Long before the 580-acre Hanford site became a recognizable nuclear reservation and beating heart of the Manhattan Project, a unique combination of lava flows, ice age floods, tectonic rotation and wind acted to form the landscape. Bruce BjornstadAbout 17 million years before government scouts landed on it, to be precise.The...
Like many others have experienced, 2021 brought challenges and changes for Hanford Mission Integration Solutions (HMIS). With every challenge comes opportunity, and our team flourished in its new role.We began operations of the Hanford Mission Essential Services Contract on Jan. 25, 2021, making significant progress to enable Hanford cleanup across...
HPMC Occupational Medical Services (OMS) is managed by HPM Corporation, a local, woman-owned business that provides specialized services to federal government clients and their contractors.Founded in 2001, HPM Corporation has grown into a multi-disciplinary organization capable of providing programs and services in occupational medicine, environmental safety and health, risk communication,...
April 15, 2021, marked the official start of work for Hanford Laboratory Management and Integration LLC (HLMI) as a new prime contractor for U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) nuclear waste cleanup efforts on the Hanford site.To support DOE’s Hanford cleanup mission, HLMI assumed sole responsibility for operation of the 222-S...
Our annual section on the work being done to clean up the Hanford nuclear reservation north of Richland provides updates from the main contractors engineering and doing the work and the regulators tasked with making sure it gets done safely.We also have stories on the massive budget required to clean...
An act of God. Or, among lawyers, a force majeure.Many contracts have force majeure clauses to govern what happens when faced with circumstances beyond anyone’s control. The global Covid-19 pandemic certainly falls into this category.How much did Covid-19 affect Hanford’s cleanup mission?Not much in the big picture.Some tank waste pumping...
The Hanford site team has consistently supported our nation during unprecedented times and this year has been no different.The innovation and determination of our workers, from the most experienced leaders to those just starting their careers, have ensured success throughout our site history during both the national security mission of...
What does having a new president in office mean for Hanford?Specifically, what does it mean to have President Joe Biden, a former vice president and longtime U.S. senator, in the Oval Office? What does it mean to have Jennifer Granholm, the former governor of Michigan, at the helm at the...
As the new manager for the state of Washington’s Nuclear Waste Program, I appreciate the opportunity to reach out and introduce myself to the Tri-City community.I’ve been on the job at Nuclear Waste for the past several months, but I’m not new to this area or its economy and concerns.I’m...
Every community has a local language, terms that are commonplace to locals but baffling to visitors.For the Tri-Cities, “vitrification” – the process of superheating nuclear waste with glass-forming materials for safe long-term storage – is one.It has been bandied about since the 1980s as plutonium production ceased at Hanford and...
