Budget & Policy

WASHINGTON — A bipartisan group of senators plans to reintroduce a bill that, in its most recent form, would have created a new federal agency dedicated to dealing with nuclear waste, Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) said during a Wednesday hearing here on Capitol Hill. Alexander would sponsor the legislation along with Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.). The […]

WASHINGTON — The federal government should prioritize interim storage of spent nuclear fuel at privately licensed sites instead of fast-tracking a permanent disposal site at Yucca Mountain in Nevada, the head of the Senate panel in charge of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s budget said in a hearing Wednesday. Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.), chairman of the Senate […]

WASHINGTON — A bipartisan group of senators plans to reintroduce a bill that, in its most recent form, would have created a new federal agency dedicated to dealing with nuclear waste, Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) said during a Wednesday hearing here on Capitol Hill. Alexander would sponsor the legislation along with Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.). The […]

The Donald Trump administration’s fiscal 2018 budget request for the Hanford Site’s Richland Operations Office is inadequate, regulators for the Department of Energy facility in Washington state said Wednesday during discussions at a Hanford Advisory Board meeting and a public budget meeting. The proposed $800 million for the office – which includes security and cybersecurity […]

Marc Selinger Defense Daily The U.S. Air Force’s efforts to improve its readiness and modernize its capabilities will be derailed if Congress does not repeal across-the-board budget cuts that are set to return in fiscal year 2018, service Secretary Heather Wilson said June 5. Funds provided for fiscal year 2017 stopped the Air Force’s readiness […]

The United States’ contributions to international nuclear security and verification organizations would not be reduced under the White House’s fiscal 2018 budget proposal, despite significant proposed cuts to the overall State Department budget. A State Department official said by email this week that the United States’ voluntary contribution to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) […]

Senate lawmakers on Tuesday challenged new Air Force Secretary Heather Wilson to explain the service’s secrecy regarding its B-21 nuclear bomber program. During a hearing of the Senate Armed Services Committee, Chairman John McCain (R-Ariz.) said it was “difficult to understand” why the Air Force is keeping all the B-21’s capabilities classified “under the veil […]

WASHINGTON — A bipartisan group of senators plans to reintroduce a bill that, in its most recent form, would have created a new federal agency dedicated to dealing with nuclear waste, Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) said during a Wednesday hearing here on Capitol Hill. Alexander would sponsor the bill along with Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.). […]

The United States’ contributions to international nuclear security and verification organizations would not be reduced under the White House’s fiscal 2018 budget proposal, despite significant proposed cuts to the overall State Department budget. A State Department official said by email this week that the United States’ voluntary contribution to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) […]

The Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee on Tuesday approved Dan Brouillette to be deputy secretary of energy, sending the Texas insurance lobbyist’s nomination on to the full Senate for a vote that had not been scheduled at deadline for Weapons Complex Morning Briefing. Glad to see our Deputy Secretary nominee, Dan Brouillette, voted through […]

Senate lawmakers on Tuesday challenged Air Force Secretary Heather Wilson on the service’s secrecy on its B-21 program, which the secretary defended during a Senate Armed Services Committee (SASC) hearing. SASC chairman John McCain (R-Ariz.) said it was “difficult to understand” why the Air Force is keeping all the B-21’s capabilities classified “under the veil […]

The Senate Environment and Public Works Committee delayed a nomination hearing for three proposed Nuclear Regulatory Commission commissioners to Tuesday, the panel announced Tuesday afternoon. The hearing had been scheduled for today. The committee did not say why it postponed the meeting. When the Committee does get around to the hearing, it will consider the […]

Hanford’s annual cleanup budget priority meeting will be held Wednesday June 7 at the Richland Public Library. To register to watch via webinar go to June 7th on the Hanford event calendar. Public comment on fiscal 2019 needs will be accepted at HanfordPriorities2019@rl.gov from June 7 to July 7. The meeting traditionally covers the next two […]

In separate hearings on Wednesday, Senators will consider the Donald Trump administration’s 2018 budget request for the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and the White House’s nominees to round out the two vacant spots on the commission. The NRC double-header is set to kick off at 10 a.m., when the Senate Environmental and Public Works Committee will […]

Three industry groups will sponsor a panel discussion and reception with officials from the Energy Department’s Environmental Management (EM) office Wednesday on Capitol Hill as part of the next meeting of the House Nuclear Clean Up Caucus. The topic of the evening panel discussion, which begins at 5 p.m. Eastern time, is: “EM’s Cost Reduction […]

