A Review of Decontamination and Decommissioning Technology Development Programs at the Department of Energy (1998)

In conformance with its Statement of Task, the committee sought to examine the technology development activities of the DDFA of the DOE OST. The committee tried to determine whether the needs of the sites to be cleaned up were consistent with OST development activities and why the field sites did not make greater use of the cleanup technologies that were identified or developed with OST funding.

The committee obtained most of its information from presentations made to the committee at its meetings by representatives of DOE and its contractors. The committee was fortunate to hear from the Assistant Secretary for Technology Development, the Director of OST, the head of the DDFA, and OST staff. The committee heard presentations from essentially all principal university, labor union, industry, and technical society contractors to the DOE. The committee attended DDFA annual review sessions and special DOE topical meetings. There were several occasions, however, when last-minute cancellations of scheduled DOE presentations delayed the committee's progress, as did occasions when written confirmation was found to supersede earlier oral information.

Committee members visited the three active LSDP sites, interviewed site and contractor personnel and recorded their observations (see Appendixes C-F). Full committee meetings took place at DOE or NRC facilities in Washington, D.C.; Morgantown, West Virginia; Woods Hole, Massachusetts; and Irvine, California. For the most part, the committee relied on the expertise of its members and the NRC staff for understanding and evaluating the information presented to it. Although individual committee members had discussions with university and in dustry experts on specific topics, the committee found it unnecessary to employ consultants.

The following is a summary of full committee meetings held during the review period 1996–97:

1. The committee first met in September 1996 for a preliminary discussion and planning session in Washington, D.C.
2. On December 12–13, 1996, the committee met at the Beckman Center in Irvine, California. During an executive session, committee members heard presentations regarding the trip reports that had been undertaken to date. Open sessions were held during the two-day meeting with presentations from Jerry Hyde, DOE-HQ Program Manager for DDFA, who discussed the DDFA program, METC and the status of the LSDPs.
3. The committee met again on April 1–3, 1997, for the Mid-Year Review of the DDFA program at METC. The committee found that of the 18 papers listed on the agenda, 3 were withdrawn, 3 were presented by alternate speakers, and many of the speakers were not conversant with the subject they presented. After the presentations, the committee had an informal discussion with Paul Hart, DOE-METC Focus Area Lead, regarding the LSDPs. Following the Mid-Year Review, the committee met in closed session to discuss the presentations.
4. On June 23–24, 1997, the committee met at the NRC's Woods Hole Study Center. They reviewed the committee's work to date, produced a draft outline, and made writing assignments during the closed sessions. During the open sessions of this meeting, Mark Kessinger and Wendell Greenwald, representatives of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, discussed the Corps' work with the DDFA and gave an overview of its costing procedure and answered questions from the committee. Jerry Hyde discussed the budget of EM, OST, and its programs, and summarized the TDI—its mission, objectives, and budget plan. He went on to discuss the LSDPs, including an explanation of the D&D product lines, status of current demonstration projects, and future schedule. Mr. Hyde discussed in particular the interim safe storage LSDP at the Hanford C-Reactor. Concerns were voiced by the committee about the unavailability of the ''Green Books." The representatives from the Corps participated in this discussion.
   
   

   Later, Dave Clements, project manager for the BNFL Engineering, Ltd., D&D project at Capenhurst Diffusion Plant, England, gave a presentation on his experience and knowledge of D&D technologies in the field. Fred Petschauer of Brookhaven National Laboratory presented his experiences with the D&D of the Shoreham Nuclear Plant.

5. A meeting of the committee was held again in Washington, D.C., on September 25–26, 1997. The closed session included a presentation of the final site visit trip report, and discussion of new information provided to the committee

5. by Jerry Hyde, Paul Hart, and Steve Bossart, a DDFA Project Manager from FETC (nee METC). The remainder of the meeting was spent drafting the report.
6. At the December 10–12, 1997, meeting in Irvine, California, the open session included a video conference with Gerald Boyd, Acting Deputy Assistant Secretary for OST, who provided additional information OST regarding the DDFA and LSDPs. Jef Walker, DOE OST, and Paul Hart, FETC, were present with the committee. The afternoon was spent in discussions of the relationship between OST and the DDFA, and the LSDP's role, past and future, in technology transfer to DOE sites. The executive session included discussion of the video conference and initial preparation of the first draft report.
7. In March 1998, the committee again met in Washington, D.C., for a writing session to finalize a draft of the report.