New employees would not receive traditional Hanford retirement benefits under three proposed prime contracts at the nuclear reservation, according to draft requests for proposals released Friday by the Department of Energy.

All three requests for proposals from potential Hanford contractors require "market-based" retirement and health care programs for new employees. Employees already accruing benefits in the Hanford retirement system could remain on that system under the new contracts.

One of the proposed new contracts would cover work now being done by CH2M Hill Hanford Group to manage the tank farms in central Hanford. The other two would divide the work now being done by Fluor Hanford into separate contracts for support services for the entire nuclear reservation and cleanup of central Hanford other than the tank farms.

Each of the new contracts would be awarded for five years with options to extend them for another five years. They also include a 90-day transition period.

They are intended to be in place at least by the time CH2M Hill's and Fluor's current two-year contract extensions expire at the end of September 2008.

All three of the new contracts would cover costs of doing work at Hanford plus offer incentive fees. The support services fee would be no more than 8 percent of the total contract cost, and the fee for doing cleanup work at the tank farms or the rest of central Hanford would be no more than 10 percent of the total contract cost.

The proposed change to a two-tiered pension plan revives DOE plans announced this spring to move to the two-tiered retirement and medical plan across the DOE complex.

"DOE has seen escalating and volatile growth in costs for reimbursement of contractor em-ployees' defined benefit pension and other post-retirement benefits," Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman wrote then in a letter to a key congressional leader.

But the proposal proved unpopular and DOE agreed in June to delay the changes for a year. That proposal would require new employees to be offered a 401(k)-style plan in which workers would invest money. Rather than receive a set payment each month in retirement, their benefits would depend on how well they invested and managed their retirement money.

Although the lengthy draft requests for proposals apparently do not specify the type of plans contractors could offer new employees, they do require them to be no more than 5 percent above the average for comparable industries.

The Hanford Advisory Board has recommended that DOE stick with its traditional benefit package for all workers, with members saying that good benefits have helped retain experienced workers at the site.

Although the Washington Closure Hanford contract for cleanup work along the Columbia River splits workers into a two-tiered pension system, that contract was awarded for work that is supposed to be completed in seven years rather than the decades that may be required for cleanup of central Hanford work. New employees doing river corridor cleanup likely would not be vested long enough in the Hanford pension system to build up significant benefits, according to those who agreed to the change.

The proposed new contracts would require new contractors to give first preference in hiring in nonmanagement positions to current Hanford employees for the first six months of work.

The requests for proposals for doing the work places some restrictions on bidders if they also will be doing other work at Hanford, based on concerns over conflicts of interest.

The support services contractor may not hold a contract for other major projects at Hanford such as the vitrification plant, cleanup of the Columbia River corridor, operation of the tank farms or cleanup of central Hanford. That includes both the head contractors applying for the support services contract, members of their teams and their parent companies or affiliates.

The tank farm contract request for proposals excludes companies that hold contracts to do work at the vitrification plant, which will treat the waste in the underground tanks once it is built.

No conflict of interest restrictions are included in the draft request for proposals for the central Hanford cleanup.

The support services contract would include services needed to support contractors performing the work of cleaning up contamination from the past production of plutonium for the nation's nuclear weapons program. That includes security, fire protection, computer services and other information technology, utilities, training at HAMMER and road and railroad services.

The central Hanford cleanup contract would include monitoring and cleaning up contaminated ground water, the completion of the cleanup of the Plutonium Finishing Plant, treatment of K Basin sludge, activities to shut down the Fast Flux Test Facility and other work cleanup work not associated with the tank farms.

The tank farm contract would manage operations of 177 underground tanks, most still holding radioactive waste from plutonium production. The contract would cover retrieving more waste from old leak-prone tanks, closing some of the tanks and supporting the vitrification plant.

DOE will take comments on the draft requests for proposals until Dec. 22. It's interested in hearing comments on topics such as its approach to avoiding conflicts of interest and how much of the work should be done by small businesses, according to letters sent to prospective contractors.

The letters said DOE encourages contractors to provide the maximum opportunities possible to compete for subcontracts.

Comments on the support services draft request for proposals may be sent to Alan Hopko at msc@rl.gov. Comments on the central Hanford cleanup request for proposals may be sent to Jenise Connerly at prc@rl.gov. Comments on the tank farm request for proposals may be sent to Bob Williams at toc@rl.gov.

The requests for proposals are posted at http://e-center.doe.gov/. Click on "Browse Opportunities," then choose the sort function by date posted before clicking on "Browse Business Opps."