Project success in a time of uncertainty

  • Posted: Friday, August 21, 2020, 9:40 am

Y-12 continued vital projects throughout the COVID-19 response thanks to planning and teamwork. To ensure projects remained on track and on time, team members took that strong plan and coupled it with adherence to essential health and safety protocols.

One important project that continued was construction and refurbishing of two firing ranges at the Central Training Facility (CTF). The project experienced many delays because of existing site conditions during excavation of a hillside in the affected area. As the COVID-19 response was implemented, the project was allowed to continue because the outside work allowed for social distancing. The team put other safety measures in place to protect CTF and the contractor.

Angela Oberding, project manager, said, “The ability to continue the work allowed the project to complete two major components – the creek diversion and excavation of the hillside.”

The pandemic also affected the Calciner project, where equipment is being installed for the purpose of converting salvaged and impure solutions, like rinse water, mop water, decontamination water, and lab and production by-products that contain uranium, into a powder that is more manageable, stable, and easier to store and transport. Completion of this project will reduce the amount of legacy solutions that are stored.

“Working with our NNSA customer, deliverables were identified early, giving the team time to react if changes were necessary,” Matthew Manrod, project manager, said. “Through the hard work of the CNS and federal project team, we were able to obtain CD-2/3 approval on May 29, authorizing full execution of the project.”

The project team quickly and smoothly adopted teleworking and implemented a daily meeting with core team members over Skype to discuss each day’s priorities and issues.

These projects are only two examples of what the Y-12 team was accomplishing — some via telework and many on-site — as the site’s operational status changed.

Firing ranges at the Central Training Facility
As the COVID-19 response was implemented, construction and refurbishing of two firing ranges at the Central Training Facility project continued.