Y-12 National Security Complex (Submitted photo)
A second protest has been filed challenging the federal decision to award a five-year contract to Consolidated Nuclear Security LLC to manage and operate the Y-12 National Security Complex in Oak Ridge and Pantex Plant near Amarillo, Texas.
The second protest was filed Jan. 25 by Integrated Nuclear Production Solutions LLC.
The first was filed Jan. 17 by Nuclear Production Partners LLC, a team led by Babcock and Wilcox.
Originally scheduled to open two hours late, the Anderson County Courthouse is closed today due to the winter storm that dropped a sheet of ice on local homes, driveways, and roads Thursday night.
Schools in Oak Ridge, Clinton, and Anderson and Roane counties are closed. The Y-12 National Security Complex has restricted access to essential employees, and Oak Ridge municipal offices are scheduled to open at noon.
The U.S. Department of Energy Oak Ridge Office announced that it had delayed its opening until 10 a.m. for employees of the Oak Ridge Office, Oak Ridge National Laboratory Site Office, Oak Ridge Environmental Management Site Office, Oak Ridge Nuclear Energy Site Office, and Office of Scientific and Technical Information.
Oak Ridge National Laboratory researchers developed a nanoporous solid electrolyte (bottom left and in detail on right) from a solvated precursor (top left). The material conducts ions 1,000 times faster than its natural bulk form and enables more energy-dense lithium ion batteries. (Submitted photo)
Looking toward improved batteries for charging electric cars and storing energy from renewable but intermittent solar and wind, scientists at Oak Ridge National Laboratory have developed the first high-performance, nanostructured solid electrolyte for more energy-dense lithium ion batteries.
Today’s lithium-ion batteries rely on a liquid electrolyte, the material that conducts ions between the negatively charged anode and positive cathode. But liquid electrolytes often entail safety issues because of their flammability, especially as researchers try to pack more energy in a smaller battery volume. Building batteries with a solid electrolyte, as ORNL researchers have demonstrated, could overcome these safety concerns and size constraints.
Work crews demolish the last section of the North End of the historic K-25 Building in Oak Ridge on Wednesday. K-25 was built to enrich uranium during World War II and was once the world’s largest building under one roof.
Work crews demolished the last section of the North End of the historic K-25 Building in Oak Ridge on Wednesday morning.
Workers used a giant, orange demolition machine known as a high reach shear to bring down the four-story building, once the world’s largest under one roof. At times, the shear resembled a large dinosaur as its massive black jaws bit into the building’s 67-year-old skeleton.
Reporters, officials, and workers watched on a clear but chilly East Tennessee morning as the high reach shear sliced through vertical steel columns and tugged at horizontal beams. After about 20 minutes, the North End crashed to the ground. So did any dreams of preserving it that might have remained.
The proposed Uranium Processing Facility at the Y-12 National Security Complex. (Image courtesy of B&W Y-12)
The following is an edited version of a question-and-answer session with John Eschenberg, federal project director for the proposed Uranium Processing Facility at the Y-12 National Security Complex. Federal officials said last fall that the UPF could be larger than originally planned to make sure all the building’s equipment fits inside.
Q: What is the status of the UPF redesign?
A: UPF is currently at 66 percent of design completion. Once 90 percent design completion is achieved, we will submit a Critical Decision-2 (CD-2) package to headquarters for approval that will contain the complete cost and schedule baseline for UPF. This process, which involves both an independent cost estimate and an external independent review, will likely take several weeks to complete.
The cost range for UPF is unchanged: $4.2 billion-$6.5 billion.
The Joe L. Evins Federal Building in Oak Ridge, one of the U.S. Department of Energy sites to be guarded under a $182 million protective force services contract announced Thursday.
Federal officials announced Thursday that they have awarded a $182 million contract to protect U.S. Department of Energy sites in Oak Ridge, including the East Tennessee Technology Park, the Oak Ridge National Laboratory, the Joe L. Evins Federal Building, and the rest of the Oak Ridge Reservation, not including the Y-12 National Security Complex.
The five-year contract was awarded to National Strategic Protective Services LLC, or NSPS.
