Group items tagged

DOE announced today that Savannah River Remediation, a limited-liability group headed by URS, won a liquid-waste contract valued at about $3.3 billion. The contract takes effect April 1, 2009 and has a base of six years, with a potential for two more years. The team consists of URS Washington Division; Babcock & Wilcox Technical Services; Bechtel National; CH2M Hill; and AREVA Federal Services. Designated subcontractors include EnergySolutions Federal EPC and Washington Safety Management Solutions.

Bechtel Power Corp has won the contract to design and consult on Egypt's first nuclear power plant, Electricity Minister Hassan Ahmed Younes said on Monday. The contract, with a price tag of 1 billion Egyptian pounds ($180 million), is for 10 years, Younes told a news conference called to announce the winner in the tender. ($1 = 5.5162 Egyptian pounds)

AIKEN - The U.S. Energy Department has finalized a $2.7 billion contract with a French company to build a South Carolina plant where weapons-grade plutonium will be converted into commercial reactor fuel, the company announced today. The modified contract allows Shaw Areva MOX Services to complete construction of the facility at the Savannah River nuclear complex near Aiken, said Shaw spokesman Sean Clancy. The facility for converting weapons-grade plutonium into a mixed-oxide fuel to be burned in commercial nuclear power reactors would be the first of its kind in the U.S

PLYMOUTH - Entergy Corp. plans to bar roughly 250 Pilgrim nuclear power plant workers from the site if a new contract agreement can't be reached by the time their current contract expires at the end of the day Thursday. The Utility Workers Union of America Local 369 plans to hold a vote Wednesday in Plymouth that would give the Braintree-based union's negotiators the authority to go on strike at the Entergy plant.

USEC and Techsnabexport, or Tenex, have agreed to amend the pricing methodology used for the final years of the US-Russia high-enriched uranium agreement, USEC said in a February 20 filing with the US Securities and Exchange Commission. USEC estimated that under the new methodology, the total amount Russia receives under the 20-year contract, which expires at the end of 2013, "will substantially exceed $8 billion." In a filing a year ago, USEC said the contract allows adjustments to be made after 2007 to ensure that Tenex "receives at least approximately $7.6 billion." USEC also said, "We do not expect that any adjustments will be required." The contract covers the so-called SWU component of the low-enriched uranium produced from the downblending of HEU from Russian nuclear weapons. The amendment applies to deliveries in the years 2010-2013. The amendment must be approved by the US and Russian governments, USEC said. USEC and Tenex are their governments' executive agents for the HEU agreement.

The Ukrainian Enerhoatom nuclear power generating company and the Russian TVEL Corporation have signed contracts on supplies of nuclear fuel to Ukrainian nuclear power plants in 2009. Ukrainian News learned this from a joint statement by Enerhoatom and the TVEL Corporation. According to the statement, a part of the nuclear fuel will be made from Ukrainian uranium. The statement reads that the Enerhoatom nuclear power generating company and the TVEL Corporation are intending to sign a long-term contract on supplies of nuclear fuel to the Ukrainian nuclear power plants after 2010.

Japan's Toshiba Corp. said Wednesday it had won a contract to build two nuclear plants in the United States that are scheduled to start generating power in 2016. It is the first such contract a Japanese company has won overseas, covering the projects entirely from engineering and procurement to construction of the nuclear plants, the company said. Under the contract, Toshiba America Nuclear Energy Corp., a US-based Toshiba subsidiary, will build two Advanced Boiling Water Reactor (ABWR) nuclear power plants in Texas.

Jordan and the United States have signed a contract for the construction of a modern central storage facility (CSF) for radioactive waste at the Jordan Atomic Energy Commission ((JAEC) in Amman. JAEC Nuclear Fuel Cycle Commissioner Ned Xoubi and Daniel Rutherford, contract manager at the US Department of Energy's Pacific Northwest National Laboratory signed the agreement in Washington, DC last week, according to a statement released by the Jordanian embassy in the US. Under the contract agreement, the US Department of Energy will provide the JAEC with $370,000 for the construction of the advanced storage facility. Expected to be completed later this year, the storage facility will host Jordan's radioactive waste and nuclear sources in a safe and secure environment for the next five decades.

Legislative leaders have put Entergy Nuclear on notice that if they don't have the terms of a possible new Vermont Yankee power contract by next week, it is next to impossible for the Legislature to take up Yankee's re-licensing this year. "We're all tremendously frustrated," said Sen. Peter Shumlin, D-Windham, president pro tem of the Senate, who sent the letter to Entergy Nuclear officials along with House Speaker Shapleigh Smith earlier this week. The two leaders set a deadline of Feb. 18 to receive details of a power contract. So far, Entergy Nuclear has said that it doesn't plan on entering into a special power contract with Central Vermont Public Service Corp. and Green Mountain Power, relying on the company's revenue sharing agreement for the state's main financial incentive.

