Introduction: Pursuant to FAR Subpart 13.106-1(b)(1), the U.S. Army RDECOM Contracting Center, Natick Contracting Division, on behalf of the Product Manager Force Sustainment Systems Directorate (PM FSS), intends to award a firm fixed price purchase order on a sole source basis to: Therm Tec, Inc., Cipole Rd, Sherwood, OR 97140-8339. THIS IS NOT A REQUEST FOR PROPOSALS. NO SOLICITATION DOCUMENT IS AVAILABLE. 1. Nature and description of the supplies or services required to meet the agency's needs: The Army's Maneuver Support and Sustainment Centers of Excellence have identified safe solid waste disposal as a capability gap in Contingency Basing. To help fill gaps at smaller camps such as 50 and 150- person, Commercial off the shelf (COTS), lightweight, portable incinerators need to be purchased for test and evaluation. A COTS solution is required to reduce cost, schedule, and performance risks associated with this evaluation and future large quantity, competitive procurements. The evaluation will determine if a COTS incinerator is suitable and effective in Contingency Base-camping at sites of 150 persons or less. Criteria for camps of 150 personnel and below include the incinerator must be small enough for it to be transported and set up at the most austere camps where material handling equipment is limited. The incinerator must be able to fit in a single, standard ISO-container, and weigh less than 9500 pounds. Incinerators must also have 2 stages of incineration as a pollution control and be able to treat 400-1200 pounds per day of solid waste. Unlike other waste disposal technologies, incineration is well proven, portable, and exists in the commercial market. Incinerators for camps greater than 150 personnel are not part of the evaluation and those will have different criteria to meet. 2. A demonstration that the proposed contractor is the only source available to provide these services or goods (i.e. unique qualifications, proprietary rights, etc.): In order to assure an adequate sampling of the commercial market, PMFSS needs to purchase multiple candidate incinerators from several different vendors to verify the general market of COTS incinerators will perform reliably and safely enough to sustain the small base camps. Extensive market research was done in 2010, which will be explained in further detail below. There were only three vendors found in the research that meet all the criteria of paragraph 1 above, because all other incinerators are too large. Several smaller incinerators from Inciner8, Thermtec, and Elastec met the criteria, so one of each is planned to be purchased via separate purchase requests for each vendor. Three, funded, separate purchase requests are currently in process. The incinerators will then be subjected to comparative performance and reliability test and evaluation to lower the performance risk during future large quantity, competitive procurements. . The sole source for this purchase request is Inciner8, which has three different incinerator models that meet the criteria Model A1600X, Model A60, and Model A850(A)2. These three models will be evaluated for camps of 150 persons or below. 3. A description of the market research that was conducted and the results, or a statement of the reason a market research was not conducted: Sources Sought Notice W91GVY-FSS-LOE-1-E2 was posted on Fed Biz Ops in March 2010 and responses were delivered to PMFSS by 30 April 2010. In addition to posting the notice, PMFSS also contacted known suppliers of incinerators and informed them of the notice. The notice asked for information regarding incinerators with throughput capacities 500-6000 pounds per day, and a wide range of responses was received. The other sources who have models meeting the criteria are Elastec and Thermtec and their models will also be purchased for evaluation via separate purchase requests (See W91GVY-1145-1047 and W91GVY-1136-1005). Incinerators from the research that do not meet the criteria of less than 9500 pounds or fit in a single container are not being considered for this performance evaluation. 4. Any other facts supporting the use of other than full and open competition: Market research indicates there are several candidate incinerators that are small enough to transport and effectively treat the solid waste at the 150-person camp and below. The Inciner8 A1600X, A850(A)2, and A60 models are three of them and are specified in this Purchase Request. Purchase requests for the other candidates (Elastec, and Thermtec) from the market research will be placed separately. By evaluating multiple COTS incinerators from various suppliers, the Army will be better able to manage the performance risks when it procures large quantities of production units for use at camps of 150 persons and below. 5. A statement of the actions, if any, the agency may take to remove or overcome any barriers to competition before any subsequent acquisition for the supplies or services required: The purpose of this effort is only to validate performance of the COTS solution before ordering COTS in large quantities for base camps. Once COTS performance is verified, a detailed performance specification can be completed and multiple vendors will be able to compete for production contracts. 6. Interested parties may identify their interest and capability to respond to this requirement to the U.S. Army RDECOM Contracting Center, Natick Contracting Division via e-mail to:
[email protected] no later than 5:00 PM (EST) on July 16, 2011. Contracting Office Address: RDECOM Contracting Center - Natick CCRD-NA-SU, Natick Contracting Division Kansas Street, Building 1 Natick, MA 01760-5011 Point of Contact: Ryan Colgan, Contract Specialist (508) 233-6186
[email protected] Contracting Office Address: ACC-APG SCRT - Natick (SPS), ATTN: AMSRD-ACC-N, Natick Contracting Division (R and BaseOPS), Building 1, Kansas Street, Natick, MA 01760-5011 Point of Contact(s): Ryan colgan, 508-233-6186 ACC-APG SCRT-Natick (SPS)