The Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge Office of Environmental Management (DOE EM) agrees with the Oak Ridge Site Specific Advisory Board’s (ORSSAB) recommendation to provide additional information in fact sheets detailing the status of areas that were remediated on the Oak Ridge Reservation (ORR).


Portions of the reservation, including the East Tennessee Technology Park, Y-12 National Security Complex, and Oak Ridge National Laboratory, have residual contamination from work performed during the World War II Manhattan Project and the subsequent Cold War. DOE EM is cleaning up those areas under the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act.


In May 2014, DOE gave a presentation and demonstration to ORSSAB’s EM & Stewardship Committee on its geographical information system (GIS). It contains information about the status of contamination and cleanup of specific sites and areas across the reservation. There are fact sheets for every area that has been the subject of a Record of Decision. The fact sheets provide a summary of each location’s history and information about its current condition. They also provide links to relevant documents regarding cleanup actions. The GIS is publically available at http://www.ucor.com/oreis.html.


The committee noted that some, but not all, of the fact sheets describe future decisions and actions. It drafted a recommendation, later approved by ORSSAB, that fact sheets for areas remediated under interim actions should indicate that additional evaluations will be performed before DOE EM finalizes decisions.


DOE responded that it is important for the public to have appropriate information on residual contamination located on the ORR. The agency continued that it will update the current GIS fact sheets to capture current and anticipated future status of all interim cleanup actions based on ORSSAB’s recommendation.


ORSSAB meets the second Wednesday of each month at 6 p.m. at the DOE Information Center in the Office of Science and Technical Information, 1 Science.gov Way, Oak Ridge, fronting the 100 block of Oak Ridge Turnpike. Additional information about the board is available on the internet at www.energy.gov/orssab or by calling (865) 241-4583 or 241-4584.