December 20, 2010

Audit of Environmental Cleanup Projects Funded by the Recovery Act at the Y-12 National Security Complex

In February 2009, the President signed the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (Recovery Act) into law. Part of the Recovery Act's purpose, relevant to the Department of Energy (Department), was to invest in environmental protection. Accordingly, the Department's Oak Ridge Office of Environmental Management (EM) received $216 million of Recovery Act funds to perform environmental cleanup activities at the National Nuclear Security Administration's (NNSA) Y-12 National Security Complex (Y-12). These funds were allocated to seven projects addressing material disposition, deactivation and demolition, and remediation. Y-12 is managed and operated by Babcox & Wilcox Y-12 Technical Services, LLC (B&W Y-12). The NNSA Y-12 Site Office (Site Office) is responsible for overseeing B&W Y-12, including its management of these projects. Due to the importance of the Recovery Act's investment in environmental protection, we initiated this audit to determine whether Y-12 is effectively managing its environmental cleanup activities funded by the Recovery Act. During the audit we reviewed three of Y-12's seven EM Recovery Act funded projects, which accounted for $164 million of the $216 million total funding. As of August 2010, Y-12 had awarded 428 subcontracts with a total value of $39 million to support the three projects we reviewed. We analyzed nine of these subcontracts valued at a total of $10 million.

Topic: Environmental Cleanup