Mark W. Frei
Acting Deputy Assistant Secretary for Waste Management
Office of Environmental Management
U.S. Department of Energy

Douglas W. Tonkay
Waste Type Plan Development Team Leader
Office of Environmental Management
U.S. Department of Energy

Paula W. Austin
Senior Policy Analyst
Science Applications International Corporation

The Department of Energy's (DOE) Environmental Management (EM) program is shifting its corporate approach at managing its waste and nuclear materials so that more can be accomplished with less. DOE is applying "program integration" complex-wide to identify and act on opportunities to do more with less, while supporting achievement of the EM 2006 vision.

DOE has established an EM Program Integration Team to facilitate the identification, evaluation, and implementation of integration opportunities. Such opportunities include the following: eliminating redundant facilities and using available capacity, crossing program boundaries or removing "stovepipes," taking advantage of the collective learning curve, applying site successes and lessons learned nation-wide, sharing the use of innovative technologies, and using national procurements to meet unique needs. As opportunities are identified and evaluated within DOE, those ripe for further consideration will be addressed as part of DOE/EM's formal decision processes, e.g., National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) and budget processes, with the involvement of states, Tribal Nations, and stakeholders.

Prior to 1989, the Department managed its waste and nuclear materials on a site-by-site basis in support of its nuclear weapons production and research and development missions. Since 1989, the environmental management program has consolidated ongoing cleanup activities from various programs, initially focusing on corrective action activities aimed at bringing sites into compliance with environmental statutes and eliminating urgent risks. With corrective activities largely in place, the environmental management program is now focusing on a vision to clean up as much as possible in a decade. Doing this cost-effectively and efficiently requires institutionalizing program integration into the corporate thinking of headquarters and field managers.

Program integration will result in recommendations that can be formally acted upon by EM managers through existing decision-making processes, such as the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) process, regulatory compliance mechanisms, and the budget process. DOE/EM has recently issued several NEPA environmental impact statements (EISs), which are expected to support various Records of Decision in 1998. These include the Waste Management Programmatic EIS, the second Waste Isolation Pilot Plant Supplement EIS (WIPP SEIS-II), and the Management of Certain Plutonium Residues and Scrub Alloy Stored at the Rocky Flats Environmental Technology Site EIS. In addition to decisions made under the NEPA process, Records of Decision are made with respect to cleanup decisions under the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA) and Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA). Any new opportunities for integration must be consistent with existing decisions or must be addressed through these decision processes again.

New opportunities could include:

• eliminating redundant facilities and using available capacity;
• crossing program boundaries or removing "stovepipes;"
• taking advantage of the collective learning curve;
• applying site successes and lessons learned nation-wide;
• sharing the use of innovative technologies; and
• using national procurements to meet unique needs.

Several key efforts are underway to incorporate program efficiencies into the DOE/EM program. These include (1) ongoing development of the Draft Accelerating Cleanup: Focus on 2006 (the "2006 Plan"), (2) programmatic configuration decisions for mixed low-level waste and low-level waste, and (3) the evaluation of additional program integration opportunities recommended by an independent team of major EM site contractor organizations. An EM Program Integration Team, comprised of program managers at both headquarters and field offices, is now in place to build upon these independent efforts and coordinate integration throughout the EM organization. These efforts are further discussed below.

In May 1996, DOE's Assistant Secretary for Environmental Management challenged the EM program to develop plans for cleaning up as much of the weapons complex as possible within ten years. To attain this ten-year vision, DOE developed a Discussion Draft Accelerating Cleanup: Focus on 2006 (known as the "2006 Plan"). The Discussion Draft was issued in June 1997 and was designed to give Tribal Nations, states, regulators, and other stakeholders an opportunity to participate in the development of the entire EM program, helping DOE to define innovative approaches to streamlining cleanup and save taxpayer dollars. Since the Discussion Draft was issued, a series of meetings and educational workshops have been held at DOE and other sites to discuss the Discussion Draft 2006 Plan and obtain feedback. The DOE sites are developing revised site-specific Draft 2006 Plans that will support a Draft National 2006 Plan. Integration efforts are playing an important role in development of the Draft 2006 Plan. The 2006 planning process is establishing a "baseline" from which the EM program will operate. The baseline will reflect milestones contained in compliance agreements and Records of Decision that are in place as a result of key NEPA activities (e.g., the Waste Management Programmatic Environmental Impact Statement). The baseline will change as additional Records of Decision or other programmatic decisions are made.

Program integration activities have provided tools to depict the baseline in a systematic fashion. The tools graphically portray the baseline and can be used to evaluate alternatives. The tools support discussions with Site-Specific Advisory Boards or Citizen Advisory Boards, Tribal Nations, stakeholders, and regulators as DOE proceeds toward decisions on a waste management configuration (discussed below) and refines its plans. These include:

• Baseline disposition maps, which illustrate a site's proposed disposition path (waste generated and in inventory, stabilization or treatment, and disposition) for each waste and nuclear material type; and
• Site input/output diagrams, which, based on a site's baseline disposition maps, will provide a picture of all waste and nuclear materials entering, exiting, or remaining at a particular site.

The development of this information will also guide decisions on where to focus technology development and deployment and specific needs for transportation. The development of this information will be completed in early 1998 so that they can be shared with DOE's stakeholders.

Integration efforts also ensure that the 2006 planning process is consistent with programmatic decision making, e.g., configuration decisions resulting from the Final Waste Management Programmatic EIS, nuclear materials decisions on Rocky Flats residues and scrub allow, and other DOE EISs (e.g., plutonium disposition). Several waste management configuration decisions will be made over the next year. These will be discussed later in this session in the presentation by Karen Guevara.

