Overview
- The Department of Defense on Thursday re-awarded NorthStar Maritime Dismantlement Services a $418.5 million firm-fixed-price contract to dismantle, recycle, and dispose of the former USS Enterprise (CVN-65).
- Work will be performed in Mobile, Alabama, and the contract schedules completion by September 2030 with hazardous materials, including low-level radioactive waste and asbestos, to be packaged and sent to licensed disposal sites.
- The recompetition followed a rival protest and a U.S. Court of Federal Claims decision earlier this year that found the Navy’s prior exclusion of a bidder improper and ordered the procurement reopened.
- Nearly all funding—about $415.5 million—was provided from fiscal 2025 Navy operations accounts and was obligated at award, while the firm-fixed-price structure shifts the risk of cost overruns from taxpayers to NorthStar.
- The project is meant to serve as a test case: salvaged steel may feed construction of the future CVN-80, the process will inform recycling of Nimitz-class carriers, and the work will create local jobs and long-term program costs the Navy must manage.