A proposed merger of two industry heavyweights, already partners on about $37 billion worth of Department of Energy nuclear-cleanup contracts, will be among the most-watched issues in 2024 for Weapons Complex Monitor.
Virginia-based Amentum plans to merge with the government contracting and cyber wings Dallas-based Jacobs, the two companies announced in October. If the deal wins the necessary antitrust and other regulatory approvals, it will create a publicly-traded, $13-billion company with about 53,000 employees.
Coming into 2024, the two companies already led prime contractor teams at six Cold War and Manhattan Project sites overseen by DOE’s Office of Environmental Management. Amentum and Jacobs also have a big footprint in the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) and Department of Defense markets. The big boys getting bigger led some rivals to bemoan the impact on competition.
Here are a few other stories likely to generate buzz in the new year:
Procurement waiting game continues. Two of the Office of Environmental Management’s largest awards remained unresolved heading into 2024. One was tied up in litigation, and the other awaited a decision by DOE.
The potential $45-billion Hanford Site Integrated Tanks contract in Washington state is being fought over in the U.S. Court of Appeals for or the Federal Circuit. It ended up there after the April 2023 award to a BWX Technologies-led group was thrown out two months later by the U.S. Court of Federal Claims. The claims court agreed with a rival bidder, led by AtkinsRéalis Nuclear, that the winner failed to stay registered with the federal online procurement tracking system.
Elsewhere in the complex, the cleanup office had yet to announce a follow-on contract winner to succeed Atkins-led Mid-America Conversion Services as provider of depleted uranium hexafluoride conversion services at the Portsmouth Site in Ohio and the Paducah Site in Kentucky. The new contract, worth up to $2.9 billion over a decade, would also cover some work at both sites now handled by Fluor-BWXT Portsmouth.
NNSA takes over as Savannah River Site landlord in South Carolina. NNSA will assume site management duties in fiscal 2025, which starts Oct. 1. Both NNSA and the Office of Environmental Management, the current landlord, expect minimal change in routine operations, although some cleanup office staff will transfer to NNSA. With the cleanup mission winding down at Savannah River, NNSA is spending more as it moves toward production of plutonium pits there.
Carbon-free power projects at DOE cleanup sites could start issuing requests for proposals this year. DOE is already asking for qualification for prospective developers of 200-megawatt electricity projects that don’t run on fossil fuels. It is part of President Joe Biden’s drive to move federal installations away from carbon-emitting power by 2030. Secretary of Energy Jennifer Granholm kicked off the Cleanup to Clean Energy program in July 2023. DOE sites are also buying more electric vehicles and chargers in an effort to curb emissions.
Safety watchdog looks to add board members, key staff. The Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board (DNFSB) is down to only two members on what is supposed to be a five-person panel. The Senate Armed Services Committed has backed Patricia Lee, a manager at Savannah River National Laboratory, to become the third member and restore a quorum. The full Senate has yet to vote on her nomination. DNFSB, which provides independent safety analysis and recommendations to DOE, also has a couple of high-level staff jobs still open.
Federal budgets continue to rely upon continuing resolutions. The current stopgap funding plan, which keeps Environmental Management near its fiscal 2023 spending level of $8.3 billion, will expire Jan. 19 without congressional action.
Big infrastructure projects move ahead. DOE and Bechtel are testing systems at the Waste Treatment and Immobilization Plant at the Hanford site. This includes making the first test glass from a non-radioactive simulant. DOE and a contractor have also pretreated 800,000 gallons of tank waste with a Tank-Side Cesium Removal pilot facility. The agency expects to start turning low-level radioactive tank waste into glass in the first half of 2025.
Elsewhere, the Integrated Waste Treatment Unit at the Idaho National Laboratory has solidified its first 68,000 gallons of sodium bearing waste. It has more than 800,000 gallons left and should soon restart after a maintenance outage.
Crews at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico should complete commissioning of a new underground ventilation system in mid-year. The Safety Significant Confinement Ventilation System should produce 540,000 cubic feet of airflow per minute, roughly triple the current level.
