Final RFP Out for New 222-S Lab Contract
WC Monitor
6/6/2014
The Department of Energy this week issued a final Request for Proposal for the new contract to provide analytical and testing services at Hanford’s 222-S Laboratory. The final RFP, which is being set-aside for small businesses, contains few changes from a draft version issued earlier this year. The planned contract is set to run for up to five years, consisting of a two-year base period and three one-year option periods, and would cover an estimated 15,000 to 25,000 laboratory analyses each year. The new contract is set to be a hybrid type, with Fixed-Price with Award Fee, Labor-Hour, and Cost Reimbursement Contract Line Items (CLINS). Bids on the new contract are due by July 17, and DOE has scheduled a pre-proposal conference and site tour for June 18. The current 222-S Laboratory contract, held by Advanced Technologies and Laboratories, is all cost-reimbursable. ATL is in the final year of its contract, and the Department currently expects to award the new contract in 2015.
According to a set of questions-and-answers issued earlier this week in advance of the final RFP, at least one potential bidder on the new contract appears to have concerns over the amount of fee DOE is offering. The planned award fee of 2.5 percent “seems low for a high risk and complex operation,” one potential bidder wrote in a new set of questions-and-answers on the draft RFP for the new contract DOE recently released. In contrast, according to the potential bidder, other prime contracts at Hanford have award fees ranging from 4.2 percent to 7.6 percent. “The fee available on this RFP is significantly lower than the percentage of fee on the other Hanford prime contracts. To compensate for the difference, additional profit would have to be included in the fixed price amount. Are we safe to assume this would be a consistent method that all bidders will take?” the potential bidder asked.
In response, DOE said, “In accordance with section L.34(e), the Offeror shall propose a firm fixed price, including normal profit, for Laboratory Operations (CLINs 00002, 00006, 00010, and 00014). Additionally, in accordance with section L.34(h), the Offeror shall propose an Award Fee of 2.5% of the Laboratory Operations CLINS (CLINs 00002, 00006, 00010, and 00014) that are performed on a fixed price basis."
New Technology to Be Used to Help Empty Tank
WC Monitor
6/6/2014
Work could start in the coming week to use a new technology to empty waste from a Hanford single-shell tank suspected of leaking in the past, according to Washington River Protection Solutions. Nearly a year ago, workers cut a hole in Tank C-105 to install a riser large enough to insert a new robotic arm that’s much bigger, tougher and more versatile than technologies previously used to empty waste from suspected past leakers. The robotic arm, the Mobile Arm Retrieval System, or MARS, has been used in another tank, C-107, but with a sluicing system that added liquid to the tank. This will be the first time a MARS vacuum system will be used. It was developed for use in tanks that require special handling because sluicing, which relies on a spray of liquid to break up waste and move it toward a pump, could cause them to leak.
Work stopped this spring with the MARS sluicing system in Tank C-107 after two different attachments failed to get all the waste out of the tank. The Department of Energy has directed that a third system be used in the tank, and work is paused at Tank C-107 until that system is selected. In the meantime, work will start on Tank C-105 with the MARS vacuum system. Work can be done on only one of the two tanks at a time because they use the same infrastructure for waste retrieval and the same waste-receipt double-shell tank. For the new MARS vacuum system, liquid is injected through a system above the waste to create a vacuum that pulls up the waste from the tank. The liquid stays in the retrieval system rather than being introduced into the tank. The system was designed and built by Columbia Energy and Environmental Services and tested for hundreds of hours on a mock tank, showing it could remove sludge, rocks and sand, and the hard-packed waste found at the bottom of some tanks.
Other vacuum systems have been used to empty some of the smallest underground tanks at Hanford. But the work was very slow even for small quantities of waste—about 2,000 gallons—and the vacuums were not powerful enough to pull up the heaviest waste at the bottom of some tanks. Tank C-105 has 132,000 gallons of waste. The only known drawback to the MARS vacuum system is that it is too large to fit down the 12-inch diameter risers that provide the only access into the tanks. To prepare to insert MARS into Tank C-105, WRPS workers had to dig up the dirt covering the top of the underground tank, and then cut a 55-inch-diameter circle to remove a portion of the tank dome to allow a larger riser to be inserted. It’s only the second time a Hanford tank holding waste has been opened up.
Approx. 7 Percent of Waste Remains in C-107
On the first tank at which MARS has been used, Tank C-107, waste pumping started in fall 2011. But the system has been down for long stretches, not because of problems with the MARS technology, but because of the failure of pumps used in harsh radiological environments. The state of Washington had expected the tank to be emptied in March. A sluicing system worked well to remove about 88 percent of the waste in the tank, according to WRPS. Then high pressure liquid was used to attack the hard waste beneath the sludge that made up most of the tank’s waste. However, that stopped being effective with about 7 percent of the 253,000 gallons of waste in the tank remaining.
Left are hard chunks of waste at the bottom of the tank that are too large to be pumped out and a “bathtub ring” of hard, crusted waste on the tank’s wall, said Rob Roxburgh, WRPS spokesman. Using a hot water wash is being considered as the third system for the tank, although a decision has yet to be made, he said. One of the benefits of MARS is that it is equipped with multiple systems, Roxburgh said, and a hot water wash could be done using the MARS equipment already in the tank.
Worked Stopped at C-102
Work also has stopped to empty Tank C-102. Work started using a sluicing system this spring and 98,000 gallons of 316,000 gallons have been removed. Now Hanford officials are considering whether more sludge can be put in the double-shell tank that’s receiving the waste. Concerns were raised that if the sludge gets too deep in a double shell tank, a bubble of flammable gas could build up. DOE is required under the court-enforced consent decree to have waste removed from all 16 tanks in the C Tank Farm by the end of September. Waste retrieval is continuing on four of the tanks. DOE is waiting to hear from the state if retrieval may be considered complete on two more of the tanks or if it must continue waste retrieval on a total of six tanks.
