Team Member's Insight, Questions Lead Oak Ridge Project to $16 Million Savings

Oak Ridge workers sort through legacy items inside the Alpha-4 building to prepare for the facility’s deactivation at the Y-12 National Security Complex.

OAK RIDGE, Tenn. — Insight and a questioning attitude from a project manager has led the Oak Ridge Office of Environmental Management (OREM) to accelerate one of the largest demolitions on the horizon at the Y-12 National Security Complex and help avoid millions of dollars in costs to taxpayers.

Brian Hutson with OREM contractor United Cleanup Oak Ridge (UCOR) believed the team could find efficiencies in a necessary step to get the Alpha-4 building demolition-ready: clearing all classified equipment and systems from the facility. Initial estimates identified nearly 3,000 items requiring special removal, which would take 4.5 years and cost $66 million.

Hutson worked closely with OREM, the Y-12 Field Office, and classification personnel to develop an approach that reduces the number of items requiring classified disposal from 3,000 to less than 300. The change shortens the schedule by 1.5 years and saves $16 million.

“Being in the right place at the right time and knowing the right people was the catalyst for bringing a different perspective to the table,” Hutson said. “It was time to re-evaluate efficiencies to reduce the process time, ease the labor burden, reduce the number of classified items for removal, make the work environment safer, and deliver a cost-avoidance outcome saving millions in budget and taxpayer dollars.”

Input and leadership from United Cleanup Oak Ridge Project Manager Brian Hutson helped avoid $16 million in costs to taxpayers and accelerates the deactivation schedule for the Alpha-4 Building project by 1.5 years.

Workers are in the early stages of deactivating Alpha-4, which spans 561,000 square feet and covers a 13-acre area. The facility was used for uranium separation in the 1940s, and it later supported lithium separation before it was shut down permanently in the 1960s.

There is hope OREM and UCOR can apply the revised approach to classified disposal to benefit other major upcoming cleanup projects at Y-12.

In the meantime, the savings from the Alpha-4 project are funding additional cleanup tasks and enabling more progress.

“Our projects at Y-12 are incredibly complex due to the size, condition and contents of the facilities we’re taking down,” said Morgan Carden, OREM’s Y-12 federal project manager. “Brian is an excellent example of what’s possible through a willingness to ask questions, challenge previous approaches and bring the right people together who are all committed to achieving the best result.”

An aerial view of the Alpha-4 facility covering a 13-acre area at the Y-12 National Security Complex.

The work currently happening inside Alpha-4 to prepare the building for teardown follows extensive efforts on its exterior in recent years.

OREM and UCOR cleaned out the old Column Exchange (COLEX) equipment on the east and west sides of the structure, and removed all of the equipment from the west side.

Crews recovered 4.19 tons of mercury before demolishing the West COLEX. By deactivating the East COLEX and performing cleanup work in Alpha-4, teams retrieved another 2.3 tons, bringing the total amount of mercury recovered to 6.49 tons.

-Contributor: Carol Hendrycks