Crews remove a high-bay area of the Alpha-2 facility at the Y-12 National Security Complex. Demolition is scheduled to be completed in early 2026, marking the largest ever demolition at Y-12 and clearing more than 2.5 acres of land to support modernization and national security missions. Image courtesy of United Cleanup Oak Ridge & DOE Oak Ridge Office of Environmental Management

OAK RIDGE, TN — Building on the groundwork laid in 2025, the Oak Ridge Office of Environmental Management (OREM) and its contractors are set to achieve significant progress in 2026.

Their projects are removing risks, supporting the U.S. Department of Energy’s modernization efforts to advance important national missions and providing land for Oak Ridge to serve as a hub for nuclear energy technology and innovation.

Projects set for the months ahead will remove old, contaminated buildings to clear space for national security and research missions, prepare more Manhattan Project and Cold War-era facilities for demolition, reduce inventories of nuclear material stored onsite and transfer land to the community for reuse to boost economic development opportunities.

Projects set for the months ahead will remove old, contaminated buildings to clear space for national security and research missions, prepare more Manhattan Project and Cold War-era facilities for demolition, reduce inventories of nuclear material stored onsite and transfer land to the community for reuse to boost economic development opportunities.

The year kicks off with United Cleanup Oak Ridge (UCOR) crews finishing demolition on a former uranium enrichment facility and beginning that process on another 1940s-era building at the Y-12 National Security Complex.

Teams are in the final stages of tearing down the 325,000-square-foot Alpha-2 facility. This project marks the largest ever demolition at Y-12, clearing more than 2.5 acres of land to support modernization and national security missions.

Oak Ridge’s eighth and final shipment of transuranic waste for fiscal year 2025 left the site earlier this month, destined for the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico for permanent emplacement.

OREM has now met its goal to complete eight shipments of transuranic waste to the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) in New Mexico for permanent disposal this fiscal year ending Sept. 30, further reducing its inventory of the material.

Transuranic waste consists of manufactured radioactive elements heavier than uranium on the periodic table. In Oak Ridge, this waste was generated from decades of research at Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL).

Employees at Oak Ridge’s Transuranic Waste Processing Center (TWPC) treat and package the waste destined for WIPP. This fiscal year’s shipments removed 232 drums from storage as OREM and contractor UCOR steadily work to eliminate the entire inventory of legacy transuranic waste from the site.

To date, crews have processed 98% of the lower-contaminated contact-handled transuranic waste at Oak Ridge and shipped 94% of it for disposal. They have also processed approximately 98% of the higher-contaminated remote-handled waste and shipped 80% of it. Click here for an explanation of contact- and remote-handled transuranic waste.

Oak Ridge Office of Environmental Management contractor Isotek is steadily processing and disposing of the nation’s remaining inventory of uranium-233 stored at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. In 2026, employees are working to reach the halfway mark in the processing campaign. Image courtesy of United Cleanup Oak Ridge & DOE Oak Ridge Office of Environmental Management

Patrick Rapp, UCOR’s TWPC area program manager, said this year’s shipments were timed to coincide with the completion of a WIPP maintenance outage that ended in March.

The shipments were orchestrated in collaboration with the Central Characterization Project (CCP), which has specialists deployed at TWPC whose expertise ensures all WIPP-bound shipments meet stringent safety protocols and regulatory compliance standards. “It is imperative that we work together in planning waste processing and waste characterization,” said Evan Desjardins, CCP ORNL project manager. “The ultimate goal is to have transuranic waste shipped out of Tennessee, and TWPC and CCP work closely together to accomplish that.”

Crews this spring are also set to initiate demolition of the Old Steam Plant at Y-12, and they will finish preparing for demolition on the 300,000-square-foot Beta-1 former uranium enrichment facility. OREM and UCOR are also ramping up efforts at Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL), where cleanup is transforming the skyline in the central campus.

Teams will begin demolishing 11 highly contaminated former radioisotope processing facilities known as Isotope Row, and complete removal of the former Radioisotope Development Laboratory's remaining hot cell, one of the most contaminated structures at ORNL.

Crews are also working to complete deactivation of the Oak Ridge Research Reactor, one of the largest structures in the heart of the site.

OREM contractor Isotek is steadily processing and disposing of the nation’s remaining inventory of uranium-233 stored at ORNL. In 2026, employees are expected to reach the halfway mark in the processing campaign, which is the highest priority cleanup project at the site. Eliminating this inventory will remove risks and avoid significant costs to taxpayers associated with keeping it safe and secure.

Employees gather samples from 29 wells located on the future footprint of the Environmental Management Disposal Facility. In 2026, they will finish a two-year effort to gather data to understand groundwater levels needed to finalize the facility’s design. Image courtesy of United Cleanup Oak Ridge & DOE Oak Ridge Office of Environmental Management

OREM and UCOR are moving closer to starting construction for the new Environmental Management Disposal Facility (EMDF), crucial to complete cleanup at ORNL and Y-12 by adding necessary low-level waste capacity. Teams will finish a two-year effort monitoring groundwater levels that provides data needed to finish the facility’s design. Crews will also begin grading soil and constructing support facilities for the EMDF, scheduled to be operational in 2030.

The Oak Ridge Office of Environmental Management is set to transfer more than 700 acres to the community for economic reuse in 2026. Orano USA has announced plans to use one of those parcels for its new facility — among the largest uranium enrichment plants in North America. The rendering is shown here. Image courtesy of United Cleanup Oak Ridge & DOE Oak Ridge Office of Environmental Management

Previous cleanup successes have made land available for community reuse. In 2026, OREM is set to transfer more than 700 acres for economic development.

Two leading nuclear energy companies have already announced plans to invest a combined $6.7 billion to locate on this acreage, and their operations are projected to create 1,100 local jobs.