Because of COVID-19, the management and operations contractor for two of the National Nuclear Security Administration’s (NNSA) nuclear weapon-production sites may not know until June whether it will be kept on the job into 2023 and what fee it earned last year.
“Due to the ongoing COVID-19 national emergency, the contractor notification date for the CNS [Consolidated Nuclear Security] FY 2019 Performance Evaluation Report (PER) and fee determination letter has been extended,” an agency spokesperson said by email Tuesday. “At this time, NNSA has not made any determination on whether or not to exercise Option II Term on the CNS Contract.”
The decision on the two-year option is delayed until June 30, at the latest, from March 31, the NNSA spokesperson wrote. The option would extend CNS through Sept. 30, 2023. The NNSA picked up the contract’s first two-year option in 2018, keeping the Bechtel-led team on the job through Sept. 30, 2021.
Asked why the COVID-19 pandemic has delayed the decision on CNS’ option, an NNSA spokesperson said, “[t]he review requires input from senior leaders whose focus has been on keeping our workforce safe while maintaining mission-critical operations during a national emergency.”
Consolidated Nuclear Security has managed the Pantex Plant in Amarillo, Texas, and the Y-12 National Security Complex in Oak Ridge, Tenn., under a single contract since 2014. Pantex assembles and disassembles all U.S. nuclear weapons for maintenance, modernization, and dismantlement, while Y-12 makes the uranium-fueled secondary stages for nuclear weapons. Teams led by BWX Technologies previously managed the sites under separate contracts.
The CNS contract is worth roughly $2 billion annually. The contract’s five-year base was worth more than $7.8 billion.
The vendor has been criticized since picking up NNSA Production Office contract for failing to deliver on promised cost savings. The NNSA put the two sites under one contract in hopes of saving hundreds of millions over dollars over the contract’s 10-year life by combining administrative and financial reporting systems at the two plants. Although Congress has asked, the agency has not quantified how much money this move has saved to date. However, the NNSA’s annual performance reviews have regularly dinged CNS for failure to clearly report the savings it has realized.
Meanwhile, both Y-12 and Pantex have confirmed cases of COVID-19: Y-12 at least two — CNS has confirmed several — and Pantex at least one.
Morgan Smith, CNS’ chief executive officer, left quarantine Tuesday after learning a symptomatic individual he’d had contact with tested negative for COVID-19. The longtime defense-nuclear manager was working from home while monitoring for symptoms of the respiratory disease.
