Oak Ridge Today

B&W Y-12 names Bill Tindal vice president for production

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Bill Tindal has been named B&W Y-12 vice president for production, effective July 26. He is replacing Joel Duling, who has accepted a position at Nuclear Fuel Services, a subsidiary of Babcock & Wilcox Nuclear Operations Group Inc., in Erwin, Tenn.

“Bill is uniquely suited for this role given his production expertise and years of experience,” said B&W Y-12 President and General Manager Chuck Spencer. “Joel has done a great job for Y-12, and we are excited for him and wish him well in his new opportunity.” [Read more…]

Letter: ORPSEF thanks contributors to Dreams and Innovations

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Deirdre Barrett and ORPSEF Foundation

Deirdre Barrett, right, is pictured above with Alice Feldman, Linda Young, Anne Garcia Garland, and Margaret Gottshall. (Submitted photo)

To the Editor:

The Oak Ridge Public Schools Education Foundation would like to extend its thanks to all who contributed to the Dreams and Innovation program honoring Oak Ridge teachers who received Foundation grants for the 2013-2014 school year.

Our thanks and appreciation goes to:

  • B&W Y-12, which provided the location, New Hope Center, for the celebration attended by more than 150 people. B&W Y-12 also provided assistance with sound and information technology for the event.
  • Aubrey’s Restaurant, one of Oak Ridge’s newest restaurants, for providing appetizers for the event.
  • Materials and Chemistry Laboratory Inc. (MCLinc), which provided booths for the event.
  • Deirdre Barrett, the ceremony’s keynote speaker, author, psychologist at Harvard Medical School, and graduate of Oak Ridge High School. She spoke on the theme of the event, describing how dreams contribute to innovation and problem solving, relating research from her book, “The Committee of Sleep.”
  • The Oak Ridge public schools teachers who provided demonstrations of materials and programs funded by past Education Foundation grant awards, showing how students have benefitted.
  • Oak Ridge JazzCats and Michelle Hairston, who provided entertainment during the event.
  • The ORPSEF board of directors, for their support for this event. [Read more…]

Responding to traffic delays, Y-12 asks for volunteers to start work later beginning July 8

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Y-12 National Security Complex Traffic

Responding to morning traffic delays, particularly at its east entrance on Bear Creek Road, the Y-12 National Security Complex has asked some employees to volunteer to start their work day later after July 8.

Responding to morning traffic delays at its entrances, the Y-12 National Security Complex has asked some employees to volunteer to come into work later in the day starting July 8.

Significant traffic delays have been an issue since a lost driver who did not have a badge or permission to be at Y-12 said she was waved into the nuclear weapons plant on June 6.

Since then, Y-12 officials have said the plant has changed its approach to checking badges at the east and west gates. The more rigorous security checks are “here to stay,” B&W Y-12 General Manager Chuck Spencer said in a June 27 message to employees.

But the new procedures have led to traffic delays, particularly at the east entrance between 5:15 and 6:15 a.m., when vehicles can back up as far as the former Dean Stallings Ford on South Illinois Avenue. [Read more…]

B&W Y-12 donates $2,500 to Girl Scouts summer camp program

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B&W Y-12 Donates to Girl Scouts

Booth Kammann, (center, left), CEO of the Girl Scout Council of the Southern Appalachians, accepts a $2,500 donation from Nancy Johnson, B&W Y-12’s vice president of Business Services and Performance Assurance. (Submitted photo)

Booth Kammann, chief executive officer of the Girl Scout Council of the Southern Appalachians, recently accepted a $2,500 donation from Nancy Johnson, B&W Y-12’s vice president of Business Services and Performance Assurance.

The money will help fund the summer program at Camp Tanasi, located near Andersonville on Norris Lake.

Joining Kammann and Johnson in the picture at left are, from left, Rebekka Range, Anna Vacaliuc, Andrea Range, and Marian Vacaliuc.

Water line rupture at Y-12 kills small fish, salamanders

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East Fork Poplar Creek

East Fork Poplar Creek starts at a spring at the Y-12 National Security Complex and flows through Oak Ridge. It has been listed on a state list of impaired waterways due to mercury and polychlorinated biphenyls, among other things.

About six million gallons of chlorinated water spilled into East Fork Poplar Creek from a ruptured drinking water line at the Y-12 National Security Complex, and an estimated 8,500 minnow-sized fish and almost 30 salamanders were killed in the area of the incoming chlorinated water, a media advisory said.

It said the rupture in the potable water line was found Saturday. The numbers of dead fish and salamanders were determined by workers from the Oak Ridge National Laboratory Biological Monitoring and Abatement Program. [Read more…]

Y-12 security update outlines improvements since July 28 intrusion

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Y-12 Security Repairs Chart

Since three protesters broke in last summer, security cameras and sensors have been repaired and replaced. There are more security patrols at the Y-12 National Security Complex and more staff in the Central Alarm Station. And officials and workers are trying to reduce the false and nuisance alarm rate.

Those are among the improvements highlighted in a Y-12 security update published in May. It said Y-12 quickly began making changes after the July 28 security breach, when three anti-nuclear weapons activists broke into the plant before dawn, cut through three fences in the high-security Protected Area, and splashed human blood, spray-painted slogans, and hammered on the Highly Enriched Uranium Materials Facility, where most of the nation’s bomb-grade uranium is stored.

