Savannah River Site MOX facility cleans up

Thursday, 05 July 2007

Page 2 of 2 When company officials looked at the plan and at the topography, they realized that if they did the projects separately, one project would take thousands of loads of dirt out and the other project would bring the fill dirt back in. They worked on that problem and did a few efficiency studies and ended up moving all the dirt in one shot, saving 50,000 loads of material that otherwise would have had to make two trips. “That’s a lot of savings to the government, and that’s in addition to the $10 million savings,” he said. Speight credits Perry’s team with being efficient in its task. “They really looked at things holistically and were able to combine some activities and work with subcontractors,” he said. “When you think of Washington Savannah River Company and the Savannah River Site, you don’t necessarily think of large civil projects, you think of nuclear plants,” Speight said. “So although this is not necessary what we’re known for, it just proves that the folks here can effectively pull off projects, whether they’re civil or nuclear.” Speight was also pleased with job safety during the project. “The safety record on the site was exemplary,” he said. “There were no lost-time accidents on that site despite some challenging work and interesting terrain and a lot of heavy moving equipment, all done in 12- to 14-hour days. “We can talk about $10 million savings and everything else, but what I’m most proud of is that those who came to work went home safe every day. We had up to 60 and 70 pieces of moving equipment on that project at any one time. These were very large pieces of equipment too. Moving 2 million cubic yards of dirt is no trivial matter, and to have done it with no injuries is remarkable.” Coming in $10 million under budget allowed the project team to take on additional scope of the project, which included site stabilization, road construction, the infrastructure support for the construction site and utility support for MOX Services’ new office complex. “Basically we were able to take the savings and do additional work for the MOX program,” said Speight. “More than likely that work would have had to come later and then there would be additional pressure to get it done. This way we were able to accomplish it and save time, make the work available now and save the pressure.” The savings could not have come at a better time. A new bill in the House of Representatives, H.R. 2641, the FY 2008 energy and water appropriations, includes a request for $167.8 million for the MOX facility, which is $263.5 million below the president’s request and $115.1 million below the amount allocated for 2007 because, as noted in the bill summary, “the administration asked for more than could be spent in 2008 and last year’s funds are sufficient to continue construction.” According to the Office of Management and Budget, the FY 2007 budget included $290 million for construction of the mixed oxide fuel fabrication plant at the Savannah River Site. The OMB document also noted that the cost of the salt waste processing facility, which will treat radioactive tank waste, has increased from $440 million to $680 million, and the completed schedule has slipped from 2009 to 2011. << Start < Prev 1 2 Next > End >>