Todd Jacobson
NS&D Monitor
2/6/2015
The Navy is continuing to accelerate the pace of returning W76-0 warheads to the National Nuclear Security Administration for storage and plans to be finished shipping the warheads back to the agency by FY 2016, the NNSA said this week. Fiscal Year 2016 budget documents released this week revealed work on the accelerated return plan is continuing, and NNSA spokeswoman Shelley Laver said 67 percent of the W76-0s—which are being replaced by refurbished W76-1s—have been returned to the agency for dismantlement. The NNSA does not release the exact number of warheads because of classification concerns.
Laver said the NNSA projected to have 85 percent of the W76-0 returns complete by the end of FY 2015, and would complete the program by the end of FY 2016. The NNSA is about halfway complete with production of about 1,500 W76-1 warheads and is expected to complete the program by the end of FY 2019. The decision to accelerate the return of W76-0 units was made to “aid the Navy in avoiding the expenditure of a large amount of funding to build additional storage space,” Laver said, noting that the Navy avoided spending approximately $190 million by not building another storage facility. The NNSA did not say where the extra W76-0 units are stored, but the Pantex Plant is the ultimate destination for dismantled nuclear weapons and the plant has a limited storage area for retired warheads.
No Big Dip in Dismantlement Funding Request This Year
Overall, the Obama Administration is requesting $48.05 million for NNSA warhead dismantlement efforts in FY 2016, $1.95 million less than FY 2015 funding levels, but it is planning to level out funding through FY 2020, according to budget documents released this week. The NNSA said it was still on track to meet its goal of dismantling all weapons retired before FY 2009 by FY 2022 under the current dismantlement plan, which includes relatively flat funding through FY 2020. Under the budget projections released Feb. 2, funding for the program would gradually increase before peaking in FY 2019 at $52.37 million. A funding level of $51.77 million is projected for FY 2020. The bulk of the NNSA’s warhead dismantlement work takes place at the Pantex Plant and the Y-12 National Security Complex.
The relatively level funding represents a departure from last year’s budget request. The Administration requested only $30 million a year ago before Congress boosted funding, and projected funding peaking at $71 million in FY 2019. Budget documents reveal that the dismantlement program “developed several dismantlement scenarios to eliminate any gaps in dismantlement due to further stockpile reductions.”
According to the budget documents, the increased funding in FY 2015 allowed Y-12 to make investments in equipment and glove box lines used in the dismantlement of canned sub-assemblies (CSAs) and it allows Pantex to increase legacy component disposition and weapons dismantlement over the next five years. In FY 2016, the NNSA said the program would “pursue a balanced approach to dismantling warheads and CSAs and increase scope.”
