Publications: Nuclear Security & Deterrence Monitor

Department of Energy contractor Parsons Corp. has been awarded a potential five-year contract worth up to $160 million for enterprise construction management services for DOE and its semi-autonomous National Nuclear Security Administration, the company said last week. The contract is a blanket purchase agreement with a one-year base period with four single-year options, the company […]

During a federal appeals court hearing Tuesday on mandatory COVID-19 vaccination for most federal employees, the Department of Justice attorney said a federal district judge was wrong to shut down the policy spawned by a September 2021 executive order just as an administrative board was about to start ruling on requests for exemptions.  Charles Scarborough, […]

The second and larger of two nearly round-the-clock mining projects in Nevada to expand the main U.S. zero-yield, nuclear-weapon test site should wrap up in 2026, the National Nuclear Security Administration said this week. The agency approved the final design for the U1a Complex Enhancement Project (UCEP) 20 subproject June 23, about a week before […]

The National Nuclear Security Administration still awaits the all-clear from the Pentagon to begin mass refurbishment of its arsenal of B61 gravity bombs and W88 submarine-launched ballistic missile warhead, an agency spokesperson said Wednesday. The agency finished proof-of-concept versions of the refurbished weapons last year and had planned to begin mass production of the refurbed […]

Sen. Jacky Rosen (D), Nevada’s junior U.S. senator, announced Tuesday she was working from home with a mild case of COVID-19. Rosen, who ousted former Sen. Dean Heller (R) in 2018 to turn the state’s upper-chamber delegation blue, is a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee that annually authorizes defense programs, including those at […]

The U.S. Air Force launched its second unarmed Minuteman III test in the early hours of Wednesday morning from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California, ramping up dry runs for the land-based nuclear-launch vehicle following a pause after Russia’s second invasion of Ukraine in late February. The test launch, which took place at 4:13 a.m. […]

In one of its first public field hearings since before the COVID-19 pandemic, the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board will review operations at the Department of Energy’s Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico this November. During a Nov. 16 session in Santa Fe, the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board (DNFSB) will look into both […]

The Senate may not pass its big defense policy bill before voters decide who controls Congress in November’s midterm elections, the head of the chamber’s Armed Services Committee said Wednesday at an industry conference. Sen. Jack Reed (D-R.I.) is “pushing hard” to get the chamber’s 2023 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) passed before lawmakers bill […]

Richard Tighe will be the president and chief executive officer of the Bectel-led Consolidated Nuclear Security, prime contractor of the Pantex Plant in Amarillo, Texas and the Y-12 National Security Complex in Oak Ridge, Tenn., the company announced Wednesday. Tighe replaces Bill Tindall, who retired in July. Gene Sievers, Gene Sievers, site manager for Y-12, […]

ARLIGNTON, VA — Though some in the U.S. government feel Russia will rely increasingly on non-conventional and nuclear arms, including tactical nuclear weapons, that does not make a case for continuing development of a low-yield, sea-launched nuclear cruise missile, a Pentagon official said here Wednesday. The sea-launched nuclear cruise missile (SLCM-N), with its W80-4 variant […]

The Department of Energy this week unveiled a framework for increasing its workplace diversity as directed by the White House, the agency said in a press release. Under DOE’s new Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Accessibility (DEIA) strategic plan, the agency aims to “sustain an inclusive and accessible work environment by strengthening recruitment, retention and promotion, […]

Life extensions for existing Ohio-class ballistic missile submarines should take some of the pressure off the Navy’s beleaguered Columbia-class replacements for those boats, the service’s head of acquisition for nuclear-armed submarines said recently. Building more Columbia boats in the 2030s than now planned could also help, Rear Adm. Scott Pappano, the Navy’s program executive officer for strategic submarines, said […]

Brandon Weathers is headed back to Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board headquarters in Washington after wrapping up a four-year stint as a resident inspector at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee, the board said recently. Weathers now will join the independent federal nuclear inspector’s Nuclear Programs and Analysis group, the board wrote in a recent […]

