ECA Update: September 30, 2016 |
IN THIS UPDATE: ECA releases September 2016 Bulletin
EM releases supporting materials from 2016 National Cleanup Workshop
Pay to Stay Coalition seeks promise of tax support from national laboratories, no matter who gets the contract
Piketon cleanup
included in stop-gap measure
DOE Advisory Board approves Draft Report on the Future of Nuclear Power
Secretary Of Defense Reviews Plutonium Operations At Los Alamos National Laboratory
DOE Extends Contract to Operate Depleted Uranium Hexafluoride Conversion Plants
ECA releases September 2016 BulletinECA
Staff September 30, 2016 The September 2016 Bulletin has been published and can be accessed here. Stories include:
- Los Alamos EM Contract Includes New Community Commitment Language
- 2nd Annual National Cleanup Workshop Focuses on Successes, Future Priorities, and Transition
- DOE Releases Draft Summary Report of Public Input on Designing Consent-Based Siting
Process
- ECA Board Begins Developing Priorities for 2017 and Beyond
- Congress, NNSA Warn of Crumbling
Infrastructure
EM releases supporting materials from 2016 National Cleanup Workshop DOE-EM September 28, 2016 WASHINGTON, D.C. – EM is making available support materials from the 2016 National Cleanup Workshop. The materials include speaker presentations, photos from the workshop and an attendee list. Links to videos of the workshop sessions will be available soon.
Approximately 600 people attended the National Cleanup Workshop, held Sept. 14-15 in Alexandria, Va. The workshop was hosted by the
Energy Communities Alliance, with DOE and the Energy Facility Contractors Group having served as cooperating organizations for the event.
The National Cleanup Workshop brought together senior DOE executives and site officials, industry executives, and other stakeholders to discuss EM's progress in the cleanup of the environmental legacy of the nation’s Manhattan Project and Cold War nuclear weapons program.
Topics discussed at this year’s workshop included major cleanup successes achieved over the course of this year; EM’s technology development program; high-level waste cleanup at Hanford and Savannah River; strengthening safety culture across the EM program; and developing a next-generation workforce.
Click here to access the supporting materials on EM's National Cleanup Workshop
webpage. Pay to Stay Coalition seeks promise of tax support from national laboratories, no matter who gets the contract Santa Fe Reporter
September 29, 2016 With the contracts for the Sandia and Los Alamos national
laboratories both in flux, the Regional Coalition of LANL Communities has approached the state Legislature to ensure that whether a nonprofit or a for-profit entity secures those contracts, the $200 million in annual gross receipts tax from lab operations continues to flow into surrounding state and local governments.
“We’re not introducing a new tax, that’s number one—this is not a new tax, and this is about continuing what our communities are able to contribute, both to infrastructure for their community members but also for the laboratory,” says Andrea Romero, executive director of the Regional Coalition of LANL Communities, which represents nine cities, counties and towns surrounding Los Alamos National Laboratory. She presented the issue to the Legislative Finance
Committee on Wednesday afternoon.
“We know this is the largest organization supplying jobs to our regional community and we obviously want to see it maintained, but also want to know that we can see this gross receipts tax as an addition to our ability to serve them and our
communities better,” she told SFR ahead of that presentation.
The coalition has drafted language for a bill Romero says she hopes to see considered as soon as the special session beginning Friday and in place well ahead of December, when Sandia’s contract should be awarded to
the next contractor with an expected start date of September 2017. A draft of the Los Alamos National Laboratory operating contract is expected early next year.
Piketon cleanup included in stop-gap measure Chillicothe
Gazette
September 29, 2016 PIKETON - Cleanup work should continue unhindered for at least the
next couple of months at the Department of Energy site in Piketon following congressional action finalized late Wednesday to keep the government up and running.
With the last day of the 2016 fiscal year hitting at midnight Friday and no agreement on a comprehensive 2017 budget in
sight, the Senate and House approved a continuing resolution to avoid a potential pending federal government shutdown by votes of 72-26 and 342-85, respectively. In order to get the temporary spending measure passed, compromises had to be reached on measures to provide aid to residents of Flint, Michigan, in response to that city's water crisis, and on aid to flood victims in Louisiana.
