Budget & Policy

The disarmament advocating Ploughshares Fund was set to host the speaker of the House, the chair of the House Armed Services Committee and the principal deputy national security advisor for a live, webcast podcast recording on Thursday. The event, Press the Button Live, was scheduled to begin at 2 p.m. Eastern time. Jon Finer, President […]

Four Republicans in the House of Representatives want Secretary of Energy Jennifer Granholm to examine potential “unintended impacts” of staff losses at the Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site in South Carolina, where some employees plan to leave the site rather than get a mandatory COVID-19 vaccination. The lawmakers’ question if DOE has thought through […]

A bipartisan group of four senators reintroduced a bill to protect whistleblowers at the Department of Energy and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission from retaliation, according to a recent press release. Before the Senate adjourned last week, Sens. Tammy Duckworth (D-Ill.), Ron Wyden (D-Wash.), Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) and James Lankford (R-Okla.) announced that they filed their […]

A bipartisan group of four senators reintroduced a bill to protect whistleblowers at the Department of Energy and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission from retaliation, according to a recent press release. Before the Senate adjourned last week, Sens. Tammy Duckworth (D-Ill.), Ron Wyden (D-Wash.), Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) and James Lankford (R-Okla.) announced that they filed their […]

A bipartisan group of four senators reintroduced a bill to protect whistleblowers at the Department of Energy and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission from retaliation, according to a recent press release. Before the Senate adjourned last week, Sens. Tammy Duckworth (D-Ill.), Ron Wyden (D-Wash.), Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) and James Lankford (R-Okla.) announced that they filed their […]

The Department of Energy’s Office of Inspector General has a busy fiscal 2022 schedule of audits and inspections planned for projects affecting the DOE’s Office of Environmental Management and the semiautonomous National Nuclear Security Administration. Last week, the DOE Office of Inspector General (OIG) published its work plan for the fiscal year that began Oct. […]

The former head of the Advanced Research Projects Agency and the one-time number-two at the National Nuclear Security Administration will lead the latest incarnation of the Secretary of Energy Advisory Board, the Department of Energy said Monday. Stanford University professor Arun Majumdar, once the head of the Joe Biden administration’s transition team for the Department […]

After both the House of Representatives and Senate passed a stopgap funding plan Thursday, President Joe Biden signed the continuing budget resolution to keep the federal government open through Dec. 3. The action prevented the Department of Energy and other federal agencies from largely shutting down at midnight. The short-term funding bill will hold spending at […]

The Senate Armed Services Committee has demanded that the National Nuclear Security Administration come up with a “comprehensive strategy” for disposing of nuclear waste created by the ongoing 30-year refresh of U.S. nuclear weapons. The provision is part of the committee’s fiscal year 2022 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), the full text of which the […]

After both the House of Representatives and Senate passed a stopgap funding plan Thursday, President Joe Biden signed the continuing budget resolution to keep the federal government open through Dec. 3. The action prevented the Department of Energy and other federal agencies from largely shutting down at midnight. The 2022 fiscal year started Friday, with […]

A pair of Democratic lawmakers this week introduced a bill that would allow a mostly non-federal taskforce, appointed in large part by the Environmental Protection Agency, to help define consent-based siting of nuclear waste and consider whether such waste could be regulated by states. If it became law, the “Nuclear Waste Task Force Act,” unveiled […]

The lights were still on in Washington Friday after Congress approved a stopgap budget to prevent a government shutdown, at least through Dec. 3, while it works on other legislation and works toward a permanent 2022 budget. President Joe Biden signed the bill Thursday evening not long after the House voted 254-175 to send congressional […]

Although the looming threat of a shutdown appeared to have dissipated at deadline Thursday, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission said it was prepared to keep the lights on for a bit if federal funds dried up because Congress and the White House could not agree on a budget for the 2022 fiscal year that starts after […]

The House and Senate are both expected to take votes today on a stopgap spending plan that could prevent federal government services from going dark at midnight, according to media reports. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) was quoted by USA Today as saying the upper chamber can act quickly to try and get a […]

A bill introduced in Congress Tuesday would create a task force to evaluate a loophole in federal law that the measure’s sponsors say would enable consent-based siting for a federal nuclear waste storage facility, according to a press release. If it became law, the “Nuclear Waste Task Force Act,” unveiled Tuesday in the House by […]