Vector Resources, a women owned small business, recently protested the award of a potentially $53 million technical and administrative services contract at the Y-12 National Security Site to Sigma Science. Vector lodged two protests about the award with the Government Accountability Officer on Monday, the congressional investigator said on its website. Work under Sigma Science’s Y-12 […]

The National Nuclear Security Administration sole-sourced a real-estate development contract to Tucson, Ariz.-based Tierra Right of Way to procure a parcel of land for the Kansas City National Security Campus in Missouri, which is “in dire need of new facilities.” The Kansas City National Security Campus, operated by Honeywell Federal Manufacturing and Technologies, is the […]

The Joe Biden administration overstepped its authority by utilizing the Procurement Act to impose a COVID-19 vaccination mandate for most employees of government contractors, a federal appeals court said recently. However, a federal district judge in Georgia went too far in issuing a nationwide injunction against the contractor vaccine mandate, the panel of judges for […]

An air-launched cruise missile warhead was not the only major civilian nuclear-weapons program slowed by COVID-19 supply chain snafus, but it was the only one drastically affected by the pandemic response, a senior government official said Tuesday. “I wouldn’t say it was the only one that was impacted,” said Brig. Gen. Stacy Jo Huser, principal […]

A lawsuit against the Department of Energy’s prime contractor at the Savannah River Site in South Carolina, filed by about 80 employees who objected to its COVID-19 vaccination policy, was dismissed. The plaintiffs, led by Shawn Phillip Rhoades, and defendant Savannah River Nuclear Solutions filed a joint motion for dismissal dated Thursday in the U.S. […]

Japan and the United States have removed all highly enriched uranium from a research reactor at Kyoto University and shipped the material to the U.S, according to a press release from the National Nuclear Security Administration. Transfer of the material began three years ago and ended with all 45 kilograms of the fissile isotope to […]

Nuclear Security & Deterrence Monitor will not be published on Aug. 19, 2022 or Aug. 26, 2022, as part of the Exchange Monitor’s annual August recess. Look for the next issue in your inbox on Friday, Sept. 2, 2022.

Workers claiming Consolidated Nuclear Security shorted a slew of employees out of a paycheck’s worth of work are taking the management and operations contractor for two major nuclear-weapons production sites to trial next summer, according to a recent scheduling notice. The trial will begin on June 13, 2023, according to a scheduling order signed last week by […]

Russia said this week that it would not accede to U.S. requests to restore access to nuclear-weapon and related sites subject to inspection under the bilateral New START nuclear arms control treaty between Washington and Moscow. In a statement, the Russian Foreign Ministry blamed logistical difficulties stemming from U.S. sanctions against Russia, which Washington levied […]

The National Nuclear Security Administration plans to add protective services to its prime contract with the Nevada National Security Site’s Honeywell-led prime contract, according to a procurement note posted online recently. SOC is the incumbent security services provider at the former Nevada Test Site under a five-year deal, worth about $200-million, that began on March 1, […]

Bids were due Monday on a DOE contract to produce energy-dense uranium fuel using a cascade that Centrus Energy Corp. has nearly finished building at the agency’s Portsmouth Site near Piketon, Ohio. The potentially 10-year contract, officially opened to all bidders in June, calls for production of a much larger volume of high assay, low-enriched […]

While it has fixed the bad welds that plagued the program last decade, BWX Technologies, Lynchburg, Va., is still having trouble manufacturing common missile compartment tubes for Columbia-, Virginia– and Dreadnought-class submarines, the company’s CEO said this week. “[W]e continue to have some struggles with the missile tubes program,” Rex Geveden, BWX Technologies’ (BWXT) chief […]

In remarks at the 10th review conference of the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, Secretary of State Antony Blinken condemned Russia’s war in Ukraine and Iran’s race to uranium enrichment, touted a 90% reduction in U.S. nuclear arms since the height of the Cold War and defended the U.S. decision to cancel scheduled […]