As Congress weighs whether to extend a $150 million financial lifeline to USEC over the next few weeks, Senate appropriators yesterday raised concerns about the Administration’s request for another $150 million in FY 2013 to support a two-year demonstration for USEC’s American Centrifuge Project, questioning the viability of the beleaguered company itself. Senate Energy and Water Appropriations Subcommittee Chair Dianne Feinstein (D-Callif.) noted that problems encountered on the project—she cited a June incident in which she said the centrifuges “blew up;” NNSA Administrator Tom D’Agostino said there were “issues with the centrifuges spinning in a way that was not conducive to their operation”—decrease confidence from lawmakers that the project is a good investment. Combined with the $150 million FY2013 request, the Department of Energy is also seeking to reprogram another $150 million in FY2012 for the project. “Candidly, I don’t know whether this facility can produce or not and yet it’s $150 million dollars,” Feinstein said, later adding: “If it can’t operate, why fund it? If it doesn’t operate well, why fund it, if there are other methods of handling the problem?”
Nuclear Security & Deterrence Monitor Vol. 27 No. 19
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Morning Briefing
Article of 8
March 17, 2014
APPROPRIATORS QUESTION FUNDING REQUEST FOR USEC
DOE has argued that USEC’s enrichment technology, which was first developed by the Department, is crucial for providing a source of enriched uranium for tritium production for the nation because peaceful use restrictions on foreign technology impede the use of other enrichment plants to produce material for the nation’s weapons program. The project would involve development and deployment of a full train of 720 centrifuge machines to demonstrate the technology on a commercial scale, and D’Agostino said yesterday that the project was ready for the demonstration stage. “It is the best technology available, and we believe the best approach going forward for maintaining an indigenous U.S. capability. That’s absolutely critical,” he said. But he conceded that the Administration would have to consider other alternatives to produce low enriched uranium for the nation’s weapons program if Congress did not provide funds for the demonstration project. That could include using existing enrichment facilities at USEC’s Paducah Gaseous Diffusion Plant, down-blending existing stocks of highly enriched uranium, or the construction of a government-owned enrichment plant. “If at some point in working with Congress it isn’t something that Congress is willing to do, we will have to explore other paths, take back the technology and use a different approach,” D’Agostino said.