K-33 uranium enrichment structure to go way of K-25 and K-27
The US Department of Energy on Tuesday released a request for proposals to demolish the K-33 building as part of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act-funded cleanup program in Oak Ridge.
The K-33 building is a 260,000 square metre (2.8 million-square-foot) structure that was decommissioned and cleaned up by BNFL Inc. in the 1990s as part of reindustrialization efforts at the government’s former uranium-enrichment plant. The processing equipment was removed, as well as most of the hazardous materials left from the old operations there. But subsequent efforts to find an industrial tenant for K-33 were unsuccessful. That’s why the old building is being torn down.
A demolition contract will be awarded by DOE’s Consolidated Business Center in Cincinnati, which uses a nationwide Indefinite Delivery/Indefinite Quantity contracting tool for the federal cleanup program.
The project will involve demolition of the building and disposal of wastes, most of which will be sent to DOE’s landfills on the federal reservation in Oak Ridge.
DOE plans to use some of the Recovery Act funding that was saved when DOE opted to scale back another project at the nearby K-27 building. About $118 million in stimulus funding had been set aside for preliminary work on K-27 to set the stage for its demolition later. Now, however, DOE plans to spend only $20 million on the K-27 work, wrapping up that activity by September 2010. That means about $90 million is available for other projects.
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