Budget & Policy

Brian Bradley NS&D Monitor 12/19/2014 Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel has signed a memo instructing the director of the division of Cost Assessment and Program Evaluation within the Office of the Secretary of Defense to evaluate whether implementation of several personnel- and resource-related reforms within the nuclear enterprise are having the desired effect. CAPE leadership plans […]

Please note: the offices of EXCHANGEMONITOR PUBLICATIONS will be closed from Dec. 24 through Jan. 4. The Weapons Complex Morning Briefing will be published Dec. 22-23, and the next full issue of Nuclear Security & Deterrence Monitor will be on your desk Jan. 9. We will issue bulletins should any major news break in the […]

Todd Jacobson NS&D Monitor 12/19/2014 President Obama this week signed an omnibus spending package that funds the government for the rest of Fiscal Year 2015. Overall, the bill provides $8.23 billion for the NNSA’s weapons program, an $83 million cut from the Administration’s $8.31 billion request but a $450 million increase over the $7.78 billion […]

Board Chairman Winokur to Retire Jan. 3 Mike Nartker NS&D Monitor 12/19/2014 In one of its last actions before adjourning for the year, the Senate this week approved the White House’s choice of Daniel Santos to serve on the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board. The White House nominated Santos to the Board this summer to […]

Congress Adjourns Without Voting on Choice to Head Cleanup Program Mike Nartker WC Monitor 12/19/2014 Monica Regalbuto’s nomination to serve as the next Assistant Secretary of Energy for Environmental Management has been returned to the White House after Congress adjourned this week without the Senate holding a vote. Regalbuto was one of three pending DOE […]

Kenneth Fletcher WC Monitor 12/19/2014 The Department of Energy is still assessing  potential impacts to Savannah River Site projects and workers after cleanup funds were cut about $29 million below the DOE request in the Fiscal Year 2015 spending bill recently passed by Congress. While most cleanup sites in the DOE complex saw a funding […]

WC Monitor 12/19/2014 WINNERS Fluor: Fluor saw major contracting success this year, leading a team that won the Department of Energy’s new Paducah deactivation contract and being part of a team that won a new contract to manage the United Kingdom’s 10 Magnox nuclear power stations and two research reactor sites. Huntington Ingalls Industries: HII […]

Please note: the offices of EXCHANGEMONITOR PUBLICATIONS will be closed from Dec. 24 through Jan. 4. The Weapons Complex Morning Briefing will be published Dec. 22-23, and the next full issue of Weapons Complex Monitor will be on your desk Jan. 9. We will issue bulletins should any major news break in the interim. Happy […]

IN CONGRESS Congress wrapped up work on the final version of the Fiscal Year 2015 defense authorization bill late last week, with the Senate approving the measure and sending it to President Obama for signature. Among the bill’s provisions is language that would create a national park comprised of sites tied to the Manhattan Project. […]

Kenneth Fletcher WC Monitor 12/19/2014 After months of uncertainty regarding hundreds of potential layoffs for Portsmouth cleanup workers, contractor Fluor B&W Portsmouth, LLC, cancelled the workforce reduction planned for this week after the site received a $76.4 million funding boost in the spending bill recently approved by Congress. Contractor officials had warned that without $92.5 […]

Board Chairman Winokur to Retire Jan. 3 Mike Nartker WC Monitor 12/19/2014 In one of its last actions before adjourning for the year, the Senate this week approved the White House’s choice of Daniel Santos to serve on the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board. The White House nominated Santos to the Board this summer to […]

WC Monitor 12/19/2014 IN CONGRESS Congress wrapped up work on the final version of the Fiscal Year 2015 defense authorization bill late last week, with the Senate approving the measure and sending it to President Obama for signature. Among the bill’s provisions is language that would create a national park comprised of sites tied to […]

Abby L. Harvey GHG Monitor 12/19/2014 While the United States is well poised for the eventual wide-scale deployment of carbon capture and storage technology, that option may not be the best for some developing countries, Julio Friedmann, Deputy Assistant Secretary of Energy for Clean Coal, said this week during an event hosted by the Center […]

Abby L. Harvey GHG Monitor 12/19/2014 Coal use, as it is now, is unsustainable, underscoring the need to drastically accelerate the deployment of carbon capture and sequestration, according to the 2014 Medium-Term Coal Market Report released by the International Energy Agency this week. Because of the many benefits of coal, including its abundance and affordability, […]

Abby L. Harvey GHG Monitor 12/19/2014 New funding totaling £2.5 million to develop carbon storage sites in the North Sea has been made available by the U.K.’s Department of Energy and Climate Change, the DECC announced this week. The funding will be delivered by the Energy Technologies Institute, a U.K.-based energy research, development and demonstration […]

