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Bechtel National Awarded $27 Million Contract to Eliminate SS-24 Intercontinental Ballistic Missile Silos in Ukraine
The contract award is the latest in a series of BNI assignments linked to the ending of the Cold War. Under terms of the agreement, BNI will provide project management, integration, and construction management services to both the Weapons Agency and the Ukrainian Ministry of Defense's 43rd Rocket Army for a $27 million effort that will eliminate silo facilities that are located at Pervomaysk, about 320 kilometers (200 miles) south of the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv. The project is being carried out as part of the Cooperative Threat Reduction (CTR) agreements reached by the U.S. and Ukrainian governments under terms of the Strategic Arms Reduction Talks (START 1) Treaty.
The new job is one of seven CTR projects in which Bechtel National is currently involved. In recent years, the company has been involved in nine CTR-related assignments in countries of the former Soviet Union. Included among the tasks for which Bechtel National will be responsible on the SS-24 assignment is the removal of the missiles from their silos, defueling and partially neutralizing them, repairing and maintaining a variety of infrastructure and special handling equipment, transporting the missiles to transfer stations, loading them onto special railway cars, and transporting quantities of liquid rocket fuel and oxidizers.
Among the types of missile facilities to be destroyed at the Pervomaysk site are hardened launch control silos; several administration buildings; standby power, refrigeration, and security installations; fuel and underground water storage tanks; security fences; connecting tunnels; and a variety of buried utility components.
The contract calls for work to begin immediately and for all silo facilities to be eliminated by December 2001. Work on a variety of related support tasks is scheduled to be completed by December 2002.
As has been the case on all of its previous CTR projects, BNI will maximize local participation by subcontracting out a majority of its work to Ukrainian nationals. In this instance, the company will team with Ukrainian contractors RPIE Stroom and K.B. Yuzhnoye and will be assisted by Ukraine's Central Design Institute in carrying out its work.
FACT SHEET
Bechtel Profile
Bechtel National, the government contracting arm of Bechtel Group, Inc. has more than 6,000 personnel currently working on more than 75 active projects in 36 states and 11 countries that generate more than $1 billion of revenue annually. The company is ranked at the top of Engineering News-Record magazine's list of the "Top 200" environmental firms in the U.S.
The Bechtel group of companies has provided engineering, construction, and related management services to customers in some 140 nations on all seven continents. Bechtel had revenues of $11.3 billion in 1997.
Bechtel Quotes
"Bechtel is extremely gratified and pleased to be involved in a project that has such significant international ramifications," said Bechtel National President Lee A. McIntire.
"We're on very familiar ground here, since the team we have assembled has extensive prior knowledge of the SS-19 silo design and related systems, all of which are similar to the SS-24 silo configuration," said Ron Naventi, principal vice president and manager of operations for BNI. "Since we're also well aware of the regulations and requirements related to dismantlement and site restoration in Ukraine, we feel we are able to offer a unique brand of service to the government there."
Bechtel Work History In Ukraine
Some of the company's prior projects in the former Soviet Union include the dismantlement of 130 missile silos of the SS-19 type, also in Ukraine; a chemical weapons destruction program in Russia; the construction of a storage facility for a stockpile of fissile material formerly contained in Russia's nuclear arsenal; the disposal of a solid rocket motor plant in Russia; and a logistical support assignment that involved a variety of CTR facilities in Ukraine, Belarus, Kazakhstan, and Russia. Currently, Bechtel National also is involved in an effort to clean up, decommission, and stabilize the damaged Unit 4 reactor building of Ukraine's Chornobyl nuclear power station.