The Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board plans to consider at least one nuclear safety recommendation to the Department of Energy during closed-door meetings in early December, according to notices published Monday.
The specific topics to be discussed by the five-member Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board (DNFSB) on Dec. 6 and Dec. 18 are unknown. In notices posted online, the independent federal board said it may legally withhold the detailed agendas for the meetings. The DNFSB said only that it will weigh “potential Recommendations” to Secretary of Energy Rick Perry and President Donald Trump.
Only the five members of the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board (DNFSB) and their staff will attend the meetings, which were scheduled for Monday but later delayed until early December.
The DNFSB cannot force the Department of Energy (DOE) or the White House to change federal policies or rules, but the board can make safety recommendations with which the secretary of energy must publicly agree or disagree.
Eventually, the board must publish its recommendation to DOE — but it could be months before the text sees the light of day.
First, the DNFSB must decide to make a recommendation. Next, the board has to draw up a draft recommendation, which the secretary of energy may take at least 30 days for review and response. Once the final recommendation drops, the DNFSB must “promptly” make it available to the public.
Since it was created in 1989, the DNFSB has issued 59 recommendations. Of these, five remain open. The board issued its latest recommendation in 2015, when it recommended ways for DOE to tighten emergency preparedness and response at the Pantex Plant near Amarillo, Texas: the only U.S. site that assembles and disassembles nuclear warheads.
If the DNFSB issues a recommendation sometime after the scheduled December meetings, it would be the first sent to DOE during the Donald Trump administration.
The DNFSB has so far had talks with senior DOE officials, including Frank Klotz, administrator of the National Nuclear Security Administration, and James Owendoff, acting assistant energy secretary for environmental management. However, the DNFSB has yet to meet with Energy Secretary Rick Perry, a board spokesperson said Monday.
