BY MAIRE O’NEILL
maire@losalamosreporter.com

NNSA Los Alamos Field Office Manager Ted Wyka took a deep dive into multiple topics during his presentation Tuesday evening to the Los Alamos County Council including mission and impacts, such as budget, hiring, housing and transportation, Los Alamos National Laboratory transformation and ongoing concerns about traffic safety.

Wyka noted that the President submitted his budget request for FY25 in March.

“As we all know, Congress will determine the outcome, but I am optimistic that it will be solid for LANL in FY25,” he said. NNSA aims to manufacture at least 80 War Reserve plutonium pits per year at the Savannah River Site. and LANL – as close to 2030 as possible to meet national security requirements with a goal of 30 PPY at LANL by 2028.”

Wyka said LANL’s primary focus is switching away from growth and more towards mission execution, and developing a pathway for workforce integration.

“For 2025, LANL is projecting to hire roughly 1400 people. That number comprises of replacing the annual attrition of roughly 900 people a year and 500 additional to cover various programmatic activities to support mission needs. To meet the traffic and housing challenges brought about by the new LANL employees, the LANL team has adopted several strategies to maneuver past the hurdle including – remote work, off-site office facilities, alternative work schedules, and such,” he said. “With these options available to employees, we are experiencing success in filling slots within the lab organizations.”

Wyka noted that he is also pleased to see that there is new housing stock coming online in the County, and across Northern New Mexico.

He addressed ongoing fire mitigation efforts noting that LANL has been undergoing transformations by clearing defensible space around facilities on the lab including TA-48, the Weapons Facilities Operations and WFO firing sites. Defensible space thinning work on NNSA property adjacent to the Ridge Park Condos in townsite has been completed and is currently ongoing at the Los Arboles condos, Wyka said. Thinning will occur in Water Canyon around the facilities in and around the Weapons Engineering Tritium Facility.

“LANL has also completed other defensible space reviews and has planned several space thinning projects for FY25, the first being TA-72, pending completion of the flood plain assessment review, which is now in the final stages of approval,” Wyka said.

Wyka addressed traffic-related safety, a concern shared by the County and NNSA.

“The Los Alamos Field Office, working with LANL, is spearheading an initiative to deter aggressive driving (such as speeding, cutting off other drivers, failing to signal, failing to yield, tailgating, road rage and other intimidation measures) on the Los Alamos National Laboratory. The initiative is in response to several complaints, near-misses, accidents, injuries, and unfortunately, fatalities that have been reported recently. Specifically, on LANL proper, speed cameras have been installed and traffic data is being collected and used to enforce safe driving habits like observing posted speed limits,” he said.

Accountability for poor driving behavior onsite and offsite among LANL employees will now have consequences, he said.

“Our area of jurisdiction is limited, but we are doing what we can now, and we are looking to partner with local law enforcement. We would like to partner to develop concrete solutions that result in reduced number of crashes or incidents involving poor driving behavior, which we hope will lead to reduced severity of injuries, reduced number of citizen complaints, and requests for frequent police response. The primary objective is to improve driver safety in and around the Los Alamos Area,” Wyka said.

Wyka went on to highlight what his team and the County have accomplished in terms of fire mitigation to ensure the safety of the community. He said the Rendija Canyon mitigation project is now complete, with areas focused along the mesa rim bottom, utility corridors and general open space.

“Approximately 130 acres were treated in a mosaic pattern resulting in a reduced risk to NNSA, private, and county property. Approximately 6000 tons of fuel were removed and or redistributed across the landscape to reduce fire risk, and erosion control measures were put in place after treatment to limit erosion until ground cover regrowth can be established,” Wyka said.

Another notable wildland fire mitigation activity this past fiscal year included annual maintenance to local evacuation routes, fire roads, and fire breaks. The size of safety perimeters around numerous firing sites was increased to reduce the risk of an onsite fire spreading to the adjacent properties, including Pajarito Acres and White Rock.

“Additionally, we began working at TA-72 to prepare for the treatment along the truck route and the outdoor firing range, as well as completing the utility corridor work in Los Alamos Canyon and added utility corridor work in high explosive areas. We also applied fire retardant paint to the bottom 5-6 feet of the wooden power pole structures in Los Alamos Canyon, along West Road and on SR4 from TA- 49 to the intersection of West Jemez,” Wyka said.

Normal program activities have also been completed, including maintenance of equipment; training; environmental regulation inclusion and adherence; and coordination and teaming with Los Alamos Fire Department, National Park Service and United States Forest Service.

“Fire mitigation is a year-round effort and even as we enter these cold months to come, my team and I will shift our focus on mitigating risks during inclement weather conditions. Next month, LANL will conduct the annual inclement weather briefing at Fire Station 3 to begin preparing stakeholders for the upcoming winter season,” Wyka said.

That briefing will include N3B, Los Alamos Fire Department, Los Alamos Police Department, Los Alamos Public Schools, Los Alamos County Office of Emergency Management, Triad Emergency Management, and Triad Leadership and will cover LANL closures, delayed openings, and early
release protocols including coordination and communication with stakeholders and employees.

Wyka said LANL is also updating their inclement weather procedure to reflect changes associated with the TA-55 shifts, including updating their snow removal plan. To ensure communications will be transmitted, LANL is validating the phone numbers on their contact list and coordinating with their communications specialists to update the annual inclement weather article posted on the LANL intranet.

