“Energycast Oak Ridge,” a monthly news show produced by the Oak Ridge Office of Environmental Management (OREM), took home national awards recognizing excellence in storytelling and public outreach.
Office of Environmental Management
June 4, 2024
minute read time
Summer Dashe, host of "Energycast Oak Ridge," interviews U.S. Rep. Chuck Fleischmann at the 2023 National Cleanup Workshop.
OAK RIDGE, Tenn. — “Energycast Oak Ridge,” a monthly news show produced by the Oak Ridge Office of Environmental Management (OREM), took home national awards recognizing excellence in storytelling and public outreach.
Watch the latest episode here.
“We’re honored to receive this national recognition,” OREM Manager Jay Mullis said. “Our communications team does a tremendous job of identifying and sharing stories that educate the community about our organization and the positive impacts our mission has across the region.”
OREM’s communications team won three Hometown Media Awards, which were established to promote community media, community radio, and local cable programs distributed on public, educational, and governmental access cable television channels.
The newscast, which launched in 2022, airs on community television channels in 24 counties across middle and eastern Tennessee. This year, it earned the top spot in three award categories: public health programming, educational activities and government meeting coverage by an independent producer.
Oak Ridge Office of Environmental Management won the public health programming category for its coverage of a project providing rare medical isotpes to advance a promising form of cancer treatment. Dr. Ken Song, president and CEO of RayzeBio, speaks about that form of treatment, called targeted alpha therapy, in "Energcast Oak Ridge."
Energycast’s public health programming covered a partnership that’s increasing accessibility to a promising cancer treatment called targeted alpha therapy. An OREM project is extracting rare medical isotopes from nuclear material slated for disposal. Those isotopes are supporting clinical trials and will help produce more than 500,000 cancer treatment doses annually for this form of treatment.
The newscast also covered the Junior Achievement of East Tennessee’s BizTown to showcase OREM employees volunteering at the highly interactive educational event. Staff interviewed local middle school students responsible for running their own businesses and city for a day to teach them about the responsibilities involved in numerous careers.
Oak Ridge Office of Environmental Management won the government meeting coverage category for its coverage from the National Cleanup Workshop. It involved talking to congressional representatives, U.S. Department of Energy leadership, regulators and event organizers about the top issues facing environmental cleanup across the country.
Finally, the team won for its government meeting coverage at the National Cleanup Workshop. The annual meeting brings together top government and business leaders who share lessons and approaches for advancing environmental cleanup in communities nationwide.
Each year, nearly 1,000 entries are submitted to the Hometown Media Awards. A panel of more than 150 judges from the industry evaluate entries on several factors. Awards are presented to the most creative programs that address community needs, develop diverse community involvement, challenge conventional commercial television formats and move viewers to experience television in a different way.
New episodes of “Energycast Oak Ridge” are released the last Wednesday of each month, and they are available on OREM’s YouTube channel.
Anyone interested in subscribing to monthly e-mails with new episodes can send a request to [email protected].
-Contributor: Ben Williams
To receive the latest news and updates about the Office of Environmental Management, submit your e-mail address.