Hanford nuclear site was on the brink of layoffs. Then this happened in D.C.

RICHLAND – Money was made available to prevent subcontractor employee layoffs at the Hanford nuclear site in Eastern Washington the day after Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., faced off with Energy Secretary Chris Wright about the Hanford budget.

The hearing with the new energy secretary was called by the Senate Energy and Water Development Appropriations Subcommittee on Wednesday to discuss the Trump administration’s fiscal 2026 budget request for the Department of Energy.

But Murray told Wright that the energy department’s Office of Environmental Management had not released money for work under the current fiscal 2025 budget that Congress appropriated.

On March 15, President Trump signed the fiscal 2025 budget resolution for the fiscal year that began Oct. 1, with a spending plan required by law within 45 days, Murray reminded Wright.

But DOE had not given that plan to Congress, which needs to know where the money is being spent, Murray said.

“Hanford site is on the brink of having to lay off subcontractors and restart an entire procurement process on an important project because they are being directed now to hold off on implementing projects at FY’25 spend levels,” she said at the hearing.

Murray is the vice chairperson of the Senate Appropriations Committee and the ranking member of the subcommittee holding the hearing.

Funds for Hanford waste disposal

DOE responded the next day by releasing money for the Environmental Restoration Disposal Facility (ERDF) at Hanford, which had subcontract work that was reportedly most immediately at risk.

The lined landfill in the center of Hanford has been used since 1996 to dispose of more than 19 million tons of waste from environmental cleanup at the nuclear reservation.

It accepts low level radioactive waste and hazardous chemical waste, that includes contaminated soil, debris from demolished buildings and debris from burial grounds that do not meet modern environmental standards.

Waste is disposed of in cells, which are added as needed.

This summer, work is planned to start on adding an 11th cell, called a super cell because it is twice the size of the landfill’s first eight cells.

It will be 2,000 feet long and 1,000 feet wide and hold about 2.8 million cubic yards of waste, providing disposal capacity to allow environmental cleanup to continue.

While money was released for the ERDF subcontract, Murray indicated during the hearing that it was not the only Hanford subcontract at risk due to money appropriated by Congress for the current year not released.

DOE provided no information last week to the Tri-City Herald on subcontracts potentially at risk.

Flat Hanford budget inadequate

For the fiscal 2026 DOE budget, DOE has released only limited information

Hanford is called out in the budget as the only cleanup site that the Trump administration proposes giving steady funding, while 13 other DOE sites and the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico are targeted for cuts totaling $389 million.

A flat budget for Hanford “has serious repercussions,” Murray told Wright.

In January, DOE and the Washington state Department of Ecology finalized an agreement on treating tank waste after nearly four years of negotiations.

But flat funding means the only way to meet deadlines in the new plan for preparing and treating high level radioactive waste for disposal would be to pull money from other Hanford cleanup priorities, Murray said.

That “would have ripple effects for workers carrying out critical projects across the site and ultimately would delay remediation along the Columbia River,” Murray said. “That is unacceptable. We cannot rob Peter to pay Paul.”

Long-term plans for Hanford cleanup outlined in the 2025 Hanford Lifecycle Scope, Schedule and Cost Report call for increasing annual spending at Hanford by billions of dollars to finish most remaining environmental cleanup as early as 2085 at a cost ranging from $364 billion to $589 billion.

Wright criticizes ‘political science’

Other DOE programs that impact research at Pacific Northwest National Laboratory would have deep cuts under the Trump administration’s proposed fiscal 2026 budget, Murray said.

“Your budget slashes $1.1 billion from the Office of Science,” Murray said to Wright. “Who is telling you that we should cede ground to China in the race for innovation and lay off scientists at our national labs?”

That spending reduction will undermine research projects, including in areas that are key for the national lab in Richland, for artificial intelligence, quantum computing and nuclear energy, she said.

But Wright responded that the $1.1 billion cut would not impact important research, including in fundamental basic science, fusion and quantum computing.

“The problem is the labs drifted into things that are not fundamental basic science – that are political science,” he said.

He named “a crazy range of things on climate change” as an example.

Murray says calls not returned

Murray called out Wright in the hearing for not responding to Congressional questions on staffing and other issues and not spending money as directed in budgets approved by Congress.

At a House subcommittee hearing on May 7, Wright said he received too many requests for information and briefings from Congress to have time to respond. But he said he would be happy to take phone calls from Congress.

But Murray said not only was she not getting written responses, but he has not been returning her calls.

It took a month and a half for her to get a call scheduled, and the seven letters she and colleagues have sent him over the past several months requesting information were ignored until the day before the Senate subcommittee hearing, she said.

Wright said at the House subcommittee hearing that less than a thousand workers had left DOE since he became energy secretary.

That was untrue, Murray said.

“We know over 3,500 DOE employees have taken the so-called buyout that you offered and we know you fired 500 more,” she said.

She also pressed him on a statement that no contracts have been canceled “when you have plainly canceled electric vehicle and low-income energy assistant grants in Colorado,” she said.

“And it is false for you to say there are no unpaid invoices, when we have heard from organizations still waiting on payments, including hydrogen hubs, which have unpaid invoices,” Murray said.

Ignoring the clear directions of Congress is illegal, Murray said.