“LANL is expected to go through physical transformations, starting with demolition of the Ion Beam facility. The Ion Beam facility was a tandem Van de Graaff accelerator built in the early 1950s, one of the first buildings in TA-03, and was in use until the 1990s with formal closure completed in the 2000s. Given the age of the facility, it has legacy contamination that is part of “the scope of DOE-EM,” Wyka said. “LANL continues to conduct risk reduction activities as well as standard surveillance and maintenance, until the building is ready for final demolition. The facility has a large tower that holds the vertical Van de Graff generator and is located adjacent to LANL’s Occupational Medicine facility.” 

He said after demolition and cleanup are completed, the space will be used for additional laboratory buildings in the area, two of which will be situated on top of or adjacent to the current structure.

With regard to the proposed Rendija Canyon Land Transfer, Wyka said NNSA continues to work with County staff to understand Los Alamos County’s proposed land uses for Rendija Canyon.

“We recently received a letter from Los Alamos County and look forward to continuing working with you on potential paths forward for Rendija Canyon. We will work with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to explore options for clearance of the terrain to additional depths for areas listed in this letter. The initial evaluation determined that a complete scan of the entire area is not feasible, particularly on the steep slopes,” Wyka said. “A complete scan would require clearcutting of all trees and overburden, which would decimate the habitat and visuals in the canyon and cost tens of millions of dollars. Additionally, clearing would only provide 90-95% confidence, some level of risk would always exist for land in Rendija Canyon.”

With regard to the NNSA preparation of a Site-Wide Environmental Impact Statement (SWEIS) to assess the impacts of future operations across LANL, Wyka said that as with prior SWEIS updates, the purpose of the new SWEIS is to analyze the environmental impacts of potential new or expanded future operational activities and programs that have not been previously analyzed through the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) process. He said that in August 2022, NNSA provided notification to tribal nations and the public about the upcoming Notice of Intent (NOI) to prepare a Site-Wide Environmental Impact Statement and to inform the tribes and public of the public scoping comment period.

“The scoping comment period ended on October 18, 2022, and we received comments and letters from tribal nations and the public. The Draft LANL Site-Wide Environmental Impact Statement is nearing completion. Publication of the Draft SWEIS and the Notice of Availability will be released once it is completed, and a release date determined. Public hearings will be held in Los Alamos, Santa Fe and Espanola approximately 30-45 days after publication and we look forward to receiving input from Los Alamos County, the Accord Pueblos, and all other interested parties. Before the online posting of the document, we will provide a technical
briefing to the County, and encourage all stakeholders to review the SWEIS and provide comment,” he said.

Wyka mentioned the LANL Electrical Power Capacity Upgrade Project, or EPCU, noting that
LANL requires a reliable, resilient, and redundant electrical supply to support mission programs and other activities. He said by late 2027, the existing lines that serve LANL and Los Alamos County will reach capacity causing operational constraints on mission work. After 2027, power demands will consistently exceed the Reeves & Norton Line’s import limit, and increased power is necessary to continue supporting LANLs critical missions and activities, including Supercomputers and Los Alamos Neutron Science Center (LANSCE).

“The Electrical Power Capacity Upgrade’s will include a new power line and internal distribution system upgrades. As you may recall, we initiated tribal consultation back in June of 2022, along with U.S. Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management, and we are currently working through the Memorandum of Agreement (MOA) process required under the National Historic Preservation Act (NHPA) with the Pueblos and Tribes to address the adverse effects,” Wyka said. “We have made some progress and the EPCU project reached a critical NEPA milestone this month. The Forest Service started their pre-decisional objection process on September 11, 2024, on the Final Environmental Assessment and Forest Plan Amendment.”

He said the objection period is 45 days. The Forest Service, with support from NNSA, has 75 days to respond to those objections. All inquiries regarding the objection process must be sent to the Forest Service. There is a link on the Forest Service and NNSA EPCU project website. NNSA expects to announce its decision on whether to issue a Finding of No Significant Environmental Impact (FONSI) or prepare an Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) in early 2025.

With regard to the shipment of waste, Wyka said NNSA remains conscious of widespread interest in transuranic waste removal.

“Reducing our waste inventory is a priority of the State and DOE/NNSA and it will continue to be a high priority for my office. We are also aware of the importance of our waste removal efforts and how waste may impact the community and the environment. We are projecting a total of 37 shipments for this fiscal year, and we are pleased with LANL’s performance in transporting waste off the hill,” he said.

Wyka noted that he Fire Department Cooperative Agreement continues to ensure the protection of LANL employees and the Los Alamos County community.

“Our partnership has been successful in securing a new cloud software that will begin operations in January 2025. The new software, First Due, is a Fed-RAMP approved software that
includes Pre-Incident Plans (PiPs), providing frameworks for pre-planning documents, hazardous materials unit, contracts, building descriptions, occupant details, and more. This package provides documentation support and has additional protections through FedRAMP to secure sensitive material. This program will support the needs of LANLs Fire Protection Program, its employees, and infrastructure,” he said. “This achievement could not have been done alone, and I wanted to take a moment to recognize the County and Fire Department in this milestone as this is a major success that will ensure effectiveness and efficiency when responding to emergency incidents”.

Watch here for a report on the questions and answer period between Council and Wyka following his presentation.