“We are pleased to welcome NSPS as a part of the Department of Energy team in Oak Ridge,” said Larry Kelly, Oak Ridge Office manager. “We evaluated the proposals and it was clear to us that NSPS is the right company for this difficult and important job.”
NSPS will replace WSI Oak Ridge, which has provided protective force services in Oak Ridge since 2000.
Note: This story was updated at 12:42 p.m. Jan. 15.
Three experts have recommended that guard forces be federalized at federal sites where bomb-grade uranium is stored, according to a nonprofit watchdog organization based in Washington, D.C.
Peter Stockton, senior investigator at the Project On Government Oversight, said U.S. Secretary of Energy Steven Chu asked the experts—Norm Augustine, C. Donald Alston, and Richard Meserve—to review the physical security of the entire nuclear weapons complex after the July 28 security breach at the Y-12 National Security Complex in Oak Ridge.
Note: This is a copy of a letter sent to Oak Ridge Mayor Tom Beehan and Oak Ridge City Council members, among others.
Dear Mayor Beehan,
Next Monday evening you will begin considering a major increase in the Oak Ridge city debt to finance the sewer upgrade project. This increase and the associated utility rate increases:
Hospital staff members and federal workers and contractors will celebrate Martin Luther King Jr. Day in two separate events on Wednesday, Jan. 16, and Monday, Jan. 21.
The U.S. Department of Energy Oak Ridge Office has its annual event Wednesday morning at the American Museum of Science and Energy.
The program is titled “50 Years Later: The Evolution of the Dream.” It’s scheduled from 10:30-11:30 a.m. Wednesday, and it’s open to the public.
We are only a few days into 2013 and most of us have discovered that we will have to make do with less this year. Before January ends, Oak Ridgers will realize that fact again when they receive their water and sewer bills, which will reflect the second rate hike since last May.
But before you have a chance to see your newly increased bill, Oak Ridge City Council may take an action that will cause your rates to rise a third time before 2013 ends. On Jan. 14, City Council will vote whether or not to apply for two state loans totaling $18 million. This debt, in addition to a large portion of the $15 million issued since September 2011, will pay for work affiliated with a U.S. Environmental Protection Agency administrative order that requires the city to stop sewer overflows.
All $33 million borrowed will be paid by Oak Ridgers through multiple increases in your water and sewer rates. The amount of those increases is not determined until after each round of debt is issued. In other words, the city first borrows on your behalf and then determines how much it will charge you without consideration for your ability to pay.
Larry Kelly
Larry Kelly, manager of the U.S. Department of Energy Oak Ridge Office, will be the featured speaker on Thursday, Jan. 10, at a joint meeting of two local nonprofit organizations. His speech is titled “Managing resources on the Oak Ridge Reservation in a changing environment.”
The talk is sponsored by Advocates for the Oak Ridge Reservation and the Oak Ridge Heritage and Preservation Association. It starts at 7 p.m. Jan. 10 at the Midtown Community Center Wildcat Den, and it is open to the public.
Chuck Fleischmann
Less than 24 hours after the U.S. Senate overwhelmingly approved it, the U.S. House passed legislation late Tuesday night to avoid the so-called “fiscal cliff,” but seven Tennessee Republicans and one Democrat opposed it.
The bill, which now goes to President Barack Obama for his signature, averts income tax increases for most Americans and temporarily delays large across-the-board spending cuts to defense and domestic programs.
However, the Associated Press reported most Americans will still end up paying more federal taxes in 2013 because the legislation did not renew a temporary 2 percent cut in the payroll tax. That reduction was worth about $1,000 to a worker making $50,000 a year.
U.S. senators Lamar Alexander and Bob Corker, both Tennessee Republicans, voted for the bill in the Senate, where it passed 89-8 early Tuesday morning. Alexander and Corker said the legislation, reached after weeks of negotiations between the White House and Congress, “rescues” 99 percent of Americans from a tax rate increase.
But all seven Tennessee Republicans in the U.S. House, including Rep. Chuck Fleischmann, voted against it. The vote in the House was 257-167.