“Y-12 has carefully examined the circumstances that led to the event, developed actions to fix the problems that were discovered, and is applying the lessons learned to our security posture and operations,” the security update said. “These actions included adding key leadership personnel, restoring to service critical security elements, and refining alarm system components to enhance reliability.” [Read more…]

The leg bone is connected to the hip prosthesis: Students analyze artificial implants

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ASM Materials Camp Lab Instrument

Student Hunter Stombaugh loads a material sample into the Saphir 550.3, a laboratory instrument used to grind and polish samples before placing them in an electron microscope for analysis. (Submitted photos)

Fifteen high school students and one college freshman recently got up close and personal with lab equipment worth nearly a half-million dollars at the ASM International Materials Camp. During the weeklong camp, students performed failure analyses on prosthetic implants including a hip prosthesis, pelvic clamps, a tibial nail, and tibial component. An area surgeon provided the sterilized implants, along with X-rays showing the implants before they were removed from patients.

The ASM Materials Camp is organized and sponsored by Y-12 National Security Complex, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Tech 20/20, and the University of Tennessee in Knoxville. Steve Dekanich, an engineer in B&W Y-12’s Quality Assurance, is the camp co-chairman. [Read more…]

B&W Y-12 again a premier sponsor of the Secret City Festival

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B&W Y-12 Secret City Festival Check Presentation

Chuck Spencer, center, B&W Y-12 president and general manager, presents a $25,000 sponsorship check for the Secret City Festival to Oak Ridge Mayor Tom Beehan, left, and Mayor Pro Tem Jane Miller. (Submitted photo)

B&W Y-12 is returning to the Secret City Festival once again as the premier festival sponsor, a press release said.

“B&W has led the way in Secret City Festival sponsorships both financially and in kind for the past eight years,” the Oak Ridge Convention and Visitors Bureau said in a Wednesday press release. B&W Y-12 operates the Y-12 National Security Complex for the National Nuclear Security Administration.

Chuck Spencer, B&W Y-12 president and general manager, presented a $25,000 festival sponsorship check during a May 28 meeting. [Read more…]

B&W Y-12 donates $25,000 to Secret City Festival

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B&W Y-12 Donates to Secret City Festival

B&W Y-12 General Manager Chuck Spencer, center, presents a $25,000 check to Oak Ridge officials for the Secret City Festival this month during a City Council meeting last week. (Submitted photo)

B&W Y-12 President and General Manager Chuck Spencer presented a check for $25,000 to Oak Ridge Mayor Tom Beehan and Vice Mayor Jane Miller during a City Council meeting last week.

B&W Y-12 has been a premier sponsor of the Secret City Festival for the past eight years, a press release said.
 [Read more…]

Parts of Y-12, Pantex contract protests upheld; GAO says procurement should be re-opened

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Y-12 National Security Complex

The U.S. Government Accountability Office has upheld parts of two protests filed over the January award of a five-year contract to manage and operate the Y-12 National Security Complex, pictured above, and Pantex Plant near Amarillo, Texas. (Submitted photo)

A federal agency has upheld parts of two protests challenging a five-year contract to manage two nuclear weapons plants in Tennessee and Texas.

The U.S. Government Accountability Office also recommended re-opening the contract procurement, raising questions about the status of the $22.8 billion contract awarded to Consolidated Nuclear Security LLC, or CNS, in January. CNS was one of three bidding teams who competed for the contract to manage and operate the Y-12 National Security Complex in Oak Ridge and Pantex Plant near Amarillo, Texas.

At the heart of the GAO decision, announced Monday, were questions about proposed savings. In particular, the agency seemed to question whether the National Nuclear Security Administration, which awarded the consolidated contract to CNS on Jan. 8, had properly evaluated the expected savings.

“NNSA failed to follow the publicly stated solicitation criteria, which provided that the agency would evaluate the feasibility and size of each offeror’s proposed cost savings resulting from the consolidation of the management and operation of these sites,” Ralph O. White, GAO managing associate general counsel for procurement law, said in a statement released Monday afternoon. [Read more…]

B&W Y-12 names Kevin Corbett as VP of quality assurance

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Kevin Corbett

Kevin Corbett

Kevin Corbett has been named B&W Y-12 vice president of quality assurance. He is replacing Janice Christman, who will be retiring from the Y-12 National Security Complex at the end of April.

With 32 years of experience, Corbett has managed quality programs on projects and installations for the U.S. Department of Energy and National Nuclear Security Administration, the Department of Defense, and the Department of State, as well as commercial nuclear power facilities and large-scale infrastructure programs valued at more than $20 billion.

“The B&W Y-12 team certainly will benefit from Kevin’s broad range of experience,” said B&W Y-12 President and General Manager Chuck Spencer. “With quality being a key component of everything we do at Y-12, Kevin’s expertise will help us ensure quality is an integral part of our culture.” [Read more…]

United Way donations down after security breach, contractor changes

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United Way of Anderson County

Tom Hilton, 2012-2013 campaign chair, left, with outgoing United Way of Anderson County Board President Jimmy Stone, who accepted the No. 1 Company Campaign Award on behalf of Oak Ridge National Laboratory. (Photo courtesy of D. Ray Smith)

Donations to the United Way of Anderson County were down this year, and on Thursday, officials cited challenges in the federal contracting community, including the July 28 security breach at the Y-12 National Security Complex and the later departure of security contractor WSI.

There was also an end to federal stimulus money, a freeze in federal budgets and salaries, and a new consolidated contract to manage Y-12 and the Pantex Plant near Amarillo, Texas, which could result in the departure of B&W Y-12, said Rick Morrow, UWAC executive director.

The United Way of Anderson County had hoped to raise $1.4 million in the fiscal year that ended March 31, but volunteers and staff members fell short of that, collecting $1,277,771. [Read more…]