Questions Come as Congress Prepares Appropriations Bills
Kenneth Fletcher
WC Monitor
6/6/2014
The Department of Energy has yet to formally ask Congress for additional funds to help reopen the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant, leading to questions from lawmakers and Hill staff as preparations for Fiscal Year 2015 appropriations bills move forward. DOE asked for $220.5 million for WIPP for FY’15, but since the request was developed, the Department has launched a major recovery effort in response to a Feb. 14 radiation release at WIPP with an uncertain price tag. Some DOE officials have informally told Hill staff that they may need about $130 million in additional funding, but no detailed budget amendment has been submitted. The effort lacks leadership, a Congressional staffer told WC Monitor. “It would be good if the Secretary [of Energy] stepped up and said ‘We’re not sure how much this is going to cost but we’re going to need extra money from Congress.’ There just hasn’t been any of that,” the staffer said.
New Mexico Sens. Tom Udall (D) and Martin Heinrich (D) this week urged the Obama Administration to amend its budget request for WIPP. “As Congressional committees begin work on the FY’15 appropriations bills, to ensure transparency we believe a revised budget justification that addresses all critical needs for recovery of WIPP should be completed and an amended budget request submitted to Congress as soon as possible,” Udall and Heinrich wrote in a June 2 letter to the White House. “Additionally, WIPP is likely to require recovery spending in FY’16 and we urge you to give consideration to the extra amounts needed to restore full operations at WIPP.” DOE this week did not respond to request for comment on a potential budget amendment.
Current DOE Estimate Lacks Details
The $130 million estimate provided so far did not include sufficient details on how the money would be spent, the Congressional staffer said. “Part of what’s tough and frustrating about this for us is, in the numbers they’ve given us we can’t separate what’s directly related to the incidents and what’s just a bunch of deferred maintenance. All that work is mashed together,” the staffer said. “Basically this thing is turning into a big opportunity for WIPP to do all the things that they needed to do for a long time and didn’t have the money for. … So we got this huge bill, but we don’t know what’s really essential and what isn’t.”
DOE has also not provided a breakdown of what maintenance work needs to be done immediately, versus in future years, the staffer said. “We’re getting this message that it all has to be done right away and it all has to be done as soon as possible, because we have to get it back up and running,” the staffer said. “But wait a minute. We’ll get back up and running when we figure out what actually happened. That’s the first step. And then we’ll figure out what needs to be done to address the root causes of what happened, we’ll figure out how to fund those and then we’ll go do them and then we’ll talk about getting back up and running.”
About $30 million in the DOE estimate is for transuranic waste processing sites such as Idaho, Savannah River and Oak Ridge for storage and other upgrades as a result of the WIPP shutdown, the staffer said. Appropriators are expected to focus on funding WIPP instead of the other sites, leaving just $100 million from the current DOE estimate. If no additional guidance is received, “ we may just have to have some placeholder money in there so that hopefully by the time we go to conference we’ll have a lot more detail on where they are and we can hash it out,” the staffer said.
What Happens to the WIPP Workforce?
New Mexico officials have been pushing to keep the site funded at a level that would maintain the full WIPP workforce. Given the demand for workers in southeast New Mexico in the oil and gas industry, if WIPP workers are laid off the site will have a hard time hiring them back when it resumes full operations, John Heaton of the Carlsbad Nuclear Task Force told WC Monitor. “Unemployment in Carlsbad is about 3.5 percent. Anybody who wants to work can get a job. It’s just really busy here. From that perspective it is really important to keep any trained personnel, because they’ll never find them again,” Heaton said. “The oil companies here are just desperate for employees [and] 1,000 people could go to work tomorrow.”
But for Congressional appropriators, maintaining the full workforce is “not the biggest issue,” the staffer said. “We can’t have a bunch of people down there sitting around waiting for the thing to come back online.” One solution would be to for workers who had been emplacing waste to focus on maintenance “It’s fine if you can get people to switch hard hats as a way to keep them on board until you can get back to operations. But we just can’t have people not doing anything for a year or two years or however long it’s going to be,” the staffer said.
NWP: Workforce Engaged in Recovery Effort
Maintenance work is one of the roles WIPP workers have taken since the plant shut down operations four months ago, according to managing contractor Nuclear Waste Partnership. “Currently, the workforce is fully engaged in performing surface facilities maintenance, assisting with procedure reviews and revisions, and helping with recovery activities,” NWP spokesman Donavan Mager said in a written response. “The workforce is also involved in the entries into the underground facility to determine the root cause of the event and evaluate mine conditions. Both the Department and the contractor have provided additional resources, with over 100 people assisting with the WIPP recovery effort. The Department’s focus is to complete a safe and compliant recovery of the WIPP facility and we will continue to bring in additional help as necessary.” DOE and NWP did not answer questions as to whether plans call for the full workforce to remain employed the rest of this fiscal year and during FY’15.
WIPP’s workforce management plan “ensures all WIPP employees will continue to be employed during the recovery,” Rep. Steve Pearce (R-N.M.) spokeswoman Jill McLaughlin said in a written response. “The Congressman continues to strongly support that decision. DOE must work with Congress to create a recovery plan that safely, effectively, and swiftly reopens the site, while at the same time keep its commitment to the community by protecting the dedicated and highly specialized workforce at WIPP. The Congressman will work with the delegation to do as much as he can to support DOE’s efforts.”
Heaton: WIPP Run ‘Into the Ground’
Meanwhile, crucial maintenance work continues, Heaton explained. “There are metal grate steps that rusted so badly that somebody stepped on one of the steps and went through it. Can you imagine?” He added, “The training room had no air conditioning or heating for two years. It was only at the end of last year when somebody fainted from the heat in the training room that they decided they have got some liability and they’ve better put in some air conditioning. URS has run this thing into the ground, and DOE has allowed it to happen.”
