The contractor for legacy cleanup at the Energy Department’s Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico, Newport News Nuclear BWXT-Los Alamos (N3B), has hired a subcontractor to remove telephone poles, old fences, and tons of concrete from Technical Area 21.
The $1.5 million contract was awarded to a team of Montana-based Envirocon and Los Alamos-based TerranearPMC, N3B said Tuesday.
Technical Area 21 was the site of chemical research for refining plutonium and related work at LANL from the 1940s until the 1970s.
In addition to disposing of hundreds of tons of concrete from an old concrete crusher and other abandoned equipment, the subcontractors will also remove rebar and decontaminate some gear, including excavators, for reuse. A new perimeter fence will be installed.
In a press release, N3B said its workers have been removing vegetation from the site before the subcontractor team starts its assignment in November. Removal of the above-ground debris near the light-industrial area of Los Alamos is supposed to be finished in April 2019.
“The TerranearPMC/Envirocon team is a welcome partner in the restart of cleanup work at TA-21,” Joe Legare, who manages the environmental remediation program for N3B, said in the press release. “The safe and disciplined remediation of TA-21 is an important priority for the entire Los Alamos community.”
TerranearPMC did similar work around the DOE facility for the prior environmental management contractor, Los Alamos National Security. That joint venture is also wrapping up its tenure as the lab’s management and operations contractor.
Newport News Nuclear BWXT-Los Alamos expects to issue another Technical Area 21 subcontract in early 2019 for removal of old underground industrial waste lines and teardown of a processing facility for radioactive liquids.
The N3B venture began its $1.38 billion, 10-year legacy cleanup contract at Los Alamos in April.
