Hanford hiring could begin this week

Hanford will receive $1.96 billion under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, possibly by the end of the week.

That will be enough money to create or save 4,000 jobs, said Dave Brockman, manager of the Department of Energy Richland Operations Office. About 250 workers who were close to being laid off now can retain their jobs, he said.

"The recovery money is like getting an additional year of federal funding for Hanford cleanup," said Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., who's credited with key work to get the money included in the funding bill. Hanford receives about $2 billion for cleanup work annually, and the $1.96 billion to be spent through fiscal 2011 is in addition to the annual budgets.

Officials had been expecting Hanford to receive close to $2 billion under the recovery act, and Energy Secretary Steven Chu confirmed that Tuesday. He announced $6 billion would be spent on Department of Energy environmental cleanup work in 12 states by Sept. 30, 2011, the end of fiscal 2011.

"These investments will put Americans to work while cleaning up contamination from the Cold War era," Chu said in a statement. "It reflects our commitment to future generations as well as to help local economies get moving again."

DOE believes it is "in good shape" to find the workers who will need to be hired, Brockman said. Hiring could start as soon as Friday at a job fair planned by contractor CH2M Hill Plateau Remediation Co.

DOE will start work immediately on modifications to its existing contracts for the additional cleanup work, he said. Until it gets formal requests from contractors for the costs of the additional work, DOE will not know exactly how much work the stimulus money will cover.

But he expects that DOE will be able to do much of the work on a proposed list released earlier this month to the Hanford Advisory Board, he said.

The money will have a huge impact on speeding up cleanup and protection of ground water, work to reduce the contaminated portion of Hanford to 75 square miles at its center by 2015 and work to clean up central Hanford, he said.

The money going to Hanford includes $1.635 billion for the DOE Hanford Richland Operations Office, one of two DOE offices in charge of Hanford cleanup. The Richland Operations Office will use the money for central Hanford cleanup work being done by CH2M Hill Plateau Remediation Co. and for cleanup work along the Columbia River being done by Washington Closure Hanford.

Work will include tearing down old buildings, digging up contaminated soil, digging up debris from old burial grounds and treating contaminated ground water

The remainder of the Hanford money, $326 million, will go to the DOE Hanford Office of River Protection for work done by its tank farm contractor, Washington River Protection Solutions. The money will be used to prepare for the treatment at the vitrification plant starting in 2019 of millions of gallons of high level radioactive waste held in underground tanks .

Projects include speeding of the design for a temporary storage facility for waste once it is turned into a stable glass form at the vit plant, making improvements to the 222-S Analytical Laboratory and constructing systems to transfer the waste to the vitrification plant.

The money also will be used to develop programs to make sure that leak-prone single-shell tanks will be sound enough to hold waste until it can be treated.

DOE is expecting the three contractors that will receive stimulus money to do much of the work through subcontracts.

"This investment is great news for the Tri-Cities community and the state of Washington," said Gov. Chris Gregoire, in a statement. "Not only will this funding create jobs for the Mid-Columbia area, it accelerates the cleanup of the most dangerous contaminated site in the nation."

However, it does not resolve the state's recent lawsuit filed against DOE seeking an enforceable cleanup agreement, she said.

"Without one, the cleanup will extend into the next century and will cost us billions of dollars more," she said. The lawsuit focuses on delays on emptying radioactive waste from leak-prone tanks and treating it, which is not directly addressed by the stimulus funds, although money is included for infrastructure upgrades at the tank farms.

Sen. Maria Cantwell, D-Wash., said the stimulus money spent at Hanford would save taxpayers an estimated $750 million in future cleanup costs.

DOE said that the additional work accomplished in the next 2.5 years will reduce overhead costs. For instance, buildings that are demolished will no longer need utilities, to be maintained and to be surveyed to ensure radioactive materials are safely contained.

"I believe the Hanford site has done a good job of identifying cleanup priorities," said Rep. Doc Hastings, R-Wash., in a statement. "These funds, combined with a robust Fiscal Year 2010 budget, will make it possible to achieve the steady, dependable levels of funding required for cleanup success."

DOE is committed to spending the stimulus dollars smartly, on work that is done safely and with full accountability and openness, he said.

As a step toward that openness, it has created a website to track and explain Hanford expenditures of stimulus money, from hiring to cleanup accomplished, at www.hanford.gov/ recovery.

w On the Net: Read more about contractors receiving stimulus money at plateauremediation.com, washingtonclosure.com and wrpstoc.com.

w Annette Cary: 582-1533; acary@tricityherald.com