The Government Accountability Project (GAP) today released the Department of Energy’s (DOE) draft summary of an investigation into workers’ concerns at Washington Closure Hanford (WCH), a prime DOE contractor responsible for cleaning up the River Corridor A section of the Hanford Nuclear Site. The investigation focuses on worker health and safety problems at WCH, and was done for DOE by Workplace Cornerstone, a private firm.
12/6/06 — Update! Click here for the full report of the investigation!
The draft summary states that workers are experiencing:
- Inadequate planning and work controls
- Inadequate industrial hygiene practices and difficulty improving them
- Difficulty using their stop work authority to correct or prevent unsafe situations
- A “chilling effect” and even a hostile work environment in some parts of the project
The draft summary also defines suggested corrective actions such as improving the Employee Concerns Program, creating a work plan control task force, and to “listen better to workers’ concerns.”
“Correcting the problems at Washington Closure Hanford will require digging a little deeper,” stated Lea Mitchell, GAP Nuclear Oversight Program Investigator. “Where was the Energy Department in all of this? Why did they let their contractor get away with this for so long?”
In September 2005, DOE hired WCH to complete five key projects by 2012 at an estimated cost of $1.9 billion. The projects include decontaminating and removing 510 facilities, closing or remediating 486 waste sites, cocooning three plutonium reactors, and disposing of approximately four million tons of contaminated material. Through its contract with DOE, WCH stands to receive fees for completing various tasks on schedule. WCH is a limited liability company led by Washington Group International based in Boise, Idaho, and jointly owned by Bechtel National and CH2M Hill.