Recommendation: The Assistant Secretary of DOE's Office of Environmental Management should direct RL to conduct a root cause analysis to identify any programmatic causes that may have led to the collapse of PUREX Tunnel 1. (Recommendation 1)

Agency: Department of Energy: Office of the Assistant Secretary for Environmental Management: Environmental Management Consolidated Business Center
Status: Open

Comments: DOE concurs with this recommendations and has agreed to conduct a root cause analysis examining the programmatic cause leading to the Hanford PUREX tunnel collapse. In DOE's October 2020 Audit Report regarding the implementation of recommendations in our report, DOE states that the Office of Environmental Management is taking action to implement this recommendation, but that action is still insufficient to satisfy the recommendation.

Recommendation: The Secretary of Energy should ensure DOE headquarters offices responsible for the oversight of EM sites' field offices conduct an assessment of RL's management and oversight of the Hanford Site contractor's surveillance and maintenance activity for contaminated excess facilities. Based on the results of this assessment, DOE headquarters offices should consider whether such assessments should be conducted on a periodic basis. (Recommendation 3)

Agency: Department of Energy: Office of the Secretary
Status: Open

Comments: DOE concurs with this recommendation and the Office of Environmental Management agreed to conduct an assessment, in coordination with headquarters oversight offices, of the Richland Operations Office's management and oversight of the Hanford Site contractor's surveillance and maintenance activities for contaminated excess facilities. In DOE's October 2020 Audit Report regarding the implementation of recommendations in our report, DOE states that the Office of Environmental Management is taking action to implement this recommendation, but that action is still insufficient to satisfy the recommendation.

Recommendation: The Secretary of Energy should direct DOE's Office of Environmental Management to revise EM's 2017 cleanup policy to establish how the EM program and DOE sites should apply the essential elements of a risk-informed decision-making framework into their current decision-making requirements and guidance. (Recommendation 1)

Agency: Department of Energy
Status: Open

Comments: In April 2020, DOE officials told us that its Office of Environmental Management (EM) had recently reinvigorated efforts to develop a comprehensive program-wide strategy to address risks in a consistent manner to align cleanup plans and activities with programmatic priorities and available budgets. According to DOE officials, EM plans to revise and replace its 2017 Cleanup Policy with a Cleanup Project Management Protocol and and EM Cleanup Program Management Policy. Officials stated that the Cleanup Program Management Policy will establish an approach for the EM program and DOE sites to apply the essential elements of risk-informed decision-making framework. DOE officials estimated that this effort would be completed by December 31, 2020.

Recommendation: The Secretary of Energy should direct DOE's Office of Environmental Management, in the development of a program management plan, to incorporate essential elements of risk-informed decision-making. (Recommendation 2)

Agency: Department of Energy
Status: Open

Comments: In April 2020, DOE officials told us that DOE's Office of Environmental Management (EM) is developing a new Cleanup Program Management Policy that will incorporate the essential elements of risk-informed decision-making, as appropriate, into EM program management policy. DOE officials estimated that this effort will be completed by December 31, 2020.

Recommendation: The Secretary of Energy should direct the Assistant Secretary of EM to develop cost estimates for the IWTU reengineering project and the SBW treatment operations that meet best practices for being comprehensive (e.g., account for all costs). (Recommendation 1)

Agency: Department of Energy
Status: Open

Comments: In an update provided in April 2020, DOE said that it had taken steps to ensure the cost estimates will meet best practices for being comprehensive (e.g., account for all costs) as part of contract negotiations for the cleanup project. GAO has requested additional information from DOE and will update the status of this recommendation after it has received and analyzed this information.

Recommendation: The Secretary of Energy should direct the Assistant Secretary of EM to develop schedule estimates for the IWTU reengineering project and the SBW treatment operations that meet best practices for being well-constructed. (Recommendation 2)

Agency: Department of Energy
Status: Open

Comments: In an update provided by DOE in April 2020, DOE said that in negotiating the Idaho Cleanup Project contract it had taken steps to ensure the schedule estimates for the IWTU reengineering project and the SBW treatment operations will meet best practices for being well constructed. Further, DOE stated that the remaining baseline scope and schedule estimate received an external review by its contractor's parent corporation and DOE's Office of Environmental Management to ensure that the schedule meets best practices for being well-constructed. GAO has requested additional information from DOE and will update the status of this recommendation after it has received and analyzed this information.

