DOE seeks contractors to provide up to $6B in services at Washington nuclear site

Dive Brief:

The U.S. Department of Energy is soliciting bids from contractors interested in performing an estimated $4 billion to $6 billion of general services at the Hanford decommissioned former nuclear plutonium production site in Richland, Washington, the Tri-City Herald reported.
The Hanford Mission Essential Services Contract includes services such as security, firefighting, land management and information technology for the 580-acre site, as well as the upgrading and maintenance of infrastructure — electric, water, roads, buildings — to support the operations of a $17 billion vitrification plan that has not yet been completed. The DOE expects the contract structure to be similar to the 10-year, $3.2 billion agreement is has with the current contractor, Mission Support Alliance, which is owned by Leidos and Centerra Group. That contract, a cost-plus-incentive-pay agreement, will expire in May.
The contract is also expected to be a boon for local contractors as the DOE requires that 40% of the total contract value be subcontracted and that 50% of those subcontracts go to local businesses. If the contract hits the maximum estimated amount of $6 billion, that would mean more than $1 billion of work for contractors located near the Hanford site.

Dive Insight:

Facilities such as Hanford provide a multitude of opportunities for contractors — as evidenced not only by the general services contract now out to bid, but by other significant contracts at the site as well.

The DOE on Thursday renewed a separate $500 million contract at Hanford with the Jacobs Engineering Group-owned CH2M Hill Plateau Remediation Co. The company's current 10-year contract, valued at $5.8 billion plus $1.3 billion of Obama-era economic stimulus work, was set to expire this weekend, but the department extended it for one year. CH2M has approximately 1,500 employees performing waste retrieval and fuels management, groundwater and vadose zone remediation, demolition services and closure of Hanford's plutonium finishing plant. CH2M is also preparing for the treatment of highly radioactive sludge along the Columbia River.

The DOE also announced its intentions to extend another major contract at the site for another year. Washington River Protection Solutions, which is co-owned by engineering and construction giant AECOM, currently has a tank farm contract at Hanford valued at more than $7 billion, but its 10-year agreement with the DOE expires Sept. 30, just like the CH2M contract. The company has about 2,300 workers at the site and manages about 56 million gallons of radioactive waste stored in underground tanks. The waste is a holdover from plutonium production.