Budget & Policy

The Senate Armed Services Committee on Tuesday advanced three of the four Trump administration nominations for the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board (DNFSB). The nominees approved on voice vote were: Bruce Hamilton, current DNFSB chairman; current board member Jesse Hill Roberson; and nominee Thomas Summers, former vice commander of the 91st Missile Wing at Minot […]

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Wednesday reaffirmed the Trump administration’s disinterest in renewing a strictly bilateral U.S.-Russian New START nuclear arms control treaty past its expiration in February 2021. As Trump and other officials have previously, Pompeo indicated China must be brought into the nuclear arms-control fold. “President Trump will never allow America to […]

The U.S. Senate is expected to vote at 11:30 a.m. today to extend stopgap funding for fiscal 2020 and avoid a shutdown of the federal government. A series of three votes are expected on the continuing resolution that would keep the government open until Dec. 20, according to the official Twitter feed for Republican Senate […]

The nomination of Deputy Energy Secretary Dan Brouillette to become energy secretary easily cleared the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee on Tuesday by a 16-4 vote. The full Senate has not yet scheduled a vote on the nomination, a source said. The previously announced resignation of Energy Secretary Rick Perry takes effect Dec. 1. […]

The House of Representatives on Tuesday passed legislation to extend the continuing resolution until Dec. 20, to provide lawmakers with an extra month to agree upon outstanding fiscal year 2020 funding bills. The bill, a House amendment to H.R. 3055, passed by a vote of 231-192, with 12 Republicans voting to support the bill and […]

California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) has set a March 3, 2020, primary followed by a May 12 special election to replace U.S. Rep. Katie Hill (D-Calif.), who resigned on Nov. 1 after being targeted for investigation by the House Ethics Committee. Hill, who represented the state’s 25th Congressional District that adjoins the Santa Susana Field […]

The House of Representatives is scheduled to vote to push the current continuing resolution deadline to Dec. 20, with hopes that lawmakers will complete negotiations for outstanding fiscal year 2020 funding bills in the extra month. The vote, which was announced Monday by House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.), comes two days before the current […]

WASHINGTON — Dan Brouillette, who a few years ago was lobbying for the insurance industry and now is on track to join President Donald Trump’s Cabinet as secretary of energy, cruised Thursday morning through a Senate nomination hearing that briefly crossed wires with presidential impeachment proceedings in the House. With approval from the Senate, Brouillette […]

Strengthened whistleblower protections approved by Congress are now written into most but not all major contracts at the U.S. Energy Department, according to a DOE Office of Inspector General report dated Nov. 4. The office reviewed 30 of DOE’s largest contracts, together worth about $386 billion – or 94% of the agency’s $411 billion in […]

A year after the U.S. Energy Department’s Office of Environmental Management initiated its end-state contracting model, confusion remains over exactly what that approach involves, whether leadership is still behind it, and if staff is ready to execute. These are among the key takeaways Tuesday when DOE’s Environmental Management Advisory Board formally adopted a report on […]

The National Academies committee studying supplemental treatment of low-activity waste at the U.S. Energy Department’s Hanford Site in Washington state is accepting public comments until Nov. 20 on its upcoming report. The comment period was originally scheduled to end Oct. 31. A National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine panel is reviewing a predecisional report […]

The U.S. Department of Energy has “no authority” under federal law to issue contracts for any commercially operated facility for temporary storage of spent nuclear fuel, Energy Secretary Rick Perry said in a recent letter to a member of Congress. That runs counter to the business plans laid out by both corporate teams seeking federal […]

The U.S. Department of Energy’s nuclear weapons programs would be funded at prior-year levels almost through the end of December, under a second stopgap spending plan announced Thursday to keep the federal government operating while Congress tries to finalize its fiscal 2020 budget. Meanwhile, the top Democrat and Republican members of the House and Senate […]

Dan Leone and Vivienne Machi WASHINGTON — Questionable “competence” within U.S. Air Force procurement ranks helped turn a competition to build a fleet of next-generation nuclear ballistic missiles into a one-horse race, the chairman of the House Armed Services Committee said here Wednesday. Proposals to build and deploy the Ground-Based Strategic Deterrent (GBSD), silo-based missiles […]

The U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) dinged the National Nuclear Security Administration recently for not providing 10 years’ worth of cost forecasts in an annual report to Congress on defense nuclear spending. The semiautonomous Department of Energy agency by law must write a joint report each year with the Defense Department profiling the expected costs […]

