Earnings fell at BWX Technologies [BWXT] in the first quarter, which the company attributed Monday to pension issues and lower productivity in the naval reactors business.
Net earnings for the first quarter were $59 million, or $0.64 per share, down from $69.7 million, or $0.73 a share, in the year-ago quarter. Quarterly revenue was $530.7 million up year-over-year from $528.2 million, according to the earnings press release
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Quarterly segment operating income for the Government Operations segment was $72 million, down from $78 million a year ago. Segment revenue was about $432 million, up from $423 million in the year-ago period.
“In the Government Operations services business, we completed the contract transition for Savannah River, which occurred toward the end of the first quarter,” said BWXT President and CEO Rex Geveden during the earnings conference call Monday. “We have now entered the fee bearing period and look forward to executing this important mission for the Department of Energy.”
BWXT-led Savannah River Mission Completion took over liquid waste management at the federal complex in South Carolina during February.
In addition, Geveden said a BWXT contractor team is awaiting the results of National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) final action on the combined management and operations contract for the NNSA’s main nuclear-weapons production sites, the Pantex Plant in Texas and the Y-12 National Security Complex in Tennessee.
“We are still in the hunt on that one,” Geveden said of the hotly contested contract, potentially worth about $28 billion over a decade. The NNSA awarded the deal to a Fluor [FLR]- led team in November, but a protest from two losing bidders, the BWXT-led team and a Bechtel-led team, has delayed transition to a new contractor until at least October.
Moving on to another major nuclear-weapons cleanup contract, Geveden said the DoE has finished hearing oral presentations on the potential $45 billion long-term contract for radioactive tank waste closure at the Hanford Site in Washington state.
“The government is in their evaluation phase and I think we would expect an announcement on the award by the end of the year,” Geveden said.
The conference call slides are available here.