Late delivery of insensitive high explosives to the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California will delay by “at 2 two months” the National Nuclear Security Administration’s program to refurbish an old warhead for a next-generation air-launched cruise missile, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) reported this week.
However, the semiautonomous Department of Energy stockpile steward still expects to finish the first war-ready W80-4 for the Air Force in fiscal year 2025, a spokesperson for the civilian agency wrote Friday in an email.
Livermore leads the W80-4 life-extension program and needs an order of triaminotrinitrobenzene for a hydrodynamic test intended to prove out computer simulations that modeled the refurbished warhead’s behavior during detonation, the GAO said in a report
The Holston Army Ammunition Plant in Tennessee was supposed to fill Livermore’s order in March 2019, but did not, according to the GAO. The report did not say how large an order Livermore placed.
First, the BAE Systems-operated explosive-material supplier delayed Livermore’s delivery to fill a higher-priority Department of Defense order.
Then, “an explosive incident” at Holston in January halted production for about three weeks, the GAO said. The tidbit was tucked into a report about the National Nuclear Security Administration’s (NNSA) projected need for conventional high explosives to refurbish the existing U.S. nuclear arsenal.
Conventional explosions are used to spark nuclear detonations. The GAO’s report said the NNSA faces a high-explosives supply crunch as the agency prepares to refurbish four active warheads over the next 30 or so years.
For now, despite the risks the GAO described, “[f]irst Production Unit (FPU) for the W80-4 Life Extension Program remains on schedule for FY2025,” an NNSA spokesperson told Nuclear Security & Deterrence Monitor on Friday. “While individual tests may experience slips in schedule, the overall program schedule is designed in such a way that it can overcome small risks and delays.”
The NNSA is refurbishing the W80 for the Long-Range Standoff Weapon: the Pentagon’s planned replacement for the 1980s-vintage Air-Launched Cruise Missile. The Pentagon wants to deploy the new missile in 2025. Initially, B-52H aircraft would carry the weapon. Eventually, it would be loaded on the planned B-21 Raider.
The cost of the W80-4 has risen somewhat even since last year. In March, the NNSA requested almost $900 million for the program for fiscal 2020. In 2018, the agency estimated it would need around $715 million for the budget year that begins Oct. 1.
The NNSA has not said, specifically, what caused the expected cost increase. In rough terms, and adjusting for inflation, the agency expects to spend between $7.5 billion and $11.5 billion to build the W80-4 over the 17 years spanning 2015 through 2032. The Pentagon has said it wants to buy about 1,000 Long-Range Standoff Weapon missiles.
The House Armed Services and Appropriations committees have each approved the $900 million requested for W80-4 for 2020.
The Senate Armed Services Committee also approved full funding for W80-4 in its version of the 2020 National Defense Authorization Act, which after a procedural vote this week could get a vote in the full Senate as soon as next week. The Senate Appropriations Committee had not drafted a 2020 NNSA spending bill at deadline Friday for Nuclear Security & Deterrence Monitor.