The U.S. Department of Energy’s nuclear weapons programs would be funded at prior-year levels almost through the end of December, under a second stopgap spending plan announced Thursday to keep the federal government operating while Congress tries to finalize its fiscal 2020 budget. Meanwhile, the top Democrat and Republican members of the House and Senate […]

WASHINGTON — Dan Brouillette, who a few years ago was lobbying for the insurance industry and now is on track to join President Donald Trump’s Cabinet as secretary of energy, cruised Thursday morning through a Senate nomination hearing that briefly crossed wires with presidential impeachment proceedings in the House. With approval from the Senate, Brouillette […]

By John Stang The chair of a key U.S. Senate committee said Thursday she hopes to have a new secretary of energy confirmed in time to take office when Rick Perry steps down from the position on Dec. 1. “My intention is to move you through the committee process as fast as possible,” Senate Energy […]

The U.S. Department of Energy and other agencies would remain funded at prior-year levels almost through the end of December, under a second stopgap spending plan announced this week to keep the federal government operating while Congress tries to finalize its fiscal 2020 budget. Meanwhile, the top Democrat and Republican members of the House and […]

The United States must finally settle on a strategy for disposition of spent nuclear fuel if it hopes to revitalize its atomic energy sector, Sen. John Barrasso (R-Wyo.) said Wednesday, without offering a timeline for introduction of a bill intended to help achieve that goal. Barrasso discussed the matter in starting off a hearing of […]

The National Academies committee studying supplemental treatment of low-activity waste at the U.S. Energy Department’s Hanford Site in Washington state is accepting public comments until Nov. 20 on its upcoming report. The comment period was originally scheduled to end Oct. 13. A National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine panel is reviewing a predecisional report […]

WASHINGTON — Questionable “competence” within U.S. Air Force procurement ranks helped turn a competition to build a fleet of next-generation nuclear ballistic missiles into a one-horse race, the chairman of the House Armed Services Committee said here Wednesday. Proposals to build and deploy the Ground-Based Strategic Deterrent (GBSD), silo-based missiles designed to replace the nuclear-tipped […]

It’s getting real for Dan Brouillette, who is scheduled for a confirmation hearing Thursday before the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee in his next official step to joining President Donald Trump’s Cabinet as secretary of energy. The hearing is set for 10:30 a.m. Eastern time and will be webcast. Brouillette sailed through his confirmation hearing […]

Strengthened whistleblower protections approved by Congress are now written into most but not all major contracts at the Energy Department, according to a DOE Office of Inspector General report dated Nov. 4. The office reviewed 30 of DOE’s largest contracts, together worth about $386 billion – or 94% of the agency’s $411 billion in current […]

Key testing has wrapped up for the Salt Waste Processing Facility (SWPF) at the Savannah River Site in South Carolina, bringing the $2.3 billion plant closer to its anticipated startup in the first quarter of 2020. Parsons, the U.S. Department of Energy contractor that built the SWPF and is readying it for operations, announced Wednesday […]

President Donald Trump on Thursday officially nominated Deputy Secretary of Energy Dan Brouillette to replace Rick Perry, who will resign as secretary of energy on Dec. 1. Brouillette, a former auto-insurance lobbyist with some turn-of-the-millennium Washington experience on his rapidly expanding resume, must be confirmed by the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee before he […]

With members of the House out of town this week, Congress made little progress on authorizing and appropriating government funding, including measures covering the Department of Energy and Nuclear Regulatory Commission. However, Armed Services Committee staffers worked behind the scenes this week to hash out differences in the House and Senate versions of the 2020 […]

U.S. Energy Department contractor Atkins Nuclear Secured Holdings has promoted Jack Craig as its new chief operating officer (COO). Craig, who joined the SNC-Lavalin Group company in 2018 as vice president of strategic programs, assumed the new post on Nov. 1, according to a press release. He succeeds Robert Frost, who continues to serve as […]

With members of the House out of town this week, Congress made little progress on authorizing and appropriating government funding, including for Department of Energy defense-nuclear programs. However, Armed Services Committee staffers worked behind the scenes this week to hash out differences in the House and Senate versions of the 2020 National Defense Authorization Act: […]

WASHINGTON — Lisa Gordon-Hagerty, head of the U.S. National Nuclear Security Administration, said Thursday she would give serious thought to remaining at her post if President Donald Trump wins a second term in office and wants her on the job. “If the president so chooses to seek my advice and counsel, I would consider that […]