As though channeling Luis Tiant of his beloved Boston Red Sox, former Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz turned away from Washington only briefly before coming back around full-tilt at the marble-pillared city he called home for more than three years as President Barack Obama’s last DOE chief. In March, just months after Donald Trump was sworn into office and […]

The Trump administration has proposed funding decreases in fiscal 2018 to the State Department’s arms control and nonproliferation work, as well as reductions for the Department of Homeland Security’s Domestic Nuclear Detection Office (DNDO). The White House released last week a budget proposal requesting $37.6 billion for the State Department and U.S. Agency for International […]

Members of the House and Senate Armed Services Committees responsible for annual defense authorization have voiced opposition to the White House’s fiscal 2018 budget proposal for differing reasons, raising questions about whether Congress will be able to agree on defense spending levels past the end of this fiscal year. While committee Republicans argue that the […]

Members of the House and Senate Armed Services Committees responsible for annual defense authorization have voiced opposition to the White House’s fiscal 2018 budget proposal for differing reasons, raising questions about whether Congress will be able to agree on defense spending levels past the end of this fiscal year. While committee Republicans argue that the […]

The White House’s fiscal 2018 budget proposal released last week would reduce funding for the Department of Homeland Security’s Domestic Nuclear Detection Office, despite increasing the department’s budget overall. The president proposed $44.1 billion in funding for the Department of Homeland Security (DHS): a $2.8 billion increase over the currently enacted fiscal 2017 omnibus appropriations spending […]

A trio of mostly Democratic senators reintroduced legislation that would require nuclear power plants to store spent nuclear fuel in dry casks rather than spent fuel pools. Sens. Edward J. Markey (D-Mass.), Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), and Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.) reintroduced the Dry Cask Storage Act Friday. The bill “would ensure that every nuclear reactor operator […]

The Trump administration has proposed a 30 percent decrease in fiscal 2018 for the State Department’s budget, alongside more modest decreases to the specific line items concerning the department’s arms control and nonproliferation work. The White House released last week a budget proposal requesting $37.6 billion for the State Department and U.S. Agency for International […]

Top U.S. Air Force officials are standing behind a significant increase in funding the service is proposing for its controversial Long-Range Standoff nuclear cruise missile for fiscal 2018. There seems to be “broad bipartisan support for LRSO,” Gen. Stephen Wilson, Air Force vice chief of staff, said Thursday at a Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies […]

The White House has officially proposed $1 billion in additional funding for the National Nuclear Security Administration in fiscal 2018, almost all of it for the agency’s weapons activities account. The Office of Management and Budget on Tuesday released President Donald Trump’s spending request for the budget year beginning Oct. 1, which would grant the Energy […]

The Donald Trump administration’s fiscal 2018 budget proposal sustains its predecessor’s plan to terminate the Department of Energy’s Mixed Oxide Fuel Fabrication Facility in South Carolina, a decision the head of the National Nuclear Security Administration said is unrelated to carryover in leadership at his agency. The NNSA’s $13.9 billion budget proposal includes $1.8 billion […]

The Donald Trump administration requested $150 million for 2018 across the Energy Department and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to restart DOE’s application to license Yucca Mountain in Nye County, Nev., as a nuclear waste repository. The $120 million of funding within DOE encompasses $110 million for Yucca licensing and $10 million for an interim storage […]

The Department of Energy’s latest budget request would reduce spending at the Hanford Site in Washington state by $118.8 from current levels. The total budget would be $2.22 billion for fiscal 2018, not including security costs. The proposal would add about $5 million to the budget of Hanford’s Office of River Protection, for a total […]

The Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site is in line to receive $1.45 billion in fiscal 2018 for its environmental management (EM) mission, much of which would fund liquid waste cleanup, according to President Donald Trump’s budget proposal this week. The request is $111 million more than the South Carolina site received for EM work […]

A bipartisan group of U.S. lawmakers on Wednesday asked the Government Accountability Office to review monitoring and maintenance of aging facilities at the Department of Energy’s Hanford Site in Washington state after the May 9 discovery of a breached waste tunnel. “Fortunately, the collapse did not result in any injuries and no measureable release of […]

Sen. Martin Heinrich (D-N.M.) this week told the head of the Energy Department’s Office of Environmental Management that President Donald Trump did not propose a large enough 2018 budget for the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP). WIPP, the nation’s only deep-underground disposal facility for the radioactively contaminated material and equipment known as transuranic waste, would […]