In 1952, in a remote corner of southeastern Utah, geologist and prospector Charlie Steen struck the largest deposit of high-grade uranium ore that had ever been found in the United States. The discovery came at a time when America was frantic for a domestic source of uranium and this discovery set off a “uranium rush.”

In order to process the uranium, Steen built the Uranium Reduction Company mill in 1956. By 1961 the facility, located on the bank of the Colorado River in Moab, Utah, required expansion in order to extract the yellowcake uranium that was in high demand by the Atomic Energy Commission. The wastes from the mill were slurried into an unlined pond on the floodplain of the river. When more capacity was needed to store the waste, a larger bowl was bulldozed to contain the radioactive materials. The Uranium Reduction Company continued to operate the mill until 1962 when the assets were sold to Atlas.

Uranium concentrate, the milling product, was sold to the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission through December 1970. During its years of operation, the mill processed an average of approximately 1,400 tons per day. Atlas operated the site until 1984 under a license and regulatory authority provided by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC). When the processing operations ceased in 1984, an estimated 16 million tons of uranium mill tailings and tailings-contaminated soil were present in the unlined impoundment located on the western portion of the property. Atlas placed an interim cover over the tailings pile in 1995 as part of ongoing decommissioning activities conducted between 1988 and 1995. Atlas proposed to reclaim the tailings pile for permanent disposal in its current location but declared bankruptcy in 1998 and, in doing so, relinquished its license and forfeited its reclamation bond. Because NRC could not legally possess a site it regulated, NRC appointed PricewaterhouseCoopers as the Trustee of the Moab Mill Reclamation Trust and the licensee for the site. The Trustee used the forfeited reclamation bond funds to initiate site reclamation, conduct ground water studies, and perform site maintenance activities.

In October 2000, Congress and the President approved the Floyd D. Spence National Defense Authorization Act for fiscal year 2001, Public Law 106-398 (the act). The act stipulated that the license issued by NRC for the materials at the Moab site be terminated and that the title and responsibility for cleanup be transferred to DOE. Title of the site was transferred to DOE on October 25, 2001. Specifically, the DOE office in Grand Junction, Colorado, now has primary responsibility for the Moab site. [NOTE: The preceding site history is quoted from the moabtailings.org website]

Following interim stabilization/cleanup measures and site characterization performed by various subcontractors between 2001 and 2006, a contract was awarded to EnergySolutions (ES) in early 2007 to design and construct support infrastructure and initiate actual cleanup of the Atlas Site. The contract with ES was awarded through competitive bidding as a Task Order under one of the large-business FOCUS contracts awarded by DOE in 2004. The Moab Project task order awarded to ES includes handling of about 2.5 million tons of Residual Radioactive Material (RRM) and is essentially a pilot project to determine the best methodology for removing and disposing of the total pile which covers 144 acres, is up to 90-feet deep, and contains approximately 16 million tons of RRM.

Envirocon was chosen as a teaming partner to ES because of our extensive radiological experience on DOE sites in general and at the Moab site in particular. The total value of the contract awarded to ES is approximately $100M. Envirocon’s work scope is defined in a Basic Ordering Agreement (BOA), and administered through individual task orders.

Envirocon’s work scope includes:

• Management of the on-pile dust control sprinkler system and this activity is ongoing for the life of the project;
• Off-Pile remediation of approximately 375,000 tons of Residual Radioactive Material (RRM); as noted below, this task is partially complete and the remainder will be done over the next 2 ˝ years;
• Development of the On-Pile Excavation Work Plan for DOE approval; the plan was written and approved by DOE nearly one year ahead of schedule;
• Procurement and Mobilization of On-Pile Equipment; the initial equipment spread was mobilized in January 2008; and
• Excavation, conditioning, stockpiling, and loadout of approximately 2.5M tons of RRM from the main tailings pile; this work will be ongoing through September 2011

Envirocon mobilized to the site in October 2007 to begin a sub-task called “Early Off-Pile Remediation” which included the cleanup of areas surrounding the main pile so that buildings and infrastructure could be constructed to support the removal of the pile. Early Off-Pile work was complete in March 2008 and by then Envirocon had remediated approximately 38 acres and moved nearly 40,000 CY of RRM to the main pile.

For the remainder of 2008, Envirocon worked with ES to optimize methodologies for executing the total project workscope. The discussions involved a variety of issues ranging from the method of transportation for disposal (truck vs. train), to which equipment should be used for loadout of RRM (loader vs. excavator). Most of these issues were resolved by fall 2008.

Envirocon mobilized to the site again in December 2008 to begin removal of the main tailings pile. Personnel were hired and trained, equipment was mobilized, and Integrated Work Plans (IWP) were written, reviewed, and approved. Removal of the main pile began in February 2009 with a crew of 21 Envirocon employees working under the direction of Project Manager Greg Church and Superintendent Kelly Finley. Initially, our work encompassed only excavation and conditioning because the infrastructure required for transportation and disposal was not yet complete. This staggered start was planned to allow Envirocon an opportunity to build a stockpile of material in advance of disposal operations.

