Publications: Nuclear Security & Deterrence Monitor

Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, the largest nuclear plant in Europe and one under Russian occupation, has been cut off from its external power supply for over a week, the director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency said Tuesday. The U.N. nuclear watchdog said this was the “longest lasting such event during more than […]

The Department of Energy’s National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) Tuesday published a request seeking proposals from contractors looking to build and power artificial intelligence (AI) data centers at Savannah River Site in Aiken, S.C. The notice calls for “entities interested in entering a long-term lease” located at Savannah River Site. Interested parties would be involved […]

The National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) and its Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) have completed treating four flanged tritium waste containers, according to a Sept. 26 press release by the New Mexico Environment Department. The Department of Energy’s semiautonomous branch in charge of maintaining the nation’s nuclear weapons stockpile informed the New Mexico Environment Department […]

The National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) has not used effective strategies to manage cost growth notifications for its construction projects, according to a report by the Government Accountability Office (GAO). The GAO squeezed this report on NNSA and one more Sept. 30 before the government shut down at 12:01 a.m. Eastern time Wednesday. “Over the […]

The National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) has awarded a BWX Technologies (BWXT) subsidiary with a contract for licensing, design and operation of High Purity Depleted Uranium production in Tennessee. BWXT Ordnance Tennessee, the subsidiary awarded the capability, will produce this form of uranium in Jonesborough, Tenn. at a manufacturing plant it establishes at its own […]

The Department of Energy’s National Nuclear Security Administration ability to reimburse contract workers for commuting expenses could help in recruiting and job retention, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) said this week.  NNSA oversees eight government-owned, contractor-operated sites and relies on around 70,000 management and operating (M&O) contractor employees to carry out the agency’s mission, according […]

The National Nuclear Security Administration’s (NNSA) Y-12 National Security Complex announced the “diamond-stamping” of a secondary stage of a nuclear weapon through the W80-4 Life Extension Program, the agency announced Sept. 25. “Diamond-stamping,” as the release calls it, refers to marking a product as war-reserve quality, or reliable and safe to use in a nuclear […]

The federal government shut down just past midnight Wednesday after the Senate failed to reach 60 votes on a stopgap bill to keep agencies open and funding flowing through Nov. 21. The upper chamber voted 55-45 on a Republican-led bill that needed a three-fifths majority to pass. Two Democrats, Sens. John Fetterman (Penn.) and Catherine […]

Teresa Robbins, until recently acting administrator of the National Nuclear Security Administration, is taking a deputy field manager position at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge Office of Environmental Management.  Robbins was removed from the Department of Energy’s National Nuclear Security Administration’s (NNSA) leadership page. She updated her LinkedIn page this week to indicate she […]

Three big nuclear Navy contract wins, two for the Trident II missile and one in maintaining and modernizing the Navy’s nuclear-powered attack submarine, were announced on the Pentagon’s website. The announcement of multiple military contracts came Sept. 30, hours before the government shut down. GSE Dynamics, a Norfolk, Va.-based engineering and manufacturing company, was one […]

Uncertainty over a potential government shutdown is rising after the Senate last Friday Sept. 19 rejected a House-passed stopgap funding bill that also included spending flexibility for the National Nuclear Security Administration’s weapons activities.  After the House earlier in the day narrowly approved a GOP-led continuing resolution (CR) to keep the government open through Nov. […]

Russian President Vladimir Putin said in a meeting with his security council Monday that Moscow will respect the New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (New START) for one year past its expiration date. Putin said Moscow would adhere to the limits of the nuclear arms reduction treaty for one more year if the United States does […]

The National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) and its Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) failed to provide “real-time monitoring data” on its radioactive tritium venting to the local community, local environmentalist groups said this week. A Sept. 18 statement by Communities for Clean Water (CCW), a coalition of organizations in Los Alamos that includes Concerned Citizens […]

Environmental health officials reemphasized Tuesday that the radioactive wasp issue at the Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site, one that made national headlines last month, is not currently considered a concern to the public. During a bimonthly meeting with the SRS Citizens Advisory Board (CAB), site officials fielded questions about the July 3 discovery of […]

