Publications: Nuclear Security & Deterrence Monitor

Thousands of pounds of stainless steel originally intended for the Mixed Oxide Fuel Fabrication Facility (MFFF) at the Savannah River Site in Aiken, S.C., has been donated to welding programs at nearby high schools and colleges. Fifteen high schools and colleges each received a ton of metal from the U.S. Department of Energy’s semiautonomous National […]

The U.S. National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) said Monday it has selected a longtime Department of Energy manager to lead its field office for the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico. Michael Weis comes to Los Alamos after nearly 25 years with the department, most recently as site office manager for the Fermi National […]

James Peery will become director of the Sandia National Laboratories on Jan. 1, after current director Stephen Younger retires, the multistate Department of Energy nuclear-weapon-engineering lab announced this week. Peery is now  associate laboratory director of national security sciences at Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Oak Ridge, Tenn. In that role, he succeeded Brent Park, […]

The U.S. Department of Energy spent $8.6 million during the last fiscal year on remediation of a cesium-137 spill at a hospital research facility in Seattle. Remediation is ongoing at the Research and Training Building for the University of Washington’s Harborview Medical Center, according to Al Stotts, a spokesman for DOE’s semiautonomous National Nuclear Security […]

BWX Technologies has tapped Dave Broussard, a former contractor at the Department of Energy’s Idaho National Laboratory, to be general manager of the company’s nuclear-naval parts factory in Barberton, Ohio. Broussard will take over the 750-person manufacturing site as it prepares to hire 80 more people and spend $80 million to ramp up production of […]

AECOM disclosed Nov. 29 that Executive Vice President and Chief Legal Officer Carla Christofferson was resigning her post effective immediately. The Los Angeles-based infrastructure multinational said its leadership and Christofferson “mutually agreed” she would resign her management position, but would remain a “non-executive” employee of AECOM through Dec. 16, according to a filing with the U.S. Securities […]

A cybersecurity provider for the U.S. National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) is urging reconsideration of the recent follow-on award for the work to a rival company. The transition out of the contract held by information-technology specialist Criterion Systems, of Vienna, Va., was driven “by a perceived need to rapidly remediate a contract protest action lingering […]

The U.S. Department of Energy and the contractor hired to build a now-terminated plutonium recycling plant at the Savannah River Site in South Carolina are seeking a joint dismissal of nine lawsuits the company filed against its employer over the past four years. Filed Wednesday in the U.S. Court of Federal Claims, the stipulation of […]

The U.S. Department of Energy is studying whether to sign off on an extension of the legal deadline to end exports of weapon-grade uranium for foreign production of the medical isotope molybdenum-99 (Mo-99). The agency’s semiautonomous National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) is accepting comments from the public through Dec. 27 ahead of the secretarial certification […]

Some time before the new year, the U.S. National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) is scheduled to award a new protective forces contract to guard its Albuquerque Complex at the Kirtland Air Force Base in Albuquerque, N.M. The three-year contract will include a one-year base period and two single-year options, according to a Nov. 19 solicitation […]

By Richard Abott Defense Daily The U.S. Navy awarded General Dynamics Electric Boat $22.2 billion to build nine Block V Virginia-class attack submarines, with an option for a 10th, the Navy’s top acquisition official said this week. It is the “largest shipbuilding contract the Navy has ever awarded,” James Geurts, assistant secretary of the Navy […]

Veteran Argentine diplomat Rafael Mariano Grossi took over Tuesday as director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency. Grossi, 58, will become the sixth director general of the United Nations organization, which promotes the peaceful use of nuclear technology and the nonproliferation of nuclear weapons technology and materials. He will serve a four-year term after […]

Fluor is receiving strong interest as it seeks a buyer for the government contracting business that does work for the U.S. Department of Energy and other federal agencies, CEO Carlos Hernandez said this week. “The interest in that business is very, very substantial,” Hernandez said Wednesday during an appearance at the Credit Suisse 7th Annual […]

The U.S. Department of Energy and anti-nuclear activists seeking to stop construction of the Uranium Processing Facility in Tennessee could find themselves in an appeals court in January to argue about a lower court’s September decision that forced a partial federal redo of the facilty’s environmental review. The public won’t know until 2020 exactly what […]

