Key testing has wrapped up for the Salt Waste Processing Facility (SWPF) at the Savannah River Site in South Carolina, bringing the $2.3 billion plant closer to its anticipated startup in the first quarter of 2020.
Parsons, the U.S. Department of Energy contractor that built the SWPF and is readying it for operations, announced Wednesday that it successfully completed the facility’s design capacity performance test on Sept. 30. That was the plant’s most realistic dry run, using simulated radiological chemicals and mock controls to demonstrate operations.
“This is truly a major accomplishment for Parsons and the Department of Energy, demonstrating the performance of the plant, our processes and our people,” Frank Sheppard, Parsons’ SWPF project manager, said in a press release. “The facility ran at full capacity for almost 10 days without any major issues and performed exactly as it was designed.”
The Savannah River Site, near Aiken, S.C. stores about 35 million gallons of radioactive liquid waste Cold War-era waste tanks. About 90 percent of that volume, or 31.5 million gallons, is salt waste and the rest is sludge. The SWPF is intended to process at least 7.3 million gallons of liquid salt waste per year, removing its cesium and transferring that material to the nearby Defense Waste Processing Facility for further processing with the sludge. The remaining salt waste will be stored permanently on-site.
With the performance test completed, Parsons will prepare a report for the Energy Department that will detail how efficiently the facility processed material during the mock run.
Parsons completed construction of the 140,000-square-foot Salt Waste Processing Facility in June 2016. At that time, DOE and its contractor were shooting for a December 2018 startup, but pushed that projection back one year as the date drew closer.
Last month, Parsons confirmed the updated goal of December 2019 had also been delayed to the first quarter of 2020. The company did not offer a specific reason for the most recent pushback, but equipment issues from 2018 contributed to the delay. They included a malfunctioning valve controller that required Parsons to replace 460 valves used to control a wide array of functions at SWPF.
Regardless, both the agency and the contractor believe the facility will begin operations well ahead of January 2021, the actual deadline in their 2002 contract.
Over the past two years, DOE and Parson have been at odds about the contractor’s performance on the project. In March 2018, the agency accused Parsons of a “deteriorating” work performance, including employees failing to adequately follow safety protocols and the company’s replacement of key personnel without proper federal approval. In a response the following month, Parsons said DOE had mischaracterized its performance. The parties agreed Parsons would submit an updated baseline that includes costs and schedules for SWPF startup. That schedule has been approved, but neither party would provide details.
In March of this year, the Energy Department told Parsons it would have to pay $33 million in disincentive fees due to missed deadlines and overspending at SWPF. The contractor fought back, stating it had to postpone target dates for various milestones due to unforeseen equipment issues that DOE was not considering.
Regarding the disincentive fees, Parsons told Weapons Complex Monitor that DOE paid the company back pay for work Parsons had previously conducted. The company would not say how much or what terms of the contract were violated.