Recommendation: The Secretary of Energy should direct the Assistant Secretary of EM to follow best practices for ensuring the reliability for the IWTU reengineering project's earned value management system. (Recommendation 3)

Agency: Department of Energy
Status: Open

Comments: In an update provided by DOE in April 2020, DOE said that cost and performance data for the IWTU is being tracked against the cost and schedule baselines incorporated in the core contract for the Idaho Cleanup Project, and that the data meets best practices for reliability. GAO has requested additional information from DOE and will update the status of this recommendation after it has received and analyzed this information.

Recommendation: The Secretary of Energy should direct the Assistant Secretary of EM to develop a strategy, including a timeline, for implementing the actions required to achieve its preferred disposal pathway, or an alternative, for the SBW. (Recommendation 4)

Agency: Department of Energy
Status: Open

Comments: In an update provided by DOE in April 2020, DOE said that EM will assess the range of potential strategies and pathways for disposal of the treated SBW. Once this effort is completed, GAO will review EM's strategy and timeline for achieving its preferred disposal pathway, or an alternative, and update the status of this recommendation accordingly.

Recommendation: The Secretary of Energy should direct the Assistant Secretary of EM to develop a strategy, including a timeline, to identify and develop a treatment approach for the disposal of the calcine waste to ensure that EM meets the milestone for completing the treatment of this waste by the target date of December 31, 2035. (Recommendation 5)

Agency: Department of Energy
Status: Open

Comments: In an update provided by DOE in April 2020, DOE said that DOE's Idaho Operations Office is in the process of chartering a team of subject matter experts to update an analysis of alternatives for calcine treatment and disposal. DOE said that this evaluation will be completed by September 30, 2020. GAO will request additional information from DOE on this analysis once completed and will update the status of this recommendation after it has received and analyzed this information.

Recommendation: The Assistant Secretary of DOE's Office of Environmental Management should update EM's policies and procedures to establish a standard definition of milestones and specify requirements for both including and updating information on milestones across the complex. (Recommendation 1)

Agency: Department of Energy
Status: Open

Comments: DOE agreed with the recommendation, but as of March 2020, DOE has not fully implemented this recommendation. DOE officials told us that they established an Integrated Project Team (IPT) to review GAO's recommendation. The IPT recommended that DOE continue to use DOE's Integrated Planning, Accountability and Budgeting System (IPABS) for tracking compliance with milestones, accompanied by a new policy providing direction to the field to use IPABS, a new data dictionary for the use of IPABS, guidance, and training. Using recommendations from the IPT, DOE has drafted policy and guidance documents for tracking compliance and is in the process of testing the draft policy using a pilot site. DOE officials told us that they plan to update the schedule for completing the final policy and guidance by September 30, 2020.

Recommendation: The Assistant Secretary of DOE's Office of Environmental Management should track original milestone dates as well as changes to its cleanup milestones. (Recommendation 2)

Agency: Department of Energy
Status: Open

Comments: DOE agreed with the recommendation, but as of March 2020, DOE has not fully implemented the recommendation. DOE officials told us they have completed an options analysis to identify the costs and benefits of conducting root cause analyses of historical milestone changes. DOE officials said they recognized a benefit to a developing a more complete root cause analysis and considered whether an analysis of historical milestone changes could provide best practices in negotiating milestone changes. DOE said they have initiated a pilot project with a major DOE site to determine the benefit of additional analyses and that the analysis of historical milestone changes will be completed by December 2020.

Recommendation: The Assistant Secretary of DOE's Office of Environmental Management should comply with the requirements in the National Defense Authorization Act by reporting annually to Congress on the status of its cleanup milestones and including a complete list of cleanup milestones for all sites required by the act. The annual reports should also include, for each milestone, the original date along with the currently negotiated date. (Recommendation 3)

Agency: Department of Energy
Status: Open

Comments: DOE agreed with the recommendation, but as of March 2020, DOE has not fully implemented the recommendation. DOE officials told us that DOE completed an options analysis to identify the costs and benefits of conducting root cause analyses of historical milestone changes. DOE officials added that they will identify what historical analyses are appropriate to conduct based on value to the government. According to DOE officials, the results of this analysis are being incorporated into a pilot project, and they plan to complete a final reporting methodology by the end of that pilot project.. DOE officials noted that they have analyzed options for reporting on regulatory compliance and the results will be part of DOE policy and guidance to be issued by June 2021.

