DOE Plans to Hire Firm for Emergency Response Support for TRU at SPRU

The Department of Energy plans to hire a firm, Co-Physics., to provide emergency response support services for mixed transuranic waste storage at the Separations Process Research Unit in New York.

The DOE Office of Environmental Management  Consolidated Business Center announced its intention to hire Co-Physics, which has provided radioactive materials support services in the Northeast for over 30 years, in a procurement notice posted online late last month.  

The Separations Process Research Unit (SPRU) located within the Knolls Atomic Power Laboratory in Niskayuna , N.Y., was host to a small-scale pilot plant that studied the chemical process to separate uranium and plutonium from irradiated materials in the early 1950s.

After Amentum effectively finished cleanup of the site, the DOE Office of Environmental Management announced in December 2020 it was transferring the property back to its owner, the Office of Naval Reactors.

But the site holds a total of 24 containers of mixed transuranic (TRU) waste resulting from demolition of a processing building and waste management building in 2015 and 2016. The waste is stored in steel container express boxes in a railroad bed pending off-site transfer for treatment, characterization and eventual disposal, according to the procurement documents.

“The Contractor shall provide emergency response services in response to a call by DOE within 4 hours of receiving the call,” according to the statement of work. “By definition, these services will be required on an irregular basis, as needed.” Based in Florida, N.Y., Co-Physics provides radiological instrumentation, laboratory analysis, site assessment, and consulting services, according to its website.