Publications: Nuclear Security & Deterrence Monitor

The Department of Energy plans an August “transition readiness review” of plans to transfer management of the Savannah River Site in South Carolina to its nuclear weapons branch from its Office of Environmental Management. The readiness review will run from Aug. 5 through Aug. 30, before the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) takes the reins […]

At a Monday meeting of the South Carolina governor’s Nuclear Advisory Council, the Savannah River Site’s prime contractor discussed starting plutonium pit production in the early 2030s and an antinuclear activist from New Mexico said the state should take on the government’s entire pit mission. “We have put a stake in the ground that we […]

Earnings rose at Leidos, Reston, Va., in the first quarter, which the national security and technology company attributed to strong business demand across all its sectors. Net earnings for the first quarter ended March 29 were $283 million, or $2.07 a share, up from $164 million or $1.17 a share, in the year-ago quarter, according […]

The schedule for one of Sentinel’s nuclear warheads will not change until at least the end of the Air Force’s review of the budget-busting missile, the head of the National Nuclear Security Administration said Tuesday. The civilian agency will stick to its current schedule for the W87-1 warhead throughout the Air Force’s ongoing Nunn-McCurdy review […]

Earnings rose at Huntington Ingall Industries, Newport News, Va., in the first quarter, which the weapons and defense contractor attributed to growth in Mission Technologies and shipbuilding.   Net earnings for the quarter ended March 31 were $153 million, or $3.87 a share, up from $129 million, or $3.29 a share, in the year-ago quarter, […]

Net earnings fell drastically for Parsons, Chantilly, Va., after a big tax hit in its first quarter, but the federal contractor on Wednesday reported record revenue and healthy core operations. Parsons posted a net loss of about $107 million, or $1.01 a share, for the quarter ended March 31, down from earnings of roughly $25.5 […]

Media reported this week that Poland’s President Andrzej Duda is “ready” to host U.S. nuclear weapons on Polish territory. Duda made the declaration Monday in a Polish-language interview with the Polish publication Fakt.    House Republicans on the Foreign Affairs Committee, including Rep. Joe Wlson (R-S.C.), whose district includes the Savannah River Site in Aiken, […]

President Joe Biden (D) this week signed a $95-billion foreign aid bill that includes funds to help the National Nuclear Security Administration monitor radiological threats in war-torn Ukraine. Biden signed the bill Wednesday after it easily passed the Senate Tuesday on a 79-18 vote. It was a modified piece of Senate legislation that the House […]

The National Nuclear Security Administration will meet legal obligations to remove plutonium from South Carolina even though it delayed a facility critical to breaking down old plutonium pits, the agency said Friday. The agency made the declaration in a record of decision published in the Federal Register. The decision, the end of a required environmental review […]

The South Carolina agency charged with environmental monitoring of the Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site near Aiken, S.C., will split into two separate organizations on July 1. Under a measure passed in 2023 by the state legislature, the South Carolina Department of Health and Environmental Control (DHEC) is becoming two separate agencies: the South Carolina […]

Rep. Chuck Fleischmann (R-Tenn.) who already chairs a key House Appropriations Committee panel affecting the Department of Energy is also picking up a seat on a defense purse strings subcommittee. Fleischmann has been appointed by House Appropriations Committee Chair Tom Cole  (R-Okla.) to serve on the Defense Subcommittee, the Tennessee lawmaker said in an April 16 […]

It could cost up to $37 billion to acquire the pair of plutonium pit production facilities needed to produce new nuclear weapon cores for the rest of this century, the head of the National Nuclear Security Administration said at a conference last week. The range, provided by Administrator Jill Hruby at the annual Strategic Weapons […]

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission will let the Tennessee Valley Authority produce more tritium for U.S. nuclear weapons using the Watts Bar Nuclear Plant in Tennessee, according to a Tuesday regulatory filing. The NRC on April 15 approved a license amendment request the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) submitted in March 2023. The commission posted the amendment online Tuesday. […]

The Kansas City National Security Campus in March produced a proof-of-concept replacement fuse for an Air Force nuclear weapon, the Sandia National Laboratory said last week. The Missouri site cranked out the first production unit for the Mark 21 Replacement Fuze, Sandia said in a press release. After this unit clears several more reviews, the […]