Recommendation: The Assistant Secretary of DOE's Office of Environmental Management should conduct root cause analyses of missed or postponed milestones. (Recommendation 4)

Agency: Department of Energy
Status: Open

Comments: DOE agreed with the recommendation, but as of March 2020, DOE has not fully implemented the recommendation. DOE officials told us that they established an Integrated Project Team (IPT) to review GAO's recommendation. DOE officials told us that the IPT identified root causes for missed or delayed milestones, which according to DOE officials, will be used in a pilot test of the draft policy. DOE officials told us that they plan to develop an appropriate list of root causes after the pilot project is completed, and officials noted that they plan to revisit the list of root causes on a recurring basis to verify that the options are still valid. According to DOE officials, DOE plans to issue a final policy and guidance, which will include the list of root causes that sites will input into the tracking system (the Integrated Planning, Accountability and Budgeting System, or IPABS) when milestones are modified or cancelled. DOE plans to issue this guidance no later than June 30, 2021.

Recommendation: The Secretary of Energy should direct DOE's Office of Environmental Management to develop a program-wide strategy that outlines how DOE will direct available resources to address human health and environmental risks across and within sites. (Recommendation 1)

Agency: Department of Energy
Status: Open
Priority recommendation

Comments: As of February 2020, DOE's Office of Environmental Management has not developed a program-wide strategy that addresses this recommendation. DOE officials said they are "developing a strategic options analysis to evaluate the current approaches to cleanup and other recently identified opportunities across the complex that could reduce risk and life-cycle costs through more efficient and innovative approaches." According to DOE officials, the analysis will consider risk-based approaches across sites, with the goal of reducing human health and environmental risks and the associated environmental liability.

Recommendation: The Secretary of Energy should direct DOE's Office of Environmental Management to submit in EM's annually required Future-Years Defense Environmental Management Plan all mandated requirements, as well as information on annual growth in environmental liability estimates by site, the key factors causing that growth, and an explanation of significant differences between environmental liability estimates and life cycle cost estimates. (Recommendation 2)

Agency: Department of Energy
Status: Open

Comments: As of February 2020, DOE's Office of Environmental Management has not implemented this recommendation. DOE officials stated that DOE will coordinate with the Office of Management and Budget on the preparation of the Future-Years Defense Environmental Management Plan, or other reporting, to supplement Congressional Budget documentation. Officials also stated that EM is currently undertaking an analysis of EM's environmental liability growth.

Recommendation: The Secretary of Energy should direct DOE's Office of Environmental Management to disclose the funding EM needs to meet all of its schedule milestones called for in compliance agreements in, for example, supplemental reports or the annual Future-Years Defense Environmental Management Plan. (Recommendation 3)

Agency: Department of Energy
Status: Open

Comments: As of February 2020, DOE's Office of Environmental Management has not implemented this recommendation. DOE officials stated that DOE will coordinate with the Office of Management and Budget to include such information in the Future-Years Defense Environmental Management Plan, or another appropriate report.

Recommendation: To enhance DOE's ability to make risk-based decisions for the treatment of Hanford supplemental LAW, Congress should consider clarifying, in a manner that does not impair the regulatory authorities of EPA and the state of Washington, DOE's authority at Hanford to determine, in consultation with NRC, whether portions of the supplemental LAW can be managed as a waste type other than high-level waste.

Agency: Congress
Status: Open

Comments: As of March 2020, Congress is continuing to consider whether to implement this Matter.

Recommendation: To help ensure that DOE's treatment of Hanford's supplemental LAW is risk based and cost effective, the Secretary of Energy should develop updated information on the effectiveness of treating and disposing of all the different portions of Hanford's supplemental LAW with alternate methods or at alternate disposal sites, and based on this information, identify potential treatment and disposal pathways for different portions of Hanford's supplemental LAW, considering the risks posed by the LAW. In implementing this recommendation, DOE should take into account the results of the analysis required by Section 3134 of the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2017.

