Skip to main content

Another story about how corrupt Bechtel is

https://www.publicintegrity.org/2018/02/05/21507/trump-administration-s-planned-nuclear-upgrade-being-undermined-cost-overruns

Comments

Anonymous said…
Read the story. It clearly states that the scope of the contract increased after award (i.e modernization activities). It blames the NNSA policy team not talking to the NNSA contracting team. Then the NNSA turns around and blames the contractor (NNSA typical practice) for staffing shortages while this article then blames the contract for the overall cost increase (not per person or scope) of operating the facility to meet the mission.Then it states in a separate paragraph that Bechtel cut benefits to reduce costs (as was part of its proposal). This article and its title are misleading at best.
Anonymous said…
"Then it states in a separate paragraph that Bechtel cut benefits to reduce costs (as was part of its proposal). "

The whole point is that overall costs did not get reduced but increased. Sounds like standard Bechtel practice.

The story is what it is no matter how you want to spin it and I strongly encourage everyone to read. Bechtel is as sleazy as it gets.

RADIOACTIVE
Feds Gave Nuclear Weapons Contractor ‘Cost Savings’ Bonuses After Going Over Budget
Millions of dollars in promised savings at two nuclear weapons plants in Texas and Tennessee haven’t appeared, and the government is letting a powerful contractor off the hook.
The savings that CNS initially promised were supposed to come from cutting what the corporations and their federal overseers claimed were excess jobs and employee benefits at the Texas and Tennessee sites. But key lawmakers and congressional staff in Washington have said this aim was misguided from the outset, coming as it did just as the Department of Energy was launching, at the Obama administration’s direction, a three-decade-long trillion-dollar weapons modernization program, which would seemingly require many new personnel.

This is a good one.

"Many workers at the plants have chafed under the new management approach and complained about its consequences, noting in a confidential staff survey that they feel profit has been prioritized over safety. " This would also correlate with the increase of issues at LANL and hence the loss of the contract.
Anonymous said…
You DARE suggest that visitors to this blog should apply some critical thought? Fear, rumor, ad hominem and non-sequitur are so much more fun. So much easier to be mentally lazy.
Anonymous said…
Here is some critical thought. Scope goes up, costs go up.

"The whole point is that overall costs did not get reduced but increased."

No kidding....

Anonymous said…
"So much easier to be mentally lazy.So much easier to be mentally lazy."

Indeed the constant "I hate UC" "I hate scientists" "I hate LANL" , and "I am special" gets old. You can point out the facts over and over again and they are just ignored or the data is cherry picked. Some people just have an agenda that they will never let go, all you have to to do is read some anti LANL and anti UC screeds in the local Santa Fe papers to get an idea of who these people are.
Anonymous said…


I have real the story and it is very damming of Bechtel, the title is certainly not misleading.
Anonymous said…
This has become a really poor blog.
Anonymous said…
This has become a really poor blog.

February 11, 2018 at 7:43 AM

Always has been.
Anonymous said…
Always has been.

February 12, 2018 at 5:58 PM

That is correct and why people like you and I never read it or post on it.
Anonymous said…
Poor attempt at irony.
Anonymous said…
Poor attempt at irony.

February 13, 2018 at 5:55 PM

Keep posting on that blog that you never read. :)
Anonymous said…
I read it all the time. To whom are you referring?
Anonymous said…
Worked for Bechtel for 20 years. Great company with great leaders.

Popular posts from this blog

Plutonium Shots on NIF.

Tri-Valley Cares needs to be on this if they aren't already. We need to make sure that NNSA and LLNL does not make good on promises to pursue such stupid ideas as doing Plutonium experiments on NIF. The stupidity arises from the fact that a huge population is placed at risk in the short and long term. Why do this kind of experiment in a heavily populated area? Only a moron would push that kind of imbecile area. Do it somewhere else in the god forsaken hills of Los Alamos. Why should the communities in the Bay Area be subjected to such increased risk just because the lab's NIF has failed twice and is trying the Hail Mary pass of doing an SNM experiment just to justify their existence? Those Laser EoS techniques and the people analyzing the raw data are all just BAD anyways. You know what comes next after they do the experiment. They'll figure out that they need larger samples. More risk for the local population. Stop this imbecilic pursuit. They wan...

Trump is to gut the labs.

The budget has a 20% decrease to DOE office of science, 20% cut to NIH. NASA also gets a cut. This will  have a huge negative effect on the lab. Crazy, juts crazy. He also wants to cut NEA and PBS, this may not seem like  a big deal but they get very little money and do great things.

LLNL un-diversity

Actual post from Dec. 15 from one of the streams. This is a real topic. As far as promoting women and minorities even if their qualifications are not as good as the white male scientists, I am all for it. We need diversity at the lab and if that is what it takes, so be it.  Quit your whining. Look around the lab, what do you see? White male geezers. How many African Americans do you see at the lab? Virtually none. LLNL is one of the MOST undiverse places you will see. Face it folks, LLNL is an institution of white male privilege and they don't want to give up their privileged positions. California, a state of majority Hispanics has the "crown jewel" LLNL nestled in the middle of it with very FEW Hispanics at all!