Since starting up a new enrichment cascade in the fall, Centrus has delivered 100 kilograms of energy-dense uranium fuel to the Department of Energy, the company wrote Friday in a regulatory filing. “Centrus has now achieved cumulative deliveries to the DOE of over 100 kilograms of [high assay low-enriched uranium] UF6,” the company wrote in an […]

Consolidated Nuclear Security paid $18.4 million to settle allegations of timecard fraud at the Pantex Plant that date back to the company’s takeover of the facility, the Department of Justice said this week. “[B]etween July 1, 2014, and June 30, 2020, [Consolidated Nuclear Security] knowingly submitted false claims to the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) […]

Local police this week arrested at least 10 antiwar advocates who were part of a protest that included about 50 people outside the National Nuclear Security Administration’s (NNSA) Kansas City National Security Campus in Kansas City, Mo., the local Kansas City Star reported. The Star did not say why the protesters chose to demonstrate at […]

Strategic Management Solutions, a small contractor for the Department of Energy and its National Nuclear Security Administration, has been acquired by a Louisiana-based private equity management firm led by a former Shaw Group executive. The purchase of Strategic Management Solutions, LLC (SMSI) was announced Tuesday in a press release by Bernhard Capital Partners. The buyer is based […]

A New Mexico resident is suing the Department of Energy’s Sandia National Laboratories for slander, defamation, violation of the Freedom of Information Act and — causing the breakup of his 28-year marriage. William Gardner, who is representing himself, filed the action against DOE and Sandia last month. Gardner claims DOE falsely accused him of criminal […]

Tennessee-based Boston Government Services said this week it hired a Leidos executive, Darrell Graddy, as chief strategy officer. Graddy spent eight years in Leidos involved in business development and project management and also spent 30 years in management roles at Lockheed Martin, Boston Government Services said in the press release. According to the release, Graddy is […]

In a Tuesday hearing, Sen. John Barrasso (R-Wyo.) requested, but did not get, a promise from the Secretary of Energy that President Joe Biden (D) would follow rules in a House-passed bill if his administration bans imports of Russian uranium. “If the administration does impose its own ban on Russian uranium imports, will you commit […]

The National Nuclear Security Administration seeks $70 million for a sea-launched cruise missile warhead for fiscal year 2025 as part of the agency’s list of unfunded priorities, a lawmaker said Wednesday. Secretary of Energy Jennifer Granholm acknowledged at the start of a hearing of the Senate Armed Services Committee that the weapon was among the […]

A U.S. Senator asked Tuesday if a planned manufacturing plant in Kansas poses a threat to the National Nuclear Security Administration’s nearby factory in Missouri for non-nuclear nuclear-weapon components. The conservative publication Daily Caller in December reported that Cnano Technology USA Inc., a company the publication said has ties to Chinese businesses, planned to build […]

The Missouri House of Representatives this week passed bills that would give tax breaks for the planned expansion of the Kansas City Nuclear Security Campus in Missouri. The state’s 163-member House of Representatives passed the bills Thursday, sending them on to the Senate, which had not scheduled a vote as of deadline for Nuclear Security […]

Drones last week attacked parts of the Russian-controlled Zaporizhzhya Nuclear Power Plant in Ukraine, the International Atomic Energy Agency confirmed this week. “On Sunday, the International Support and Assistance Mission to ZNPP (ISAMZ) confirmed the first attacks since November 2022 to directly target Zaporizhzhya NPP,” Rafael Grossi, the International Atomic Energy Agency’s (IAEA) director general […]

The centerpiece of a federal neutron research complex in Maryland will use highly enriched uranium fuel until at least 2030, according to a recent regulatory filing. That’s because the Department of Energy and its semiautonomous National Nuclear Security Administration have yet to develop a fuel the National Bureau of Standards Reactor (NBSR) can use, according […]

The Air Force risks not meeting the 2036 fielding date for the next generation nuclear-tipped missile to replace the Minuteman III, Sen. Jon Tester (D-Mont.) said in a hearing this week.  “Quite frankly, we’re running against, from my perspective, some real time issues if we’re gonna get these replaced at the three [intercontinental ballistic missile] […]