DNFSB SEEKING APPROX. $30 MILLION FOR FISCAL YEAR 2015

The Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board is seeking a small boost in funding next year to hire additional staff the Board says are needed to handle additional workload requirements. The DNFSB’s Fiscal Year 2015 budget request, released late last week, seeks $30.15 million, an increase of approximately $2 million from the Board’s current funding levels. Approximately half of the requested funding increase would be used to add five new full-time equivalents (FTEs) in response to “the need for increased resources for safety oversight” at the Hanford Waste Treatment Plant; the assignment of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s Inspector General to also provide IG serves to the Board; and changes made by lawmakers to how the Board operates, such as requiring the Board to assess risk when preparing recommendations, the request states.

Defending its proposed funding increase, the Board said in its request, “The cost of re-engineering and making post-construction safety modifications to complex DOE defense nuclear facilities due to the late identification of significant design flaws would require significantly more resources than the Board’s requested budget. When incomplete or incorrect safety features are identified late in the design stage (or worse, in the construction stage) project costs are increased and schedules are delayed.” The request goes on to state that the additional sought-after resources are “necessary to address congressional concerns and provide the scientific and technical resources needed to review DOE’s design and construction projects, remediation activities, and weapons programs in a timely and efficient manner.” The Board’s full FY 2015 request can be found here.