During preparation of the Discussion Draft 2006 Plan, DOE's Assistant Secretary for Environmental Management challenged senior executives of eleven of DOE's contractor organizations to independently identify, analyze, and recommend technical opportunities which reduce costs, significantly accelerate cleanup schedules, and further the goals of the 2006 Plan.

By using teams of national experts in a "workout" format, and through use of systems engineering approaches, the "Complex-Wide EM Integration Team" developed a series of recommendations for further integration opportunities. The team's recommendations cover mixed and low-level wastes, high-level waste, transuranic waste, environmental restoration activities, and spent nuclear fuel. The team identified 36 recommendations with a potential total of about $24 billion in life-cycle cost savings and avoidances if all were accepted and implemented by DOE.

DOE staff performed an initial screening of the recommendations and concluded that 22 of 36 should be further considered. These recommendations were summarized in the June 1997 Discussion Draft 2006 Plan and were presented as alternatives to the Discussion Draft 2006 planning basis. One recommendation is no longer being considered at this time, reducing the number to 21 recommendations. DOE is now evaluating these to determine whether to reject or to implement them. A summary of the recommendations and estimated cost savings is presented below.

• Pretreatment process to reduce high-level waste volumes ($4.8 billion savings);
• Accelerate calcine separation of INEEL high-level waste ($1.1 billion savings);
• Hanford Cs and Sr to INEEL ($0.15 billion);
• Shared HLW storage and vitrification facilities -- INEEL sends waste to Hanford ($0.41 billion savings);
• West Valley Demonstration Project canisters to Savannah River Site for storage ($0.74 billion in savings).

• Accelerate transuranic waste shipments and closure of WIPP (being implemented to the extent possible through accelerated cleanup at sites) ($2.7 billion savings);
• Develop enhanced transportation systems ($0.4 billion savings);
• Apply mobile waste preparation system to minimize need for new facilities (being implemented) ($0.3 billion savings);
• Consolidate transuranic waste storage ($0.2 billion savings);
• Pursue transuranic waste acceptance changes for disposal ($0.1 billion).

• Maximize use of existing DOE facilities for mixed low-level waste treatment ($70 million savings);
• Dispose in existing DOE and commercial facilities ($70 million savings);
• Expand use of national procurement contracts ($85 million savings);
• Establish a "de minimus" radioactivity level ($100 million savings);
• Standardize mixed low-level waste characterization ($50 million savings).

• Consolidate disposal facilities, with direct funding of disposal operations (NTS, Hanford) ($0.25 billion);
• Treatment of low-level waste only when cost-effective or required (already being implemented) ($0.22 billion savings).

• Uniform cleanup standards ($0.2 billion savings);
• Accelerated remedial process ($0.1 billion savings);
• Sharing of expertise and resources ($0.3 billion savings).

• Establish performance-based spent nuclear fuel storage and disposal ($1 billion savings)

The EM Program Integration Team is coordinating the evaluation by DOE headquarters and field offices of the contractors' recommendations described above. DOE will not implement the recommendations until it has completed an intensive review of their underlying assumptions and rationale and a detailed evaluation of such factors as: cost and schedule savings; initial investment; risk to workers, the public, and the environment; and perceptions of equity on the part of stakeholders. The evaluation must also ensure that all necessary reviews have been completed under NEPA (e.g., programmatic, site-specific, or project-specific environmental reviews) and/or within other applicable regulatory requirements.

Some of the recommendations fall within existing legal and regulatory requirements, while others are based on changes to such requirements. DOE's evaluation will include a review of the potential cost and timing factors that could be associated with such constraints prior to acceptance for future implementation. The evaluation must also carefully evaluate risk to workers, the public, and the environment.

For those recommendations that DOE deems appropriate for further consideration, there will be opportunities for stakeholders to weigh in on the recommendations. These would include site advisory board meetings, Tribal Nations, DOE's ongoing discussions with state regulators and national/regional groups, and the public during review of the Draft 2006 Plan. As needs for conducting additional reviews of the recommendations under existing environmental regulations may be identified, the recommendations would again be presented to the public as part of established decision processes, such as those under NEPA for ensuring environmental compliance.

Results are just beginning to appear from the program integration efforts. Headquarters and field managers have engaged in the process to develop a baseline and carefully evaluate alternatives. Waste and nuclear materials disposition maps and supporting data are being shared with regulators, Tribal Nations, and stakeholders. We are reaching agreement on the scope of work that needs to be performed to complete cleanup and systematically evaluating opportunities, but there is much more to be done.

The EM Program Integration Team is working to link EM's science and technology development programs to the waste and nuclear materials disposition pathways. Our tools will provide an indication of the availability of the pathway, in terms of needed technology, transportation, or other efforts. Linking our science and technology needs directly to our program requirements will enable managers to ensure that resources are being correctly allocated consistent with needs.

Transportation systems analysis from EM's National Transportation Program supports the EM Program Integration effort. Activities include continued evaluation of transportation needs and evaluation of integration opportunities for packaging and handling. The transportation efforts support implementation of waste and nuclear material integration opportunities, because many involve movement of waste or materials between sites to take advantage of shared facilities. Stakeholder interaction is important as communities and states along transportation corridors are impacted by waste shipments.

The EM Program Integration Team is also working very closely with our Nuclear Material Stewardship effort to provide support in defining their systems requirements. Future efforts may extend into interfaces with other DOE programs that are involved in management of waste and nuclear materials, e.g., Material Disposition, Civilian Radioactive Waste Management, and Defense Programs, just to name a few. The Department can benefit from the systems analysis that integration provides to meeting its overall missions.

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