DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY
Special Report on "Management Challenges at the Department of Energy - Fiscal Year 2021"
Office of Inspector General | 11/25/2020
The goal of this report is to identify the most pressing challenges for the Department of Energy (DOE) in a variety of departmental offices and to resolve management issues to accomplish near term progress.
Regarding National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) and pit production, DOE plans to use two sites to accomplish pit production, producing 30 pits per year during 2026 at the Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) and 50 pits per year during 2030 at the Savannah River Site (SRS). With the gap in pit production following the closure of Rocky Flats, there is also now a gap in creating and maintaining
an expert workforce that has the numbers and skills required to perform the project.
DOE is also facing the twofold challenges of modernizing the Plutonium Facility at LANL and repurposing the former Mixed Oxide Fuel Fabrication Facility at SRS. To further the pit production mission, several subprojects are taking place at both LANL and SRS to ensure enduring capability and capacity to produce the pits. DOE must act to determine the necessary investments in human capital and equipment to
meet the 80-pit requirement.
Regarding the Office of Environmental Management (EM) and tank waste, EM is tasked with treatment and disposition of approximately 91 million gallons of tank waste, some of which is stored in aging containers. This represents a high financial risk and a high environmental risk to communities. The report highlights accomplishments at Savannah River Site, West Valley Demonstration Project, Idaho National
Lab, and Hanford.
While addressing tank waste at a variety of sites across the complex, DOE has instituted new policies and approaches to create new waste disposition pathways. This updating of policies greatly impacted the interpretation of high-level waste. By defining waste based on radiological constituents rather than origin, waste will be more appropriately managed. Moving forward DOE will need to address management
of operations and facility modifications at several sites along with development of final disposition pathways for treated tank waste.
| Follow the latest DOE budget updates with ECA's budget tracker
|
APPROPRIATIONS
Appropriators strike deal on funding totals to avoid December shutdown
Politico | 11/24/2020
Top House and Senate appropriators on Tuesday clinched a deal on a bipartisan set of funding levels, paving the way for a $1.4 trillion spending package to avert a government shutdown next month.
The agreement on the funding allocations, confirmed by a House Democratic aide, establishes overall totals for 12 appropriations measures that will be rolled into one massive omnibus bill that would boost federal budgets for the rest of the fiscal year. Negotiators plan to keep the numbers — known as 302(b)s — under wraps until a bipartisan, bicameral omnibus is finalized, the aide
said.
The deal comes at a time with little margin for error. After the Thanksgiving break, both chambers will have just two weeks to flesh out the finer points of the 12-bill spending package and pass the legislation in order to avoid a government shutdown by the Dec. 11 deadline.
ENVIRONMENTAL MANAGEMENT
Paducah Marks 25 Years of Successful Pump-and-Treat Operations
DOE-EM | 11/17/2020
For the last quarter century, a cornerstone of the cleanup program at EM’s Paducah Site has been the safe operation of the system to treat and reduce groundwater contamination.
After the discovery in the late 1980s of contamination in nearby groundwater wells, EM’s immediate response was to supply clean drinking water to those affected. EM then initiated the design and construction of a pump-and-treat system, which reduces groundwater contaminant concentration as well as mitigates the spread of contamination.
For a quarter century, the pump-and-treat system has been successfully removing groundwater contaminants. The primary contaminant is trichloroethene (TCE), a common industrial degreaser that was used at the Paducah Gaseous Diffusion Plant (PGDP) to clean equipment.
Since operation of the pump-and-treat system in the northwest area of the site began in August 1995, followed by an additional system in the northeast area of the site, EM has made great progress in remediating groundwater contamination. To date, a total of approximately 4.4 billion gallons of water have been treated — enough to fill 6,500 Olympic-sized swimming pools.
Dec. 16, 2020 New Nuclear Webinar; Virtual
Sept. 8-10 National Cleanup Workshop 2021
Read about DOE's High Level Waste Interpretation
Have questions about DOE’s recent high-level waste (HLW) interpretation? Download ECA’s Key Points and FAQs on the issue to better understand what ECA believes are the potential benefits of implementation.
Interested in learning more? Read the ECA report “Making Informed Decisions on DOE's Proposed High Level Waste Definition” at www.energyca.org/publications
Stay Current on Activities in the DOE World
Read the latest edition of the ECA Bulletin, a regular newsletter providing a detailed brief of ECA activities, legislative news, and major events from across the DOE complex. Have suggestions for future editions? Email [email protected].
|
Learn More about Cleanup Sites with ECA's DOE Site Profiles
ECA's new site profiles detail DOE's 13 active Environmental Management cleanup sites and national laboratories, highlighting their history, missions, and priorities. The profiles are a key source for media, stakeholders, and the public to learn more about DOE site activities, contractors, advisory boards, and their surrounding local
governments.
|
|
|
|