Envirocon’s work scope includes:

• Excavating about 2.5 million tons of uranium mill tailings (RRM) using a PC400 excavator, a D6 LGP dozer, and a D155 dozer.
• Loadout of excavated RRM into 35-ton articulated haul trucks.
• Spreading the RRM in 10-inch lifts on drying pads using a D155 dozer.
• “Land Farming” to condition (dry) the RRM using a Cat Challenger and disk to turn the material frequently. About one-third of the material is a milling byproduct called “slimes” which are about the consistency of toothpaste and contain up to 85% water.
• Pushing the conditioned RRM into stockpiles using a D155 dozer.
• Loading the conditioned RRM into 32-yard containers using a PC400 excavator. The containers are mounted on modified tractor-trailer units owned by ES.
• Hauling the filled containers through a lidding station where hard lids are placed on each container.
• “Handing off” full and lidded containers to ES across a radiation boundary to a Container Transfer Area (CTA) (staging area).
• Picking up an empty container to repeat the cycle.

By spring 2009, the infrastructure was complete, along with rail modifications and improvements. In addition, the disposal cell at Crescent Junction, Utah was complete and ready to accept RRM from Moab. Transportation and disposal began April 20, 2009. After receiving filled containers from Envirocon, the ES transportation and disposal workscope includes:

Envirocon’s original proposal was based on a daily production rate of about 5,000 tons per day (TPD) resulting from operation of two separate excavation, conditioning, and loadout operations. However, our initial effort was limited to a single operation because of issues with the project baseline schedule and budget. Nevertheless, Envirocon has been able to produce an average of about 4,000 TPD with the single operation and to date we have been able to produce material faster than it can be disposed of at Crescent Junction.

One of the challenges to our operation is the conditioning of the material. The pile consists, in general, of three types of material: 1) red, dry uncontaminated cover material, mainly sand; 2) relatively dry, gray uranium mill tailings; and 3) the previously mentioned “slimes” which are very unstable and contain a high percentage of water. These three materials are dispersed through the pile in an unpredictable manner, so each day’s excavation exposes a different ratio between them. This also means that excavated material, when spread on the drying pads, has widely variable overall moisture content, so the number of days of disking required to sufficiently dry the material is not entirely predictable. This, together with variations in temperature, wind, and other weather conditions require continuous monitoring of the moisture content on the drying pads to ensure adequate drying while allowing material to be moved off the pads quickly after it is deemed ready for shipment. Fortunately, about nine months of the year is conducive to drying in the Moab desert climate and we anticipate that only the three remaining months will present an ongoing challenge.

Concurrent with the On-Pile work, Envirocon will also remediate the remaining Off-Pile areas, bringing an additional 257,000 tons of RRM to the main pile to be blended with on-pile tailings and slimes. In addition, Envirocon will dismantle, modify, operate, and maintain the existing On-Pile sprinkler/dust control system.

In early spring 2009, the Moab Atlas UMTRA project received an unexpected boost in the form of $108M in additional funding over the next 2 ˝ years (September 2011). The source for the additional funding is the American Reinvestment and Recovery Act (ARRA), more commonly known as “Stimulus Funding.” The Moab project was selected to receive the additional funding for a number of reasons. Foremost was the fact that the project was in its early stages of operation and was thus determined to be “shovel-ready.” Additionally, legislators from Utah, Arizona, Nevada, and California have for years been putting pressure on their peers in Congress and on the NRC and DOE to clean up the Moab site because its proximity to the Colorado River was seen as a potential source of radiological and chemical contamination which might affect downstream populations in those states. Further, there has been a good deal of pressure from the State of Utah because of the considerable tourist dollars spent in the Moab area. The additional funding, if it is continued at the ARRA/Stimulus would see all 16 million tons moved and the project complete by 2019 rather than the originally projected 2028.

Meanwhile, ES and Envirocon are gearing up for efficient utilization of the $108M in ARRA money already funded. Several scenarios are being considered, but the one with the most traction at this time is a seven-day-per-week operation. Envirocon would employ two separate crews; crew one would work a 4 X 10 schedule Monday through Thursday and crew two would work a 3 X 12 schedule Friday through Sunday. Both shifts would operate two excavation/conditioning/loadout operations. If this becomes a reality, Envirocon would employ about 70 people on site and have nearly 35 pieces of owned equipment on site through September 2011. In addition, production would increase from the current 90 containers per day to 136.

ES’s task order with DOE expires September 30, 2011 and it is undecided at this time whether or not DOE will re-compete the remaining 12+ million ton contract among FOCUS Contract holders. Both ES and Envirocon are working together closely to perform the work safely, control costs, and provide the best possible performance to DOE in order to optimize our chances for a negotiated contract extension rather than a re-compete. In any case, the Moab Atlas Project is a marquee project for both ES and Envirocon. It receives a great deal of media attention and is being watched closely by the federal government as a means to gauge the success of ARRA funding. Locally, there are several community watchdog groups with a deep and continuing interest in seeing the massive pile removed. In the end, this project has the potential to be one of the largest and most successful ever completed by Envirocon in our 20-year history.