The UAE denied last night that it was days away from awarding the largest ever energy contract in the Middle East for the development of a nuclear power plant. The denial was issued after industry sources said that the UAE was on the verge of naming a winner for the contract to build at least four reactors, which consultancy Eurasia Group estimates may cost as much as $40 billion (BD15bn). The consortium from France, which includes nuclear group Areva, GdF Suez, and Total, is in pole position to win the contract, sources said.

AREVA (Paris:CEI) has signed today a contract* to supply 40 MOX fuel assemblies for unit 2 of the Shimanenuclear power plant, owned and operated by Japanese utility Chugoku EPCo. Under the terms of the contract, the fuel will be fabricated at AREVA`s MELOX plant in southern France, using plutonium recovered from the treatment operations performed at AREVA`s La Hague plant, thereby recycling it to be used in Japan as MOX fuel.

A contract foreman with Columbia's Westinghouse nuclear fuel plant has been fired and the company cited by federal regulators after inspectors found that the foreman falsified safety records at the Bluff Road facility. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission announced a settlement Friday with Westinghouse in which the company said it will improve oversight of contractors hired to work the plant. It also agreed to an assessment of how well company employees are trained to investigate wrongdoing. Company spokesman Jackie McCoy said the contract foreman had been relieved of his duties, but she declined to name the person. She said the contract foreman oversaw fewer than 10 employees at the plant, near the Congaree River south of Interstate 77. Westinghouse Electric Co.'s 550,000-square-foot plant, one of the few of its kind in the United States, makes fuel rods for nuclear power stations across the country. The Bluff Road factory is one of the Columbia area's largest employers, with more than 1,000 workers.

The Department of Energy needs to improve oversight after a contractor at Hanford was allowed to approve federal funding on behalf of DOE for its own contract, according to an audit by the Department of Energy Office of Inspector General. The audit also said that in some cases the contractor was allowed to prepare statements of work, which established DOE's requirement for work to be performed under its contract. The DOE Hanford Office of River Protection, or ORP, already has made some changes after recognizing that oversight of Project Assistance Corp. was weak before the Office of Inspector General began its investigation. DOE issued a blanket purchase agreement to Project Assistance Corp. in 2003 for project management, risk assessment, program assessment, quality assurance, safety, cost and schedule estimating, budgeting and finance, and engineering. Annual costs of the contract have increased from $4.7 million in 2005 to $9.2 million in 2008.

Salt Lake City-based EnergySolutions Inc. said Tuesday it has won a $19.2 million contract to clean up a U.S. Energy Department test facility in upstate New York, the Energy Separation Process Research Unit. URS Corp., which awarded the contract, will help perform the work. The job includes sorting, packaging, loading, rail transport and treatment, as well as disposal of soil, debris and mixed waste. Work will begin immediately, and the project will take an estimated 24 months.

South Korea signed a US$20 billion deal with the United Arab Emirates to build four nuclear power plants in the oil-rich country, a deal expected to generate contracts for South Korean companies worth an additional $20 billion for decades to come, South Korea's presidential office said Sunday. The agreement marks South Korea's first nuclear power plant export deal. The biggest energy deal contracted ever either by South Korea or UAE was signed by a consortium led by South Korea's state-run Korea Electric Power Corp. and Emirates Nuclear Energy Corp. shortly after a summit between South Korean President Lee Myung-bak and his UAE counterpart Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan here.

South Korea signed a US$20 billion deal with the United Arab Emirates to build four nuclear power plants in the oil-rich country, a deal expected to generate contracts for South Korean companies worth an additional $20 billion for decades to come, South Korea's presidential office said Sunday. The agreement marks South Korea's first nuclear power plant export deal. The biggest energy deal contracted ever either by South Korea or UAE was signed by a consortium led by South Korea's state-run Korea Electric Power Corp. and Emirates Nuclear Energy Corp. shortly after a summit between South Korean President Lee Myung-bak and his UAE counterpart Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan here.

Korea signed a US$20 billion deal with the United Arab Emirates to build four nuclear power plants in the oil-rich country, a deal expected to generate contracts for South Korean companies worth an additional $20 billion for decades to come, South Korea's presidential office said Sunday. The agreement marks South Korea's first nuclear power plant export deal.

The Tarapur Atomic Power Station - which has since long been on the radar of terrorist organisations - has been shaken by a security breach. Two contract workers managed to steal two computers from the site, and even got them past the first security point of the nuclear plant, which is guarded by over 300 Central Industrial Security Force (CISF) personnel. The accused, Prashant More and Amit Shelke, were nabbed when they failed to give a satisfactory reply at the second security post. More and Shelke worked for Sharma Engineering, a company that has been awarded a maintenance contract for the piping in the core area of the 320 Mw thermal power plant.

The Tarapur Atomic Power Station - which has since long been on the radar of terrorist organisations - has been shaken by a security breach. Two contract workers managed to steal two computers from the site, and even got them past the first security point of the nuclear plant, which is guarded by over 300 Central Industrial Security Force (CISF) personnel. The accused, Prashant More and Amit Shelke, were nabbed when they failed to give a satisfactory reply at the second security post. More and Shelke worked for Sharma Engineering, a company that has been awarded a maintenance contract for the piping in the core area of the 320 Mw thermal power plant.