With Congressional Republicans threatening to thwart a stopgap funding plan to keep the government running beyond Thursday, the Department of Energy and other agencies could be forced to suspend operations. The DOE declined comment Tuesday, directing inquiries to the White House’s Office of Management and Budget, which did not immediately respond by Weapons Complex Morning […]

A bill introduced in Congress Tuesday would create a task force to evaluate a loophole in federal law that the measure’s sponsors say would enable consent-based siting for a federal nuclear waste storage facility, according to a press release. If it became law, the “Nuclear Waste Task Force Act,” unveiled Tuesday in the House by […]

The Senate Armed Services Committee has demanded that the National Nuclear Security Administration come up with a “comprehensive strategy” for disposing of nuclear waste created by the ongoing 30-year refresh of U.S. nuclear weapons. The provision is part of the committee’s fiscal year 2022 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), the full text of which the […]

The full House this week passed a stopgap spending bill that would essentially freeze federal spending, including at the Department of Energy, at 2021 levels until Dec. 3. It was a party-line vote in the Democratic-majority chamber: 220-211, with one member not voting. The stopgap budget now heads to the Senate, where Republican leaders have […]

A service life extension would be authorized for the B83 megaton gravity bomb in 2022 and every new president would have to review U.S. nuclear force posture, if a Senate committee’s version of the 2022 National Defense Authorization Act becomes law. The Senate Armed Services Committee approved its 2022 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) behind […]

A possible government shutdown loomed closer at deadline, as Senate Republicans threatened to filibuster a stopgap budget to keep federal agencies, including the Department of Energy, funded when the 2022 fiscal year begins on Oct. 1. The continuing resolution, which passed the House Tuesday on a 220-211 party-line vote, will keep federal agencies at their […]

The House Appropriations Committee’s proposed two-month stopgap spending bill for 2022 that would keep the Department of Energy cleanup office at roughly fiscal 2021 levels, but also includes a provision to prevent a shortfall in uranium cleanup funds after Oct. 1. The plan released Tuesday by House Appropriations, and passed later the same day in […]

A service life extension would be authorized for the B83 megaton gravity bomb in 2022 and every new president would have to review U.S. nuclear force posture, if a Senate committee’s version of the 2022 National Defense Authorization Act becomes law. The Senate Armed Services Committee approved its 2022 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) behind […]

The full House on Tuesday evening passed a stopgap spending bill that would essentially freeze federal spending, including at the Department of Energy, at 2021 levels until Dec. 3. It was a party-line vote in the Democratic-majority chamber: 220-211, with one member not voting. The bill would make an exception to the 2021 budget for […]

The Department of Energy would keep its 2021 budget through Dec. 3, under a short-term stop-gap budget bill unveiled this week by the House Appropriations Committee. The bill would push an increase in the U.S. debt ceiling off until Dec. 16: an effort to untether continued funding for government agencies from the always-politically-contentious issue of […]

A group of Maryland environmental activists Monday protested Congress’s proposed tax credits aimed at saving economically-troubled nuclear power plants, according to a press release. Activists from Beyond Nuclear and the Nuclear Information and Resource Service (NIRS) among others delivered letters Monday to Reps. Jamie Raskin and John Sarbanes (both D-Md.) during a “national day of […]

The Secretary of Energy will head off to Europe next week to lead the U.S. delegation at the International Atomic Energy Agency’s General Conference, the Department of Energy announced Thursday. At the annual conference in Vienna, Austria, Secretary Jennifer Granholm will give a speech “underscoring the use of nuclear to combat climate change, advance medical […]

A budget markup of the Joe Biden administration’s Build Back Better Act made its way through the House’s energy panel Tuesday, with the majority shaking off a couple of attempts by Republicans to get more nuclear energy in the mix. The energy subsection of Congress’s budget reconciliation recommendations passed on a 30-27 party-line vote during […]

States and tribal governments along haulage routes leading to the Department of Energy’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico could divvy up about $8.9-million in federal project grants during fiscal 2022, according to a recent notice. “The participating States, tribes, and the DOE will work to develop, coordinate, and implement activities in accident prevention, […]

A budget markup of the Joe Biden administration’s Build Back Better Act made its way through the House’s energy panel Tuesday, with the majority shaking off a couple of attempts by Republicans to get more nuclear energy in the mix. The energy subsection of Congress’s budget reconciliation recommendations passed on a 30-27 party-line vote during […]