DOE Inspector General Identifies Weaknesses in LANL Waste Processing
Kenneth Fletcher
WC Monitor
10/3/2014
More changes are underway at Los Alamos National Laboratory as planning begins to transition lab cleanup work from the National Nuclear Security Administration to the Department of Energy’s Office of Environmental Management. This week, the lab announced that Randy Erickson will serve as acting Associate Director of Environmental Programs after Los Alamos moved last week to relieve four cleanup managers of their duties. Erickson has been a deputy at LANL’s Chemistry, Life and Earth Sciences Directorate since January 2009. “With his 30-year experience at the Lab and his three years in Washington, DC, where he helped DOE to manage nuclear facilities and nuclear materials issues associated with the end of the Cold War, Randy understands the complexities of Los Alamos and of DOE and is well-positioned to manage important relationships while implementing DOE’s path forward to restore TRU waste operations,” LANL Director Charlie McMillan said in an Oct. 2 message to employees.
DOE announced last week that it will transition cleanup work at Los Alamos to EM’s responsibility after waste processing issues were linked to the February radiological release at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant. Waste processing at the lab is on hold as the investigation into the WIPP release continues. LANL’s cleanup program encompasses between $180 million and $220 million of work per year, including the transuranic waste efforts, groundwater cleanup and legacy sites, according to an Oct. 1 presentation by LANL WIPP Recovery Leader Terry Wallace obtained by WC Monitor. The Department is establishing two DOE/NNSA working groups to plan the transition, the LANL presentation states.
EM and the National Nuclear Security Administration will “develop a plan for the transition of legacy environmental cleanup work at the Department’s Los Alamos site from NNSA to EM,” acting EM Assistant Secretary Mark Whitney said in a message to stakeholders last week. The contract vehicle to be used for the work is still unclear, but will be addressed in a transition plan that is expected to be completed in mid-November. “This change will align the focus and accountability of the cleanup with EM and enable the Los Alamos site prime contractor, Los Alamos National Security (LANS), to continue its focus on the core national security missions at the site,” Whitney said. “EM and NNSA will work together to evaluate all elements necessary for an effective transition, including federal oversight, acquisition strategies, and quality, safety and security.”
Four LANL Cleanup Managers Leave, Erickson Acting
LANL Director Charlie McMillan last week relieved four managers of their duties in relation to the site’s waste processing problems, including Jeff Mousseau, associate director of environmental programs, Dan Cox, LANL deputy associate director of environmental programs, Kathy Johns-Hughes, Director of the LANL TRU Program, and Tori George, program director for regulatory management. For a brief time Deputy Associate Director of Environmental Programs Enrique Torres served as acting head of the department until Erickson took over this week. “As continuing Deputy Manager, Kiki Torres will provide important management oversight to ensure continued safe, secure operations and to meet key environmental program deliverables,” McMillan said.
It’s too early to tell if more management changes will occur at Los Alamos and whether cleanup workers at the lab will lose their jobs, Wallace said in the presentation. McMillan said more changes could be coming in a message to employees late last week. "It is time for us to be introspective and self-critical to ensure we fully learn from this event. In the coming days and weeks, we will be taking additional actions to ensure we address the underlying causes and strengthen our processes to prevent future upsets or events,” states the Sept. 26 message. “Understanding the breached drum at WIPP continues to be a significant challenge to the Laboratory, but I believe we have our best people working on these issues. I ask for your continued support as we work through this recovery together. This is our obligation to the community, the state, and to our national security mission.”
New Mexico Called for Transition
The transition of cleanup work at Los Alamos from NNSA oversight to management by EM comes after last month New Mexico Environment Department Secretary Ryan Flynn publicly called for such a move as a condition for reopening WIPP. NMED is “optimistic” that the move from NNSA to EM “will lead to better results,” NMED spokesman Jim Winchester said in a statement. “NMED feels EM is better equipped to handle the complexities of environmental cleanup at generator sites. NMED had been pushing DOE to make this change for a long time.”
LANL, DOE Move to Address IG Report Recommendations
Meanwhile, Los Alamos and DOE are addressing recommendations the Department’s Inspector General’s Office raised in a report finding weaknesses in LANL’s waste remediation and packaging techniques. The IG launched the investigation after a breached LANL drum in the WIPP underground was tied to the Feb. 14 release. The IG report noted that LANL did not fully consider reactivity issues between nitrate salt bearing waste and the organic absorbents and liquid acid neutralizers used to process the transuranic waste into drums and did not follow established procedures for revising its processes. This comes after NMED cited Los Alamos in July for treating some WIPP-bound waste without the proper permit—while LANL is allowed to process waste under its permit, it cannot take further steps that would be considered treating the waste.
The IG report included numerous recommendations for DOE and LANL, including ensuring that procedure changes are more thoroughly reviewed and notifying federal TRU waste program officials of such changes. “Due to the unusual circumstances of events leading up to the radiological release at WIPP, prompt and effective corrective actions are essential to ensure that LANL’s processes to change operating procedures appropriately identify the hazards associated with those changes,” the IG report states.
The NNSA concurred with all of the recommendations, and said that it and the lab are securing the remaining drums. “The events at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant have the Department’s full attention, and we have already initiated actions to address the underlying issues identified in this report and other assessments,” states a management response by NNSA Administrator Frank Klotz. “As a result of initial findings, management made the decision to pause remediation and repackaging of legacy transuranic waste in May 2014. These operations will not be resumed until there is a thorough understanding of the cause of the errors and corrective actions have been completed to prevent a recurrence, including resolution of the recommendations in this report.”
LANL and DOE had already identified many of the issues in the report, according to a Los Alamos spokesman. “The OIG report is consistent with many of the waste processing issues already identified by the Energy Department and the Lab. We will actively address the OIG’s recommendations in our continuing efforts to learn from these events and improve our operational practices,” the spokesman said in a statement. “As a precautionary measure, all nitrate salt waste at Los Alamos is stored safely and securely in steel and glass structures equipped with high efficiency particulate air filtration and fire suppression systems. The waste is visually inspected and monitored for temperature. We are committed to working cooperatively with the State of New Mexico, and will not resume the processing of legacy waste until we are certain it is safe to do so.”
