"Feds seek to speed work on SRS plutonium facility," ExchnageMonitor, Sept. 16
Ellen Thomas
Feds seek to speed work on SRS plutonium facility
The National Nuclear Security Administration’s (NNSA) prime at the Savannah River Site is seeking to speed construction on the plutonium pits facility in South Carolina.
Fluor-led Savannah River Nuclear Solutions (SRNS) said in a Monday press release it is working with its partners to accelerate the major NNSA project.
The release said crews are opening “new early construction work fronts” to expedite the Savannah River Plutonium Processing Facility (SRPPF).
SRNS is opening up new work fronts prior to NNSA’s issuance of critical decision (CD)-2/3, which would greenlight full construction, according to the release. Some of the early chores include work inside and outside of the main Process Building, ordering special equipment and installing an underground water system.
SRNS has constructed a haul road and burrow pit recently and is currently working on a High-Fidelity Training and Operations Center, a contractor spokesperson said by email Tuesday.
“Time is critical for this mission of national importance, and every day matters as we work to deliver SRPPF project completion by the early 2030s,” SRNS CEO Jeff Griffin said in the release.
The release “really holds nothing new as a host of subprojects in any case should have been well underway by now,” Tom Clements, who heads Savannah River Site Watch, said via email. “The fact that NNSA is trying to highlight that makes me wonder if the schedule has slipped and they are only now getting to the point where the anticipated subprojects are now visibly proceeding.”
The Savannah River plutonium pits facility is undergoing a programmatic environmental impact statement ordered by a federal judge.
SRNS, which runs the Savannah River Site for NNSA, is coordinating with Fluor Federal Services, the plant construction subcontractor. The project entails converting the unfinished 400,000 square feet large Mixed Oxide (MOX) Fuel Fabrication Facility (MFFF) into a plant to make plutonium pits. Such pits are critical to nuclear weapons.
NNSA expects the plant’s design to be 90% complete in 2026.
NNSA must be able to produce 80 or more pits yearly replenish the nuclear stockpile, according to the release. Savannah River is expected to make upwards of 50 and Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico, 30.
