The prime for the Department of Energy’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico has signed a construction subcontractor to keep a major ventilation project going while a new provider is selected.
Nuclear Waste Partnership said Thursday it has awarded a $3-million subcontract to Kiewit US Contractors Co. to support construction of the Safety Significant Confinement Ventilation System at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP).The project is designed to help get WIPP back to full throughput.
In late August the prime terminated a $135-million subcontract awarded to Critical Applications Alliance in November 2018 for construction of a new ventilation system. The contract was ended for government convenience, as DOE and the prime indicated they were not satisfied with the pace of progress.
In its press release, Nuclear Waste Partnership the Kiewit contract ensures continued construction of the Salt Reduction Building, concrete finish work, and procurement activity in support of the ventilation project. Omaha-based Kiewit was previously awarded a $500,000 time-and-materials contract to assist with transition efforts.
The DOE and the WIPP management contractor have said getting a replacement subcontractor lined up to finish the ventilation project is a high priority, but have not said when they expect to hire the new subcontractor.
A spokesman for the WIPP prime declined to speculate on whether Kiewit could eventually be selected as the replacement subcontractor to finish the job.
The privately-held Kiewit is one of the largest engineering and construction companies in North America, with $9 billion in revenue in 2018, according to its website. Kiewit is a major player in industries such as mining, natural gas, power plants and chemicals.
“Kiewit US Contractors Co. provides the manpower, technical expertise and capacity, quality control, and similar previous experience to support the critical effort required to keep the SSCVS project moving forward,” said Sean Dunagan, the president and project manager for the Amentum-led Nuclear Waste Partnership.
In addition to infrastructure such as the Salt Reduction Building on the surface, the project will feature the largest containment fan system among DOE facilities, Nuclear Waste Partnership said. The project will provide about 540,000 cubic feet per minute of air to the underground, significantly more than the 170,000 cubic feet per minute provided by the current ventilation setup.
As a result, the system that might start operating in 2022 could return WIPP operations to levels not seen since before a February 2014 underground radiation leak that contaminated a portion of the salt mine and forced the facility offline for about three years.
WIPP Shipments Down Sharply for 9-Month, 12-Month Periods
Shipments to WIPP in New Mexico are down more than 40% for both the first nine months of 2020, and the just-completed 2020 fiscal year, based on figures from the site’s public database.
During the first nine months of pandemic-affected 2020, WIPP received 142 shipments from DOE waste generator sites. That compares with 254 shipments during the first three quarters of 2019: a decline of roughly 44%.
During fiscal 2020, which ended Sept. 30, WIPP received 180 shipments. By comparison, during fiscal 2019, which ended Sept. 30, 2019, the facility took in 315 shipments. That reduction is close to 43%.
In September, the deep-underground salt mine received 21 shipments. This includes 11 shipments from the Idaho National Laboratory, six from the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico and four from the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California. Livermore’s shipment was the first transuranic sent to WIPP by the lab in 15 years.
Winter weather in early 2020 coupled with reduced onsite staffing during March and April due to COVID-19 restrictions have slowed operations this year, prime contractor Nuclear Waste Partnership has said previously.
About 1,000 DOE and contractor employees are typically onsite at the disposal complex, but that decreased to less than 300 during April and May when staffing was reduced in an effort to slow the spread of the coronavirus. Since the pandemic took root in the United States in January, WIPP has limited itself to no more than five shipments weekly, about half as many as during a good week of normal operations, DOE officials have said at various meetings.
There were 18 positive COVID-19 tests reported at WIPP between Oct. 8 and Oct.17, site management and operations contractor said late Tuesday. Thus far, 63 employees at WIPP have tested positive and 36 have recovered and been cleared to return to work, according to the contractor.
