Savannah River Nuclear Solutions took home $13.1 million in fiscal 2017 fees for the nuclear-weapon work it manages for the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) at the Savannah River Site in South Carolina.
That was roughly 84 percent of the total available $15.7 million fee for the budget year that ended on Sept. 30 of last year. Among other operations, Savannah River Nuclear Solutions (SRNS) oversees tritium extraction for U.S. warheads. Tritium gas increases the potency of nuclear explosions.
The NNSA shaved a little off the award fee because “[i]n early 2017, SRNS experienced multiple operational events and failed to effectively manage the safety basis requirements for the Tritium Facilities,” according to the performance evaluation report for SRNS dated Nov. 8 and posted Thursday on the NNSA website.
SRNS also netted just shy of $1.9 million of the available $2 million in fees for work scored according to guidelines from the Department of Energy’s Office of Environmental Management: the Cold War nuclear-cleanup branch that manages the company’s management and operations contract for the Savannah River Site. The 10-year pact is set to expire July 31, and the Department of Energy has yet to start a competition for a follow-on, or announce an extension for SRNS.
The NNSA recognized SRNS for taking the lead on developing a cost estimate informed by multiple agency sites for a new approach to dispose of 34 metric tons of surplus weapon-grade plutonium that was originally to be turned into commercial reactor fuel at Savannah River. This major nonproliferation effort was part of an arms-control pact with Russia finalized in 2010 after a decade of negotiations.
The plutonium was supposed to be converted into fuel at the Mixed Oxide Fuel Fabrication Facility CB&I AREVA MOX Services is building at Savannah River under a separate NNSA contract. However, the Barack Obama administration sought to cancel the mixed oxide facility and instead use Savannah River’s H-Canyon chemicals separations facility to dilute the metal for underground disposal at the government’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico.
The Donald Trump administration also wants to cancel the Mixed Oxide Fuel Fabrication Facility, though Congress has yet to embrace that plan.