Agency: Department of Energy
Status: Open
Priority recommendation

Comments: As of January 2020, DOE is taking steps to implement GAO's May 2017 recommendation. In 2017, DOE's Office of River Protection contracted with Savannah River National Laboratory, a federally funded research and development center, to evaluate viable treatment options for supplemental low-activity waste. According to DOE, the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine conducted a peer review of that laboratory's evaluation. The laboratory issued a final report in October 2019, and the National Academies issued a final report in late March 2020. According to DOE officials, both reports include information DOE may be able to use in making a decision about treating supplemental low-activity waste. DOE told GAO that they plan to use the studies as scoping documents as they move forward with the decision process. According to DOE officials, as of January 2020, DOE plans to decide how it will treat supplemental low-activity waste by 2026. In addition, in response to GAO's May 2017 recommendation, DOE said it successfully completed the first phase of a project--called the Test Bed Initiative--in December 2017 to demonstrate the feasibility of grouting, transporting, and disposing of three gallons of Hanford's low-activity waste at an alternate disposal site in Andrews, Texas. As of November 2018, DOE was beginning a second phase to demonstrate the feasibility of grouting, transporting, and disposing of 2,000 gallons of Hanford's low-activity waste at the same site in Texas. However, DOE stopped the demonstration project in spring 2019 when it withdrew its permit application for the Test Bed Initiative. According to DOE officials, this was because the State of Washington Department of Ecology (Ecology) proposed that DOE and Ecology engage in negotiations to develop a "holistic and realistic" approach to the retrieval and treatment of Hanford's tank waste. Congressional appropriations committees directed that DOE could spend up to $10 million to continue the Test Bed Initiative in fiscal year 2020, but DOE officials do not have specific plans for resuming the initiative. In October 2018, DOE requested public comment on a new interpretation of the statutory term "high level waste," which if the agency adopts it, could facilitate the use of alternate treatment and disposal methods. The National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2020 prohibits DOE from spending its fiscal year 2020 funds on applying this high-level radioactive waste interpretation at Hanford, and as a result, DOE officials stated that DOE does not have near-term plans to use this high-level waste interpretation for supplemental low-activity waste at Hanford. Until DOE develops information that reflects what is now known about the performance of alternate treatment and disposal methods, such as immobilizing tank waste in grout, congressional and agency decision makers will not have access to current scientific information as they decide how to best allocate limited financial resources among many competing needs. Moreover, having updated information on the effectiveness of alternate methods for treating supplemental low-activity waste will help to inform DOE's discussions with the state of Washington.

Recommendation: To help ensure that DOE's treatment of Hanford's supplemental LAW is risk based and cost effective, the Secretary of Energy should have an independent entity develop updated information on the lifecycle costs of treating and disposing of Hanford's supplemental LAW with alternate methods or at alternate disposal sites. In implementing this recommendation, DOE should take into account the results of the analysis required by Section 3134 of the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2017.

Agency: Department of Energy
Status: Open

Comments: As of January 2020, DOE is taking steps to implement GAO's May 2017 recommendation. In 2017, DOE's Office of River Protection contracted with Savannah River National Laboratory, a federally funded research and development center, to evaluate viable treatment options for supplemental low-activity waste. According to DOE, the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine conducted a peer review of that laboratory's evaluation. The laboratory issued a final report in October 2019, and the National Academies issued a final report in late March 2020. According to DOE officials, both reports include information DOE may be able to use in making a decision about treating supplemental low-activity waste. DOE told GAO that they plan to use the studies as scoping documents as they move forward with the decision process. According to DOE officials, as of January 2020, DOE plans to decide how it will treat supplemental low-activity waste by 2026. In addition, in response to GAO's May 2017 recommendation, DOE said it successfully completed the first phase of a project--called the Test Bed Initiative--in December 2017 to demonstrate the feasibility of grouting, transporting, and disposing of three gallons of Hanford's low-activity waste at an alternate disposal site in Andrews, Texas. As of November 2018, DOE was beginning a second phase to demonstrate the feasibility of grouting, transporting, and disposing of 2,000 gallons of Hanford's low-activity waste at the same site in Texas. However, DOE stopped the demonstration project in spring 2019 when it withdrew its permit application for the Test Bed Initiative. According to DOE officials, this was because the State of Washington Department of Ecology (Ecology) proposed that DOE and Ecology engage in negotiations to develop a "holistic and realistic" approach to the retrieval and treatment of Hanford's tank waste. Congressional appropriations committees directed that DOE could spend up to $10 million to continue the Test Bed Initiative in fiscal year 2020, but DOE officials do not have specific plans for resuming the initiative. In October 2018, DOE requested public comment on a new interpretation of the statutory term "high level waste," which if the agency adopts it, could facilitate the use of alternate treatment and disposal methods. The National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2020 prohibits DOE from spending its fiscal year 2020 funds at Hanford on this high-level radioactive waste interpretation, and as a result, DOE officials stated that DOE does not have near-term plans to use this high-level waste interpretation for supplemental low-activity waste at Hanford. Until DOE develops information that reflects what is now known about the costs of alternate treatment and disposal methods, such as immobilizing tank waste in grout, congressional and agency decision makers will not have access to current cost information as they decide how to best allocate limited financial resources among many competing needs.