The new liquid waste contractor at the Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site in South Carolina is taking charge of the Salt Waste Processing Facility, an agency spokesperson confirmed Monday.
The transition to BWX Technologies-led Savannah River Mission Completion from Parsons Government Services, which built and started up the Salt Waste Processing Facility (SWPF), began Monday March 28, the DOE spokesperson said via email.
Parsons’ $2.3-billion contract for design, construction and commissioning ended Sunday, the spokesperson said following an inquiry from Weapons Complex Monitor. Under the terms of its contract, Parsons ran the plant for a year before handing it over to the waste contractor.
The SWPF has processed more than 466,000 gallons of waste since resuming operations Feb. 11, the spokesperson said. After being shut down last week for “routine chemical process cleaning,” it should restart later this week, the spokesperson added. A combination of operational and technical safety concerns kept the SWPF offline between October and February but the plant works, DOE and contractor managers say.
Savannah River Mission Completion, which also includes partners Amentum and Fluor, took over liquid waste management at the Savannah River Site at the end of February. The contract could be worth up to $21 billion over 10 years.
The SWPF, considered by DOE as crucial to emptying waste tanks at Savannah River over the next 10 years, employs a two-step process to separate highly radioactive waste from the less-radioactive salt solution. First, it removes strontium and actinides, such as uranium and plutonium. Secondly it uses caustic side solvent extraction to remove radioactive cesium.
Once the separation is done, the concentrated high-activity waste is moved to the site’s Defense Waste Processing Facility where it is converted into a stable glass form for eventual disposal offsite. The salt solution is grouted and ends up in onsite Saltstone Disposal Units, according to DOE.
