The Oak Ridge Office of Environmental Management finished a 2.5-year piping replacement project that is crucial to maintain ongoing missions and daily operations at Oak Ridge National Laboratory.
Office of Environmental Management
September 8, 2026
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Crews lift stainless steel pipes to weld them into position at the Process Waste Facility at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. In total, teams installed 2,500 feet of piping in the 2.5-year project.
OAK RIDGE, Tenn. — The Oak Ridge Office of Environmental Management (OREM) finished a 2.5-year piping replacement project that is crucial to maintain ongoing missions and daily operations at Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL).
This life-extension effort involved replacing all above-ground piping for the Liquid and Gaseous Waste Operations (LGWO) system’s Process Waste Facility. The upgrades significantly reduce the risk of outages that would pause operations at the site and the need for frequent maintenance and repairs on the aging infrastructure.
LGWO is comprised of more than 60 facilities and 27 miles of piping that process waste generated from cleanup operations, research and development laboratories and nuclear reactors. The system treats an average of 110 million gallons of waste every year.
“By modernizing this system, we are safeguarding vital daily operations and reducing the long-term maintenance demands associated with aging infrastructure,” said Michael Griswold, acting ORNL portfolio federal project director.
Crews replaced decades-old carbon steel piping with new stainless steel piping at the Process Waste Facility, part of the Liquid and Gaseous Waste Operations system at Oak Ridge National Laboratory.
Crews with OREM cleanup contractor United Cleanup Oak Ridge (UCOR) replaced 2,500 feet of carbon steel piping with stainless steel at the Process Waste Facility. Workers removed old insulation to measure, fabricate and weld lines of various sizes, and they updated more than 300 support components, such as valves and flanges, to stainless steel. Flanges are ring-like rims attached to pipe ends.
Along the way, teams installed heat trace systems, which prevent the pipes from freezing and impacting operations during winter months.
Workers insulate a portion of newly installed and upgraded piping at the Process Waste Facility, part of the Liquid and Gaseous Waste Operations system at Oak Ridge National Laboratory.
“Because of the careful planning and collaboration across this project, we had zero negative impacts to routine waste processing and faced no storage constraints during this multiyear task,” said James Wheeler, UCOR’s ORNL nuclear operations area project manager.
Replacing the above-ground piping and other supporting components ensures LGWO continues to safely collect, store and efficiently transfer wastewater for treatment without interruption to ongoing cleanup and research missions.
Up next, crews will begin similar piping upgrades at ORNL’s Melton Valley Process Waste Collection Tank Facility, also part of the LGWO system.
-Contributor: Ella Stewart
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