An internal U.S. Dept. of Energy (DOE) study details how managers at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) shifted costs to understate total spending on the controversial National Ignition Facility (NIF) mega-laser. The previously secret document, released today by the nuclear watchdog group Tri-Valley CAREs, pegs the current hidden costs of NIF at $80 million annually. "Livermore Lab is systematically disguising the true costs of the NIF," charged Tri-Valley CAREs' executive director, Marylia Kelley. "When calculated over the life of the project, these hidden costs total more than $2 billion." Kelley continued, "This illegal scheme circumvents the United States Congress, which sets NIF's budget each year, and violates our nation's most basic federal contracting laws." According to the report by the DOE National Nuclear Security Administration Office of Field Financial Management (OFFM), Livermore Lab's practice of assigning NIF overhead expenses to other Lab programs violates Public Law 100-679 Cost Accounting Standards (CAS). This law is an integral part of the structure set up to regulate government contracts. Some of the NIF fee reductions date back to 2001. The OFFM investigators noted that the misleading cost accounting, "materially misstates the actual costs by LLNL for the NIF/National Ignition Campaign... and may result in an undercapitalization of the NIF/NIC's total project costs."

An internal U.S. Dept. of Energy (DOE) study details how managers at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) shifted costs to understate total spending on the controversial National Ignition Facility (NIF) mega-laser. The previously secret document, released today by the nuclear watchdog group Tri-Valley CAREs, pegs the current hidden costs of NIF at $80 million annually. "Livermore Lab is systematically disguising the true costs of the NIF," charged Tri-Valley CAREs' executive director, Marylia Kelley. "When calculated over the life of the project, these hidden costs total more than $2 billion." Kelley continued, "This illegal scheme circumvents the United States Congress, which sets NIF's budget each year, and violates our nation's most basic federal contracting laws." According to the report by the DOE National Nuclear Security Administration Office of Field Financial Management (OFFM), Livermore Lab's practice of assigning NIF overhead expenses to other Lab programs violates Public Law 100-679 Cost Accounting Standards (CAS). This law is an integral part of the structure set up to regulate government contracts. Some of the NIF fee reductions date back to 2001. The OFFM investigators noted that the misleading cost accounting, "materially misstates the actual costs by LLNL for the NIF/National Ignition Campaign... and may result in an undercapitalization of the NIF/NIC's total project costs."

"An estimated 5,600 tons of nickel is being relocated to prepare for the upcoming demolition of the K-33 building in Oak Ridge. LATA-Sharp of Westerville, Ohio, recently won a $51 million contract to demolish 1.4 million-square-foot building at the East Tennessee Technology Park. The large inventory of radioactive nickel is a Cold War legacy of the uranium-enrichment operations. It was extracted from equipment by BNFL Inc., which decommissioned three of the process buildings - including K-33 - as part of a late-1990s contract with the Department of Energy's Oak Ridge office. Under the original terms of the contract, BNFL was to take ownership of the nickel and other potentially valuable metals as partial payment for the cleanup work. The company planned to recycle the metals to remove the radioactive constituents and then resell the metal on the commercial market."

According to the newspaper Expressen, the Swedish power company Vattenfall has signed a binding commitment stating that they have unlimited financial responsibility for the costs in case there would be an accident in one of their nuclear power plants in Germany, something the company denied last week. The storm around Vattenfall continues. Expressen writes that Vattenfall has claimed that the contract can be singlehandedly broken by Vattenfall at any time. Expressen has however read a copy of the contract and after consulting juridical expertise they claim it can not be broken during a five year period from the signing in June this year. This means that the whole company could go bankrupt in case of such an accident.

According to the newspaper Expressen, the Swedish power company Vattenfall has signed a binding commitment stating that they have unlimited financial responsibility for the costs in case there would be an accident in one of their nuclear power plants in Germany, something the company denied last week. The storm around Vattenfall continues. Expressen writes that Vattenfall has claimed that the contract can be singlehandedly broken by Vattenfall at any time. Expressen has however read a copy of the contract and after consulting juridical expertise they claim it can not be broken during a five year period from the signing in June this year. This means that the whole company could go bankrupt in case of such an accident.

We drive by its headquarters near Ohio State University, attend events in the hall named for it in the Columbus Convention Center and go to the park that bears its name, but few of us know what Battelle really does. The research institute's stock in trade has always been smarts. The company that opened in Columbus in 1929 as Battelle Memorial Institute brought the world Xerox copiers, compact discs and the coating for M&M's. But it's what we don't hear about -- the hundreds of contracts for national security, energy and health research -- that drives its revenue to new heights. Battelle grew its annual revenue from $921 million in 1998 to $4.6 billion last year by winning contracts to manage seven national laboratories, boosting its national-security work and focusing a lot of research power on energy and health science.