CHU: DOE WORKING TO RESOLVE USEC INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY ISSUES

Responding to concerns by Senate appropriators about interim funding provided for USEC centrifuge plant R&D program, Department of Energy Secretary Steven Chu said yesterday that if the program is fully funded DOE will work to clarify the technology’s intellectual property rights and other issues. In a letter to Chu late last month, Senate Appropriations Energy and Water Chair Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) criticized the $44 million supporting the proposed two-year program through March, which DOE provided without Congressional approval. She said that new project management and resolution of intellectual property rights are needed. Chu noted that DOE developed the initial technology for the American Centrifuge Plant, which USEC has since added to, and said that DOE would work on the issue. “In return for helping with the R&D program, we are working on the intellectual property rights. The thing we did that only goes through March did not do that, but I would say yes, if we even funded it for one year out of the two years we would insist on something like that,” Chu told reporters yesterday on the sidelines of the National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners Winter Meeting.