Abby L. Harvey GHG Monitor 12/19/2014 With coal set to remain a significant portion of the global energy mix well into the foreseeable future, carbon capture and storage can help solve both increasing energy demand and a need to reduce carbon emissions, experts said this week at an event hosted by the Center for Strategic […]

Abby L. Harvey GHG Monitor 12/19/2014 Various parameters and variables exist within the means by which the Environmental Protection Agency measured the potential benefits of its proposed carbon emissions standards for existing coal fired power plants that could affect the credibility of the EPA analysis, a group of experts said during a webinar hosted by […]

Abby L. Harvey GHG Monitor 12/19/2014 The United States has become a global leader in carbon capture and storage efforts, but beyond research and development, issues relating the legal and regulatory climate surrounding the technology must be cleared up, the International Energy Agency found in a review of U.S. energy policy released this week. In […]

Abby L. Harvey GHG Monitor 12/19/2014 The Sierra Club has filed an appeal to a November summary judgment granted by the Illinois Pollution Control Board in favor of the FutureGen 2.0 project under development in Meredosia, Ill. In the Dec. 11 appeal, the Sierra Club states that the November ruling “was clearly erroneous, arbitrary and […]

Please note: the offices of EXCHANGEMONITOR PUBLICATIONS will be closed from Dec. 24 through Jan. 4. The next full issue of GHG Monitor will be on your desk Jan. 9. We will issue bulletins should any major news break in the interim. Happy holidays.

Abby L. Harvey GHG Monitor 12/19/2014 In a last minute wave of confirmations this week, the Senate confirmed Christopher Smith as the Department of Energy’s Assistant Secretary of Fossil Energy. Smith, who had held the title of Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary for Fossil Energy, was nominated to fill the Assistant Secretary position in September 2013. […]

Abby L. Harvey GHG Monitor 12/19/2014 With a Jan. 8 deadline for finalization of the Environmental Protection Agency’s New Source Performance Standards for new-build coal-fired power plants fast approaching, the agency is still going through the more than one million comments received during the comment period, EPA spokeswoman Liz Purchia told GHG Monitor this week. […]

Abby L. Harvey GHG Monitor 12/19/2014 Carbon emissions standards for existing coal fired power plants proposed by the Environmental Protection Agency in June are unworkable, unrealistic and may not be legal, according to a report released this week by Republicans on the House Energy and Commerce Committee. The proposed regulation sets state-specific carbon emission reduction […]

Abby L. Harvey GHG Monitor 12/19/2014 If the wide-scale deployment of carbon capture and storage technology on coal occurs within 10 years, deployment of the technology onto natural gas facilities could follow as little as five years behind, according to Revis James, Director for Generation Research and Development at the Electric Power Research Institute. Speaking […]

Abby L. Harvey GHG Monitor 12/19/2014 After two weeks of negotiations in Lima, Peru, delegates to the 20th Session of the Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP 20) left early this week with a slightly better idea of what would be expected leading up to and at […]

GHG Monitor 12/19/2014 IN CONGRESS Congress over the weekend completed work on an omnibus spending package for the remainder of FY 2015. For the Environmental Protection Agency, the measure provides a total funding level of $8.14 billion, down from last year’s $8.2 billion, but still significantly higher than the Obama Administration’s FY15 request of $7.89 […]

Please note: the offices of EXCHANGEMONITOR PUBLICATIONS will be closed from Dec. 24 through Jan. 4. The Weapons Complex Morning Briefing will be published Dec. 22-23, and the next full issue of RadWaste Monitor will be on your desk Jan. 9. We will issue bulletins should any major news break in the interim. Happy holidays!

NNSA Weapons Program Receives $8.23 Billion in Bill, Down $83 Million From Request Todd Jacobson NS&D Monitor 12/12/2014 A feasibility study for refurbishing the cruise missile warhead will go forward in Fiscal Year 2015, according to funding legislation released this week by House and Senate appropriators. The $9.4 million study represents a sliver of the […]

Robert Scher, the President’s nominee to be the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Strategy, Plans and Capabilities, was confirmed late Tuesday night shortly before the Senate adjourned. Scher was part of a group of noncontroversial nominees confirmed by unanimous consent Tuesday, ending a relatively short wait for the Pentagon official. Scher was nominated to the […]

The Senate yesterday confirmed a handful of Obama Administration nominees, ending a more-than-500 day wait for Assistant Secretary of State for Verification and Compliance Frank Rose and clearing Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board member Daniel Santos as well. Santos has had a much shorter wait than Rose as he was nominated in June by the […]