Local and federal officials were on hand Thursday at the official groundbreaking of the Construction Support Building for the Uranium Processing Facility (UPF) project at the Y-12 National Security Complex in Tennessee.
The three-story building will be the project’s first permanent structure and will provide office space, a warehouse, and craft break areas to house UPF personnel, according to the National Nuclear Security Administration. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’ Nashville District is managing the project, and expects to complete construction next fall.
The support building is a component of the UPF’s Site Infrastructure and Services Subproject, which the NNSA said in a press release also involves “building demolition, civil and site utility work, security features and a concrete batch plant.”
The new building will be 64,800 square feet and cost approximately $19.5 million to build, Joe Duncan, project manager for the Oak Ridge Construction Office of the Army Corps Nashville District, said by telephone Thursday. The structure will house a maximum of 550 site workers per day at the peak of construction, Duncan said.
The Uranium Processing Facility will host enriched uranium operations in support of the U.S. nuclear weapons stockpile, replacing some activities currently conducted in aging facilities at Y-12. Lawmakers have demanded that the project cost no more than $6.5 billion and be completed by 2025.
Y-12’s enriched uranium processing operations are currently housed in the aging 9212 and 9215 complexes and the newer 9204-2E building. Some of the operations to be housed at the UPF include enriched uranium casting and chemical processing, which are currently done in 9212.
Early last year the UPF project celebrated the completion of its first subproject, site readiness work, on time and under budget at $43 million. Work completed under that subproject included relocation of a road and several potable water lines, construction of a new bridge, demolition of a parking lot, and rerouting of overhead electrical lines. That milestone paved the way for the current site infrastructure and services work now underway.
Officials including NNSA Administrator Frank Klotz, Rep. Chuck Fleischmann (R-Tenn.), Rep. Jim Cooper (D-Tenn.), Oak Ridge Mayor Warren Gooch, and U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Nashville District Commander Lt. Col. Stephen Murphy attended Thursday’s groundbreaking ceremony.
Duncan said construction of the support building is the last major activity under the site infrastructure subproject. After completion, the project will enter the site preparation phase, he said. The NNSA said in its fiscal 2017 budget request that the site infrastructure subproject would cost $78.5 million and would be completed in April 2018.
Upcoming subprojects encompass installation of an electrical substation; construction of a building to house mechanical, electrical, ventilation, and other support systems; process support facilities; a salvage and accountability building for waste preparation, decontamination, nondestructive analysis, and related operations; and construction of the Main Process Building for casting and oxide production capabilities.
