Wrap Up: Trump taps Gil to lead DOE science; House member plugs RECA; Vandy lands DOE research grant

President-elect Donald Trump this week announced Darío Gil, a senior vice president at IBM, is his pick to be Department of Energy undersecretary of science in the incoming administration.

The Office of Science, which supports DOE’s national laboratories, was the administrative stovepipe for DOE’s Office of Environmental Management during the first Trump term. Science, like other undersecretary posts, requires Senate confirmation. In social media posts  Thursday Trump called Gill a “brilliant businessman and scientist.”

A 21-year veteran of IBM, Gil served on a national council of science advisers during the first Trump tenure, Greenwire reported Thursday. “Mr. President, thank you for the honor of being nominated to be Under Secretary for Science at the Department of Energy,” Gil said Thursday on his LinkedIn page. “This office is the largest federal sponsor of basic research in the physical sciences, and through its world-leading network of national laboratories, it tackles some of the most inspirational and aspirational challenges we pursue as a Nation.”

Rep. Nikki Budzinski (D-Ill.) this week called upon Congress to expand the Radiation Exposure Compensation Act to include more people made sick by their work to process uranium and thorium for the nation’s nuclear weapons program.

Budzinski and local officials gathered at a former Dow Chemical factory in Venice, Ill, Monday Jan. 13 to promote expansion of the Radiation Exposure Compensation Act (RECA), which was not acted upon by the House of Representatives in the last Congress, although it did pass the Senate. Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) and others have pushed reauthorization and expansion of the legislation.

“For decades, local families have endured serious health problems caused by the toxic legacy left behind from this factory,” Budzinski said in a Monday press release. “Despite this, they’ve had to face overwhelming financial and medical challenges without any federal assistance.”

Vanderbilt University in Nashville is receiving a $37.5 million nuclear cleanup research grant from the Department of Energy Office of Environmental Management, the agency announced Thursday.

The non-competitive five-year grant runs through Jan. 16, 2030, according to the Environmental Management office press release. The grant calls for Vanderbilt to team up with other U.S. colleges and universities to seek more risked-based and cost-effective means of cleaning up environmental contamination remaining from the U.S. nuclear weapons program.