Consolidated Nuclear Security (CNS) this week resumed casting enriched uranium at the World War II-vintage Building 9212 at the Y-12 National Security Complex in Oak Ridge, Tenn., a company spokesperson said Thursday.
Casting was offline for about two-and-a-half months after an unspecified quantity of fissile material leaked into machinery at the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA)-owned plant.
Workers halted all casting operations in Building 9212 on March 28 after discovering “small quantities of enriched uranium in process equipment,” the CNS spokesperson said in April after the incident became public. Personnel removed the uranium from the bottom of 9212’s casting furnaces shortly after they discovered the material, according to the company.
Casting furnaces at Building 9212 melt enriched uranium so it can be molded into shapes that fit into nuclear weapons and reactors, including those that power naval warships.
Consolidated Nuclear Security has declined to comment about the operations interrupted by the nearly two-month pause, but said Thursday that 9212 has returned to full throughput.
The Bechtel-led CNS, prime contractor for Y-12 and the NNSA’s Pantex Plant in Texas, is building the Uranium Processing Facility to replace Building 9212. The new facility is slated to be finished by Dec. 31, 2025, and cost no more than $6.5 billion to construct, the NNSA has said.
