In The News

U.S. Congressman Brad Wenstrup (R-OH-2nd District) made a stop at Diner 23 in Waverly on Friday, meeting with constituents and speaking with the News Watchman about the chance of potential layoffs at the former Portsmouth Gaseous Diffusion Plant at Piketon and lack of funding for the plant’s decontamination and decommissioning (D&D) project.

The D&D project at the Piketon site is currently facing a $110 million budget shortage for fiscal year 2015, which begins on October 1, that will potentially result in the layoffs of approximately 675 employees during the next few months.

According to Wenstrup, he and other members of the Ohio Congressional Delegation are working on language dealing with funding for the D&D project at Piketon as part of a continuing resolution.

“We have hopes that there is going to be a mechanism to increase it (funding) in some way, so we’re kind of weeding through what the verbiage says on that,” he said.

He indicated that this has been worked on in a bipartisan fashion by other Ohio members of the U.S. House and Senate.

Wenstrup also mentioned a letter that he had sent to U.S. Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz asking him to visit the Piketon site and see what is going on at the plant. He said that the secretary has declined the invitation to visit due to time constraints.

“There are a lot of people making decisions on things they never see,” he said of his invitation to the secretary.

Wenstrup said that the Piketon site is different from other U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) sites because of its “huge potential for rejuvenation”.


“This is a golden opportunity,” he said. “It doesn’t matter what type of energy you’re for. The infrastructure is there to put it out. Whether it’s renewable, fossil fuels, nuclear — whatever — it can happen here.”

Currently, the D&D project at the plant is funded 70 percent through uranium barter and 30 percent through Congressional appropriations. However, within the last couple of years, there has been a deterioration of uranium prices, resulting in a budget shortfall for the project. In addition, it is estimated that the uranium used for barter will be gone within a few years.

“We have to find another way,” Wenstrup said of funding the project. “That market isn’t there, so we need to find other ways. Again, that gets back to the importance of looking long-term ... When you look out 20 years, it’s an opportunity for our energy independence to thrive, but we have to take care of the contamination first.”

Wenstrup said he knows the funding for the project is a local priority but that it needs to be a national priority, as well.

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