ARLINGTON, VA — The Department of Energy’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) near Carlsbad, N.M., expects to meet its fiscal 2025 target of receiving 425 shipments of transuranic waste within days, a DOE manager said here Wednesday. As of this week, WIPP has received 419 shipments of defense-related transuranic waste from across the weapons complex, […]

Brandon Williams, President Donald Trump’s pick to head the National Nuclear Security Administration, was sworn into his role Thursday morning, according to James McConnell, NNSA’s associate principal deputy administrator. McConnell announced the news during a panel discussion shortly after 10 a.m. Eastern Time at the Department of Energy’s National Cleanup Workshop in Arlington, Va.  Williams […]

The U.S. needs to revise its anti-proliferation strategy by creating new compacts with allies, pursuing diplomacy with peer adversaries and revitalizing nuclear exports, the Task Force on Nuclear Proliferation and U.S. National Security said in a report. The bipartisan task force, consisting of former senior government officials and experts on national security, published the report […]

NATIONAL HARBOR, Md. – Every stage of the Sentinel intercontinental ballistic missile has been tested at this point by the Air Force and Northrop Grumman, a company executive said here Monday.  Ben Davies, corporate vice president and president of Defense Systems at Northrop Grumman made the remark during a panel discussion on modernizing the nuclear […]

This fall, the Defense Department may approve an updated acquisition strategy for the Northrop Grumman LGM-35A Sentinel future ICBM before a possible re-approval of the program for engineering and manufacturing development (EMD) by early to mid-2027. “We are definitely making sure we get the restructure of the program right,” Brig. Gen. William Rogers, program executive […]

The National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) does not have a plan to safely continue operating in an aged uranium processing facility until the new one is ready, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) said. The Uranium Processing Facility (UPF) is the National Nuclear Security Administration’s (NNSA) next-generation factory for nuclear-weapons secondary stages at the Oak Ridge […]

WASHINGTON – House Republicans Friday morning passed a short term stopgap spending bill to run through Nov. 21 that would keep funding at fiscal 2025 levels aside from exceptions including the National Nuclear Security Administration’s weapons activities. The final vote was 217-212, with two Republicans voting against the bill and one Democrat voting for the […]

The Australian government Sunday committed to providing $8 billion (U.S.) to a shipbuilder project in Western Australia with aims to maintain and build conventionally-armed nuclear-powered submarines (SSNs) under the AUKUS deal with the U.S. and the United Kingdom. The Australian government specifically called this $8 billion investment (roughly $12 billion worth of Australian currency) a […]

Technology provider Parsons announced Wednesday the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) awarded the company a $13 million multiple award contract for deploying systems for counter-nuclear smuggling in the Indo-Pacific. The task order calls to deliver “end-to-end” support for counter-nuclear smuggling systems in 18 countries in the region, the press release said. Support could come in […]

The National Nuclear Security Administration’s (NNSA) prime at the Savannah River Site is seeking to speed construction on the plutonium pits facility in South Carolina. Fluor-led Savannah River Nuclear Solutions (SRNS) said in a Monday press release it is working with its partners to accelerate the major NNSA project. The release said crews are opening […]

The Department of Energy’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) in New Mexico received 55 waste shipments in August.  That’s slightly more than the 50 shipments sent to the facility in August 2024, and the 48 WIPP received in July. The figures are according to DOE’s public website for the underground salt mine disposal site.  Of […]

The second U.S. Air Force B-21 Raider stealth bomber by Northrop Grumman has arrived at Edwards Air Force Base (AFB), Calif., for flight testing, the service said Thursday. “With the arrival of the second B-21 Raider, our flight test campaign gains substantial momentum,” Air Force Secretary Troy Meink said in a statement. The Air Force […]

The Air Force inventory of silos able to launch Minuteman III intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) is in no immediate danger of dropping below the threshold of 400 established by Congress in the fiscal 2017 National Defense Authorization Act. This information comes as the Air Force transitions from the 1970s-era Boeing LGM-30G Minuteman III to the […]