Publications: Nuclear Security & Deterrence Monitor

The Fluor-led Savannah River Nuclear Solutions (SRNS) could be eligible for around $250 million in fees over three years, if the Department of Energy picks up the team’s options to manage the Savannah River Site in Aiken, S.C., according to the text of a contract modification awarded over the summer. The modification, signed on July […]

The No. 2 official at the U.S. National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) this week briefed members of the Secretary of Energy Advisory Board on the “staggering goal” of swelling the nuclear-weapon steward’s workforce by about 20,000 heads over the next six years. Those hirings, mostly of contractors, would be spread across the NNSA complex, including its […]

The U.S. Department of Energy on Thursday unveiled details of how it will levy civil penalties against anyone who violates a federal authorization to export nuclear technology to foreign countries. The proposed rule, posted in the Federal Register, does not establish the civil penalties for violating an authorization under Section 810 of the Atomic Energy Act. Congress did that […]

The Senate confirmed Air Force Gen. John Hyten to become the next Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff on Sept. 26, by a vote of 75-22. The vote to promote the current U.S. Strategic Command commander comes after several months of drawn-out debate over allegations that Hyten had sexually assaulted one of his […]

Nevada should not be allowed to seek removal of one-half a metric ton of weapon-usable plutonium from its borders by amending a lawsuit it filed against the Department of Energy last year, according to the federal government. “With no success in convincing this Court that DOE’s transportation of plutonium into the state is so dangerous that […]

General Dynamics Electric Boat broke ground on a new 200,000-square-foot facility that will be dedicated to building the new Columbia-class ballistic missile submarine. Called the South Yard Assembly Building (SYAB), it will be on 7 acres of the company’s property at its Groton, Conn., facility and is the largest company construction project in 45 years, GD […]

A local community advisory board wants the U.S. Department of Energy to complete a plutonium downblending mission at the Savannah River Site in South Carolina a decade earlier than the current projection for fiscal 2046. In a 19-0-1 vote Tuesday, the SRS Citizens Advisory Board (CAB) agreed to ask the Energy Department to apply more […]

A former Tinder executive, the chairman emeritus of a national whiskey distiller, and the president of the California Institute of Technology are among the eight new members of the Secretary of Energy Advisory Board, Secretary of Energy Rick Perry announced Monday. The board is a sort of think-tank and sounding board for the energy secretary. Membership […]

Former Los Alamos National Laboratory business manager Craig Leasure will become the full-time vice president for national laboratories at the University of California on Oct. 1, after about eight months on the job in an interim capacity. The university is a senior partner in the management contractors for two U.S. Energy Department nuclear-weapon labs. “I […]

Andrea Thompson, the State Department’s point person for nuclear arms control, has left her post after 15 months on the job, Secretary of State Michael Pompeo announced late last week. “Andrea Thompson is a dedicated public servant who brought over 25 years of military experience to her role at the [State Department],” Pompeo wrote in […]

The U.S. Department of Energy rejected a Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board (DNFSB) recommendation intended to better protect workers at the Savannah River Site’s tritium facilities from fires, explosions, and other accidents that could expose the public to radiation. In doing so, DOE and its semiautonomous National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) also rejected the independent […]

The National Nuclear Security Administration will keep its 2019 budget for a little less than two months of fiscal 2020, under a stopgap spending bill awaiting President Trump’s signature at deadline Friday for Nuclear Security & Deterrence Monitor. The Senate overwhelmingly approved the bill Thursday afternoon by a vote of 82-15. The House last week […]

Three U.S. senators — two Democratic presidential candidates and one of the party’s premier nuclear doves — urged House and Senate lawmakers negotiating the final version of the 2020 National Defense Authorization Act to tightly limit future U.S. production of plutonium nuclear-weapon cores. That is according to a letter dated Sept. 13 and delivered to […]

The U.S. National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) will have to prepare at least one more environmental review of earthquake hazards to the Uranium Processing Facility under construction at the Y-12 National Security Complex in Oak Ridge, Tenn., a federal judge tuled Tuesday. A spokesperson for the semiautonomous Department of Energy nuclear-weapon agency said  “construction of […]

