The Department of Energy’s Office of Environmental Management could improve its cost and schedule oversight for big-ticket projects such as the Hanford Site’s multi-billion-dollar Waste Treatment Plant in Washington state, the Government Accountability Office said this week.
The Government Accountability Office (GAO) said Wednesday it did a performance audit from December 2020 to April 2022 to see how Environmental Management (EM) is doing.
The GAO studied EM’s 15 largest capital asset projects and 11 other selected operations. The good news is nine of the largest capital projects were either finished or are on track for completion within initial baseline cost and schedule estimates, GAO said. Two of the 15 don’t yet have cost/schedule timelines.
The Hanford Site in Washington state and the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) in New Mexico each have two projects missing their targets, GAO said in the 98-page report. The projects are the $16.8-billion Waste Treatment Plant as well as the demolition of the Plutonium Finishing Plant at Hanford. The Safety Significant Confinement Ventilation System as well as the Utility Shaft at WIPP also lag behind initial projections.
“GAO has previously identified DOE project management as a high-risk area because the department’s track record regarding management and oversight of contractors has left DOE vulnerable to fraud, waste, abuse, and mismanagement,” according to the report.
“Sufficient staffing” is a common culprit for not getting projects done on time and on budget, GAO said.
The Outfall 200 Mercury Treatment Facility project at the Oak Ridge Site in Tennessee suffered delays but not cost overruns, GAO said. When work crews ran into bedrock and soil problems during foundation construction, EM brought in outside help from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and other contractors, GAO said.
Meanwhile, enterprise wide, “The extent of cost increases for EM capital asset projects and operations activities due to COVID-19 are not fully known,” GAO said.
The nuclear cleanup office splits its work into capital asset projects and operations, GAO said. A capital project has a defined beginning and end point and can include tasks such as construction of new waste treatment and facilities, as well as environmental remediation.
Operation activity can have start and end dates but often involve reoccurring tasks.
“As we reported in 2019, capital asset projects accounted for 18 percent (about $1.3 billion) of EM’s approximately $7.2 billion fiscal year 2019 budget, and operations activities accounted for 77 percent,” or $5.5 billion, GAO said in the report.
