Budget & Policy

The sitting leaders of the Senate Appropriations energy and water development subcommittee plan to remain in place when the next Congress convenes in January. Staffers for both subcommittee Chairman Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) and Ranking Member Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) this week confirmed their bosses’ intentions for the 116th Congress. Alexander has held the post since 2015, […]

The sitting leaders of the Senate Appropriations energy and water development subcommittee plan to remain in place when the next Congress convenes in January. Staffers for both subcommittee Chairman Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) and Ranking Member Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) confirmed their bosses’ intentions this week. Alexander has held the post since 2015, taking over from Feinstein […]

The United States needs an all-new organization separated from the federal government if it hopes to finally end the decades-long impasse in building a permanent resting place for the nation’s nuclear waste, a panel of experts said Monday. That was one of a long series of recommendations listed in the 126-page “Reset of America’s Nuclear […]

A pair of nuclear doves in the Senate demanded this week that Energy Secretary Rick Perry brief them about his negotiations to bring U.S. nuclear-power technology to Saudi Arabia. In a Tuesday letter to Perry, Senate Foreign Relations Committee members Edward Markey (D-Mass.) and Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.) also told Perry the United States should indefinitely suspend […]

Vivienne Machi Defense Daily The Senate Armed Services Committee (SASC) will include Sens. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.), Tammy Duckworth (D-Ill.), and Doug Jones (D-Ala.) when it convenes for the 116th Congress in January. Minority Leader Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.)’s office released the list of new committee assignments for his party Dec. 12. Republican assignments and all subcommittee […]

The sitting leaders of the Senate Appropriations energy and water development subcommittee plan to remain in place when the next Congress convenes in January. Staffers for both subcommittee Chairman Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) and Ranking Member Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) confirmed their bosses’ intentions this week. Alexander has held the post since 2015, taking over from Feinstein […]

Despite some pushback from members of his own party, Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) will become the Democrats’ ranking member on the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee. Manchin, a former West Virginia governor, has been a member of the committee since being elected to the Senate in 2010. He has served as a champion for […]

The cost to replace the Air Force’s aging aircraft fleet and build new advanced jets is only expected to rise over the next three decades, averaging between $15 billion and $23 billion through 2040, according to a new Congressional Budget Office report. The CBO report, titled “The Cost of Replacing Today’s Air Force Fleet” and released […]

Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) hopes to remain chairman of the Senate Appropriations energy and water development subcommittee when the next Congress convenes in January, a staffer confirmed. The longtime lawmaker has held the post since 2015. There was no word Tuesday on whether Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) expects to stay on as her party’s ranking […]

A pair of nuclear doves in the Senate demanded Tuesday that Energy Secretary Rick Perry brief them about his negotiations to bring U.S. nuclear-power technology to Saudi Arabia. In a letter to Perry, Sens. Edward Markey (D-Mass.) and Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.) — members of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee — also told Perry the United […]

The Pentagon will unveil its fiscal year 2020 presidential budget (PB) request Feb. 4, the department’s chief military spokesman said Dec. 10. Whether the topline will be $700 billion or $750 billion remains to be seen. Army Col. Robert Manning declined to comment on recent reports that President Trump is now considering submitting a $750 […]

A joint venture, APTIM-North Wind Construction, has won a $92 million contract from the Energy Department to build the Outfall 200 Mercury Treatment Facility at the Y-12 National Security Complex in Oak Ridge, Tenn. The DOE Office of Environmental Management announced the four-year award in a Tuesday press release. The agency received two proposals for […]

Turnover in key committees in the upcoming Congress might not have a major impact on the Energy Department’s Office of Environmental Management (EM). When Democrats assume leadership in the House of Representatives next month, the primary question involves not the incoming chairs of each panel, but how much they might be swayed by likely House […]

The United Kingdom’s Nuclear Decommissioning Authority (NDA) said this week it expects to spend £3.1 billion ($3.9 billion) in its upcoming 2019-2020 budget year. Just over £2.9 billion ($3.7 billion) of that will be spent on its nuclear cleanup, reprocessing, and waste management operations around the nation. The remaining money be directed toward non-site-specific activities, […]

The Energy Department is giving interested parties additional time to weigh in on the proposed new interpretation of high-level radioactive waste (HLW). The public comment deadline has been pushed back from Dec. 10 to Jan. 9, according to a DOE notice Tuesday in the Federal Register. Comments can be emailed to HLWnotice@em.doe.gov. After the department […]

