Expanding on its decision last week to deny a protest of the Department of Energy’s most recent cleanup contract at the Oak Ridge Site, the Government Accountability Office said this week that the agency properly vetted a Veolia-led team’s proposal and took into consideration the team’s relevant past experience with cleanup jobs.
The agency’s evaluation was reasonable and followed standards set out in the solicitation, according to a redacted decision made public Monday, after the Government Accountability Office (GAO) on Friday denied Oak Ridge Environmental Partners’ protest of DOE’s decision to award the potentially decade-long $8.3 billion contract to Amentum-led United Cleanup Oak Ridge.
“In sum, while OREP [Oak Ridge Environmental Partners] quibbles with the overall summary level ratings for its past performance references, it fails to advance any credible objections to DOE’s detailed underlying findings,” the GAO said. “On balance, the record demonstrates that the agency carefully evaluated the protester’s past performance references, reasonably found that those references only included some of the size, scope, and complexity of the ORCC [Oak Ridge Cleanup Contract],” GAO held.
Oak Ridge Environmental Partners includes Veolia (VNS Federal Services), NorthStar Facility and Site Services and Parsons Government Services, according to the GAO decision. The winning team of Amentum, Jacobs and Honeywell scored better than the challenger on key personnel, past performance, management approach and price, GAO said.
The Veolia-led group claimed the DOE analysis did not properly evaluate the team’s past performance. The group submitted 15 past performance references, three each for Veolia, NorthStar and Parsons and two each for a trio of teaming subcontractors.
A DOE source evaluation board evaluated nine of the references as relevant in terms of size, scope, and complexity. But it found the other six were not similar enough to the Oak Ridge Site work to be considered.
The DOE received five proposals that bid on the initial tasks in the indefinite-delivery/indefinite- quantity contract, with the bids ranging from $205.6 million to $213.2 million submitted by the Veolia-led group. The winner submitted a bid of $210.7 million. GAO did not identify the other three bidders in its decision.
The DOE selection group rated the new UCOR’s key personnel as “outstanding” compared with “good” for Oak Ridge Environmental Partners. In addition, UCOR members had a good rating on past performance and management approach, while the bid challenge was deemed “satisfactory” in both categories.
The 12-page document denying the protest was signed by GAO’s general counsel Edda Emmanuelli Perez.
