the Yucca Mountain repository.

“Equally importantly, the subcommittee acted fairly and did not follow the administration’s request to levy another tax on nuclear energy companies that have already met their legal obligation in funding the Decontamination and Decommissioning Fund program. It is patently unfair for the administration to try to re-impose this tax on the industry

Leveraging New Media and Internet for Nuclear Education

IAEA Opens Multi-Network Platform for Enhanced Communication and Training

Seven Networks are currently being sponsored by the IAEA and managed by the Department of Nuclear Energy, with support from the Technical Cooperation program and funding from the European Commission. These networks range from nuclear knowledge management, implementation of nuclear technology, radioactive waste management, decommissioning and environmental remediation across the globe.The IAEA has long been a champion of the concept and use of professional networks to advance best practices in diverse areas of nuclear technology. Through inter-departmental initiatives, the Agency has set up a number of networks to encourage experts to contribute and share their knowledge and resources with peers, as well as with other professionals with limited resources.To further enhance these centers of collaboration, the IAEA has built a web platform that inter-connects these networks and their participating institutions and experts. Known by the acronym CONNECT, for Connecting the Network of Networks for Enhanced Communications and Training, this platform uses new media and web technologies to enable increased participation from individuals and organizations involved.