The United Kingdom’s Nuclear Decommissioning Authority (NDA) said this week it expects to spend £3.1 billion ($3.9 billion) in its upcoming 2019-2020 budget year. Just over £2.9 billion ($3.7 billion) of that will be spent at its nuclear cleanup, reprocessing, and waste management facilities around the nation. The remaining money be directed toward non-site-specific operations, […]

Longtime Rep. Frank Pallone Jr. (D-N.J.) is expected to become the new chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee next month when Democrats take over leadership in the House of Representatives. Pallone, elected last month to his 16th term in the lower chamber, is currently ranking Democrat on the panel. He would succeed current […]

A Hanford Advisory Board meeting scheduled in Richland, Wash., for Dec. 5-6 has been canceled after President Donald Trump declared Wednesday a national day of mourning for former President George H.W. Bush. Federal offices will be closed and federal employees have the day off. Bush died Friday at age 94. The Hanford Advisory Board meeting […]

Three Democratic senators on Monday appealed to President Donald Trump to confer with Congress before formally withdrawing from the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty. Sens. Bob Menendez (N.J), Jack Reed (R.I.), and Mark Warner (Va.) communicated their concerns in a letter first reported by Politico. In October, Trump announced the United States would cease complying with […]

Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto (D-Nev.) and Sen.-elect Jacky Rosen (D-Nev.) on Friday called on three top Democratic lawmakers to ensure the upcoming federal appropriations bill does not provide a cent for the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste disposal facility. There have been rumors, but no confirmation, that the budget bill needed to keep a number of […]

Nearly lost amid higher-profile nomination hearings in high-octane committees this week is a nuts-and-bolts piece of legislation that could open the door for more whistleblower disclosures in the nuclear weapons, waste, and power industries. The bill, one of many discussed in a Thursday hearing of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources energy subcommittee, is sponsored by […]

Rep. Ben Ray Luján (D-N.M.) will be the assistant Democratic leader in the 116th Congress come January, bolstering the political bona fides of the six-termer, whose 3rd Congressional District includes the Los Alamos National Laboratory. Luján confirmed the news in a Twitter post late Wednesday. It is a relatively low-ranking leadership post — fourth after […]

Lawmakers set the stage for the nuclear weapons debate to come in the next Congress with a wave of bills and rhetoric that burned the post-Thanksgiving fog from Washington this week. Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) — upon whom partisans and the press have heaped presidential buzz — provided a capstone Thursday with a speech at […]

The Department of Energy should consider performing a lengthy environmental review of its plan to dispose of 34 metric tons of surplus weapon-usable plutonium by burying the material deep underground, a congressionally chartered panel said Friday. The department’s semiautonomous National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) might find the disposal plan easier to manage if it produces […]

The Department of Energy’s (DOE) fiscal 2018 budget increase handily outpaced the rise in dollars under contract, according to a report from the agency’s Office of the Inspector General late last week. The DOE budget rose about 10 percent to some $34.5 billion between fiscal 2017 and fiscal 2018, while the amount of money under […]

WASHINGTON, D.C. – While the Energy Department’s top nuclear cleanup manager said Wednesday her office will not use a new agency order to thwart oversight by the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board (DNFSB), members of the panel remained apprehensive. Order 140.1, issued in May, will not change the relationship between DOE’s Office of Environmental Management […]

A new law easing Washington state workers’ compensation program requirements for claims from employees of the Department of Energy’s Hanford Site violates the U.S. Constitution, according to the Department of Justice. The agency plans to file a civil lawsuit against the state near the end of this week to block the law, if a resolution […]

Oak Ridge, Tenn.-based Atkins Nuclear Secured Holdings Corp. on Nov. 8 named William Madia to its Board of Directors. In addition to heading his own energy consulting firm, Madia is chairman of the board and vice president for the SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory at Stanford University in California. Originally called the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center, […]

The Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee on Tuesday signed off on the Trump administration’s nominee to lead the U.S. Energy Department’s Office of Nuclear Energy. Rita Baranwal, currently director of DOE’s Gateway for Accelerated Innovation in Nuclear (GAIN) program, now waits for a vote by the full Senate in the waning days of the […]

A Michigan Senate committee next week will again consider legislation that would set specific radioactivity limits for disposal of technologically enhanced naturally occurring radioactive materials (TENORM) in state landfills. The bill from Sen. Tom Casperson (R) would add a number of amendments to the 1994 state Natural Resources and Environmental Protection Act, including citing a […]