Decision Making in the U.S. Department of Energy's Environmental Management Office of Science and Technology (1999) / Chapter Skim
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6 Findings and Recommendations
6 Findings and Recommendations
Pages 73-88
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From page 73... ...
A legitimate issue is how effective a centralized RD&D function such as OST (as opposed to some over organizational structure) can be in funding technology projects that are developed and deployed on DOE-EM site cleanups and whose use provides benefits as measured in cost, risk, schedule, or other relevant criteria.
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From page 74... ...
Recommendation to DOE-EM A centralized RD&D function within DOE-EM should be maintained because of its potential advantage in coordinating potentially duplicative technology development efforts needed at DOE-EM sites and because it is in a better position to address important broader issues (e.g., alternative technologies in the baseline functional flowsheets and alternative functional flowsheets) than more specifically directed RD&D.
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From page 75... ...
Site Baseline Remediation Functional Flowsheets Finding Decisions on site technology development needs are derived from the so-called baseline functional flowsheets developed at the sites by the site remediation problem owners. These flowsheets are fundamentally important in determining process steps and related technology needs.
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From page 76... ...
imply that DOE-EM should plan for alternatives to the site baseline functional flowsheets, especially when the baseline flowsheet involves high cost, high or poorly defined risk, and/or substantial probability of technical failure. Uncertainties about the future, both in funding and those related to possible failures of existing functional flowsheet process steps, highlight the importance of developing technology alternatives.
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From page 77... ...
OST Involvement in Reviews of Site Remediation Functional Flowsheets Finding The site remediation functional flowsheets, whose development and review are in the domain of the site problem owners, are important for OST because they define the user plans from which technology needs are derived.
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From page 78... ...
in the schedule of peer reviews of the site baseline functional flowsheets. The purpose of this OST involvement is to make the results of these reviews and the rationale for the technology development needs available to OST.
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From page 79... ...
Recommendation OST managers, in conjunction with other top-level EM managers,4 should produce strategic goals and plans that define explicitly the technical problems that the program will (and will not) address, and use these goals and plans effectively within OST program units to assist them in making technology development decisions.
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From page 80... ...
Recommendation For decisions involving the allocation of significant resources, OST should institute a decision-making structure wherein projects and/or proposals are evaluated against consistently defined criteria such as project cost, probability of technical success, probability of implementation on field applications, potential cost savings, and human health risk reduction. This structure should be applied broadly throughout the organization, with each OST program unit evaluating projects against the
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From page 81... ...
It is a challenge to perform estimates well with the degree of rigor that is possible depending on the state of maturity of the concept. Initial estimates of early-stage development projects would likely be subject to data limitations, large uncertainties, and limited sophistication.
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From page 82... ...
Specific Methodologies Finding The quantifiable approaches used by OST (see Appendixes B-E) are simple multicriteria scoring techniques in which criteria are developed with relative weights assigned to them.
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From page 83... ...
The judgments for OST management are whether, for OST decisions, the shortcomings of any decision methodology are important practical concerns and whether the decision methodology provides a useful organization of input information to help guide a decision among several candidates. The current OST quantitative schemes are multiattnbute systems with criteria and relative weights, and rely on expert (e.g., reviewer)
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From page 84... ...
Recommendation To the extent practicable, and with input from its various organizational elements, OST headquarters should establish general selection and prioritization criteria, and guidelines for applying these criteria, to include allowance for instances in which exceptions to the criteria may be appropriate. Procurement of Externally Demonstrated Technologies Finding The present approach to technology procurement wherein both OST's Industry Program and other OST organizational units such as the LSDPs perform some aspects of technology selection and procurement from industry is cumbersome and duplicative, and impairs OST's deployment initiatives.
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From page 85... ...
Recommendation In selecting a new technology development project for funding, OST should base this decision on both technical merit and quantifiable estimations of the project's probable value to site cleanup activities. OST has developed this latter concept as part of the criteria of the stage-and-gate system, but OST program units do not uniformly adopt and use these criteria to guide their selection of new projects for Finding.
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From page 86... ...
There is a role for RD&D activities in providing economical, effective, acceptable, and practicable technologies for use in DOE-EM site cleanups. Although OST accounts for a small part of the DOE-EM budget, its work can have substantial and beneficial impacts on reducing the costs, risks, and probability of technical failure associated with environmental remediation activities, which are estimated to represent in excess of $100 billion dollars.
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From page 87... ...
This report points out that OST should earmark a part of its funds for exploratory development of new technologies that have easily recognizable applications. The stage-and-gate process is designed to assess the maturity and likelihood of success of a developing technology and to terminate technology developments found to be lacking promise of successful completion or application.
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From page 88... ...
This report recommends (~) a "policy review" at the headquarters level where budget targets are formulated for the various OST program units, and (2)
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