The Russian Federation appeared this week to support an unconditional and immediate extension of the New START nuclear arms-control treaty with the United States in the next three weeks or so, according to an official translation on the Kremlin’s website. “Russia is ready to immediately, as soon as possible, right before the end of this […]

NS&D Monitor was thankful to get a couple days off for the holiday during the week of Nov. 25, but nuclear news continued to pour in like gravy. Collected below are a few of the tastier leftovers from the short week.   Energy Dept. Still Struggling With Cybersecurity, IG Finds The U.S. National Nuclear Security […]

Dan Brouillette was sworn in Wednesday as the 15th U.S. secretary of energy, after the Senate voted 70-15 to confirm him for the Cabinet spot earlier this week, a Department of Energy spokesperson said. Brouillette had served since 2017 as the deputy secretary of energy under Rick Perry, who resigned as secretary effective Sunday. The […]

Congress had not produced a compromise National Defense Authorization Act for fiscal 2020 as of Friday morning, prolonging a lack of authorization for key nuclear modernization programs. It was a week of whiplash predictions from top defense authorizers Sen. James Inhofe (R-Okla.) and Rep. Adam Smith (D-Wash.), who in the aggregate appeared less certain of […]

The U.S. Senate will vote Dec. 2, its first day back in Washington after Thanksgiving holiday break, on Dan Brouillette’s nomination to head the U.S. Department of Energy. The floor vote should occur around 5:30 p.m. ET that day, according to a Thursday Twitter post by the Senate’s Republican majority staff. Earlier Thursday, the Senate […]

The U.S. National Nuclear Security Administration’s (NNSA) strategy to reboot its tritium-production enterprise went about as smoothly as it could have in fiscal 2019. And even if it is not a perfect microcosm of the whole nuclear security enterprise, it’s tough to ignore the similarities. First, as with just about everything else it makes or […]

A Bechtel subsidiary on Nov. 15 received three contract modifications worth over $1.4 billion in total to supply parts for the federal Naval Nuclear Propulsion Program. The U.S. Navy issued cost-plus-fixed-fee modifications for existing awards to Bechtel Plant Machinery, based in Monroeville, Pa. The modifications are respectively worth $913.5 million, $483.7 million, and $31.8 million. […]

The U.S. government on Nov. 15 urged a federal judge to dismiss a revised lawsuit from the state of Nevada requesting the removal of half-a-metric tons of weapon-usable plutonium from the Department of Energy’s Nevada National Security Site (NNSS). The U.S. District Court for Nevada “lacks subject matter jurisdiction to decide this matter because Plaintiff […]

Nuclear Security & Deterrence Monitor will not be published on Nov. 29 in observance of the Thanksgiving Day holiday. Look for the next issue in your inbox on Friday, Dec. 6.

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Wednesday reaffirmed the Trump administration’s disinterest in renewing a strictly bilateral U.S.-Russian New START nuclear arms control treaty past its expiration in February 2021. As President Donald Trump and other administration officials have previously, Pompeo indicated China must be brought into the nuclear arms-control fold. “President Trump will never […]

Just over six years after the last U.S.-built uranium enrichment centrifuge closed down, the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) is poised to take a milestone step: choosing a technology to power the next domestic, defense-uranium-enrichment cascade. It’s a major, if preliminary, step toward a world in which the United States no longer relies on the […]

AECOM said Friday that CEO and Chairman Michael Burke plans to retire by next year, either once his successor is found or ahead of the company’s 2020 yearly shareholders meeting scheduled for March. Burke will be the last executive to hold the dual title, the Los Angeles-based infrastructure and engineering multinational said in a press […]

A multinational medical isotope company jumped the gun in demanding that the U.S. National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) “show cause” against termination of its application for a federal license to export weapon-grade uranium to Europe, according to a lawyer for the agency. In any case, the argument laid out by Curium has no merit, NNSA […]

The Senate Armed Services Committee on Tuesday advanced three of the four Trump administration nominations for the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board (DNFSB). The nominees approved on voice vote were: Bruce Hamilton, current DNFSB chairman; current board member Jessie Hill Roberson; and Thomas Summers, former vice commander of the 91st Missile Wing at Minot Air […]