The Department of Energy is still being very tight-fisted when it comes to sharing information with the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board, DNFSB said in a recent letter to Congress.
In addition, the congressionally-created safety watchdog said in its July 10 letter that DOE is not living up to the terms of a 2022 memorandum of understanding that was supposed to settle DNFSB’s right to review documents and talk to DOE contractors and staff as part of its work.
In its January report to Congress, DNFSB said DOE “had not formally denied the board access to any information it had requested, but highlighted concerns with delayed responses to access requests,” according to the July letter from DNFSB member Patricia Lee. Lee is currently the lone member of what is supposed to be a five-expert panel charged with providing DOE independent analysis and advice on defense nuclear installations.
“Since that time [January], the board has experienced increasing access challenges, the most significant in its history, including verbal and written denials from DOE and a lack of responsiveness to access requested before and after the previous reporting period.,” Lee said in the letter.
This has prevented DNFSB from doing certain safety reviews, including an evaluation of “electrical testers that are relied upon to protect nuclear explosive devices from errant electrical energy at the Pantex Plant,” according to the DNFSB letter to Congress. Also, the board “has not been provided access to large numbers of draft DOE safety directives and regulations that are currently being revised.”
During the first six months of 2026, “DOE has explicitly denied eight of the Board’s access requests, some of which are revocations of longstanding access to safety information provided to the board’s staff,” according to an attachment to the July 10 DNFSB letter. “This includes revocations of access to National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) safety and operations meetings and safety basis schedule updates.”
DNFSB is supposed to have access to such meetings under the 2022 MOU, which was drafted at the behest of Congress, DNFSB goes on to say.
DOE did not immediately respond to a Wednesday morning request for comment.