WASHINGTON —It will cost as much as $850 million to replace commercial capacitors deemed unsuitable for use in two refurbished nuclear weapons, a senior National Nuclear Security Administration official told lawmakers here this week. For the B61-12 gravity bomb, an ongoing homogenization of four different versions of the oldest deployed nuclear weapon, the costs will […]

Fluor, the Texas-based engineering and construction giant trying to reverse its worsening financial condition, said this week it will sell off its government contracting business that includes all its work for the Department of Energy. Long a major player in government services, the laboring Fluor now sees the business as a valuable property that can […]

General Dynamics recently appointed Kevin Graney, president of GD National Steel and Shipbuilding Company, as president of GD Electric Boat, effective Oct. 1. These moves come with Jeffrey Geiger, president of Electric Boat since 2013, scheduled to retire on Sept. 30 after a 35-year career with the company. “Kevin Graney’s leadership, nuclear propulsion expertise and […]

As Secretary of State Michael Pompeo flew this week to Saudi Arabia in the wake of missile attacks on the nation’s oil industry, Sens. Edward Markey (D-Mass.) and Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.) urged him and Energy Secretary Rick Perry to break off nuclear technology negotiations with the U.S. ally. “Sharing nuclear technology with Saudi Arabia, especially […]

ALEXANDRIA, Va. — U.S. Rep. Chuck Fleischmann (R-Tenn.), a six-term congressman representing the Oak Ridge National Laboratory and the Y-12 National Security Complex, said he does not want to succeed Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) in the Senate. “I’m not going anywhere,” Fleischmann, 56, said during a presentation last week at the National Cleanup Workshop, an […]

NATIONAL HARBOR, Md. — Keeping the threat of a bid protest in his back pocket, a Boeing Co. executive said here Tuesday the U.S. Air Force can save time and money building the next generation of nuclear-tipped intercontinental ballistic missiles by scrapping a competition in which only Northrop Grumman is now competing. “What I am suggesting […]

Northrop Grumman on Wednesday announced changes to its organization and leadership it argued will better align portfolios. The company said there will be four modified operating sectors: Aeronautics Systems, Defense Systems, Mission Systems, and Space Systems. Changes will be effective Jan. 1, 2020. Northrop is a major contractor on the bomber leg of the U.S. nuclear […]

NATIONAL HARBOR, Md. – The U.S. Air Force is considering whether to move funding from the B-1B Lancer program to buy additional next-generation B-21 bombers in the fiscal 2021 budget, as changes are considered for the overall future of the aging bomber force. Accelerating procurement of the Northrop Grumman-developed B-21 Raider is a priority for the service, […]

As Congress moves to fund Department of Energy conversion of the Mixed Oxide Fuel Fabrication Facility (MFFF) into a new nuclear-weapon parts plant, a federal attorney is urging the Supreme Court to bury a South Carolina lawsuit that seeks to block the government from shuttering the facility. Redeploying the same legal argument that helped seal […]

Senate appropriators could slow the National Nuclear Security Administration’s (NNSA) plan to award a uranium purification-and-conversion contract to BWX Technologies, according to a report accompanying the upper chamber’s fiscal 2020 energy and water spending bill. The planned contract is the semiautonomous Department of Energy branch’s way of ensuring it has enough uranium to complete scheduled nuclear […]

The U.S. National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) would be funded at an annualized level that is nearly 10% lower than requested for nearly the first two months of fiscal 2020, under a stopgap spending bill approved Thursday by the House of Representatives. In a 301-123 vote, with 76 Republicans joining 225 Democrats in support, the […]

The head of the U.S. National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) was briefly on President Donald Trump’s short list to replace John Bolton as national security adviser, media reported Tuesday. However, Trump on Wednesday announced via Twitter he had selected Robert O’Brien, the special presidential envoy for hostage affairs at the State Department and a former […]

A Department of Energy budget bill that is working its way through the Senate would prohibit the independent federal Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board (DNFSB) from reorganizing its small bureaucracy without Congress’ permission. The prohibition against reorganization unless “specifically authorized by law” is part of the fiscal 2020 energy and water development spending bill that got mired in […]