Funding through the continuing resolution will remain in effect through Dec. 9, by which time Congress must either have approved a 2017 budget or come to agreement on another continuing resolution to avoid a shutdown.
DOE Advisory Board approves Draft Report on the Future of Nuclear Power Lexology September 26, 2016
During its quarterly meeting on September 22, the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE’s) Secretary of Energy Advisory Board approved a Draft Report of the Task Force on Nuclear Power (Draft Report), as reported by Platts Nuclear News Flashes. The Draft Report, which has a special focus on non-light water
“advanced reactors,” now heads to Secretary Moniz for his review. In its Draft Report, the Task Force recognized that nuclear energy is vital for achieving a planetary reduction of carbon dioxide emissions, but found that two things must happen for nuclear power to remain competitive: first, the overnight cost of financing a new plant must decrease, and second, “electricity markets must recognize the value of carbon-free electricity generation based on the social cost of carbon emissions
avoided.”
According to the Task Force, the cost issue is primarily
a problem for advanced reactors; as current light water reactor designs would not require significant additional support “assuming market imperfections are resolved.” The team nonetheless acknowledged that overnight capital costs (OCCs) for light water reactors can and should come down in America, noting that while new U.S. plants have an OCC of greater than $5,000/kWh, South Korea has managed to keep such costs at $2,500/kWh. For advanced reactors, the Task Force concluded that the federal
government should launch on an aggressive program to promote the technological readiness of advanced reactors, with the program separated into four phases.
Secretary Of Defense Reviews Plutonium Operations At Los Alamos National
Laboratory Los Alamos Daily
Post September 28,
2016 U.S. Secretary of Defense, Ash Carter (center), Los Alamos National Laboratory Director Charlie McMillan (right), and Bob Webster, Principal Associate Director for Weapons Programs (left), in the pit casting area of the Laboratory's Plutonium Facility 4 (PF-4),
the nation's only plutonium science, technology and manufacturing center.
"A strong plutonium science and manufacturing capability is essential to the U.S. nuclear deterrent and cannot be underestimated," Carter said. "I want to express my sincere appreciation for the difficult and vitally important work done at Los Alamos to help assure the development, assessment and security of the nuclear
triad."
McMillan said, "The Los Alamos Plutonium Facility is a unique and essential national security capability. The Secretary’s visit provided him the opportunity to see firsthand how Los Alamos National Laboratory uses innovative science and technology to make our nation and the world a safer place." The pit casting area is where molten plutonium is shaped into a pit, the plutonium core of a nuclear
weapon.
DOE Extends Contract to Operate Depleted Uranium Hexafluoride Conversion
Plants DOE-EM September 29, 2016
LEXINGTON, Ky. – The U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Environmental Management (EM) today announced it is extending its
contract for Operations of Depleted Uranium Hexafluoride (DUF6) Conversion Facilities at Paducah, Kentucky and Portsmouth, Ohio for a period of up to four months.
The contract period for the current contractor, BWXT Conversion Services LLC (BWCS), had been scheduled to expire on September 30, 2016. The contract was previously extended non-competitively for a period of nine months to accommodate the
competitive procurement process for a new DUF6 Operations contract and to avoid interruption of services. This additional non-competitive contract extension, valued at approximately $35.8 million, is intended to accommodate DOE’s transition to the new contract without interruptions of ongoing services.
|
|
| October 2016 | | 6 | DOE-EM Site Specific Advisory Board Meeting in Piketon, OH
|
|
| October 2016 | | 11-13 | Energy, Technology and Environmental Business Association's Business Opportunities Conference in Knoxville, TN
|
|
| October
2016 | | 13 | DOE-EM Business Opportunity Forum in Knoxville, TN |
|
| October 2016 | | 15 | DOE-EM Site Specific Advisory Board Meeting in Paducha, KY
|
|
| October 2016 | | 20 | DOE-EM Site
Specific Advisory Board Meeting in Paducha, KY |
|
| November 2016 | | 16-18 | INVITATION ONLY 2016 Intergovernmental Meeting with DOE in New
Orleans, LA |
|
Find the most recent ECA Bulletin here |
|
