Publications: Nuclear Security & Deterrence Monitor

For now, top management at the Department of Energy still plans a phased return to onsite work for employees and contractors starting on Tuesday, Jan. 18. “Per DOE’s COVID-19 Workplace Safety and Reentry Framework, employees who are designated site critical will return to the worksite on Jan. 18,” a DOE headquarters spokesperson said in a […]

Secretary of Energy Jennifer Granholm visited the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory on Thursday. Granholm praised the lab for its work on “biosecurity. Defense. Nonproliferation.”   Nonproliferation policy pro Laura Holgate on Tuesday returned as an ambassador to the U.S. Mission to Vienna, the State Department said. The Senate in October approved Holgate’s nomination as the […]

Confirmed active cases of COVID-19 nearly doubled across the National Nuclear Security Administration enterprise compared with early December, a spokesperson for agency headquarters in Washington said Friday.  The increase in active cases, the only number the semiautonomous nuclear-weapons agency reports, occurred with the highly contagious but reportedly less severe omicron variant of the virus spreading […]

The Department of Energy’s Office of Environmental Management published draft solicitations this week for a potentially 10-year, $2-billion contract that includes processing depleted uranium tetrafluoride for National Nuclear Security Administration nuclear weapon programs. The work would be part of the cleanup branch’s Portsmouth Paducah Project Office Operations and Site Mission Support Contract, the meat of […]

The National Nuclear Security Administration hopes its efforts to boost the domestic industry for Molybdenum-99 will result in commercial-scale availability of the medical isotope a couple years from now, according to an annual nonproliferation report the agency released before the holidays. Under its partnership with four U.S. companies the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) “aims […]

The five major nuclear-weapon states this week released a new statement about the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, the bedrock international accord that promotes the peaceful use of nuclear technology and a philosophy of defensive use of nuclear weapons. “We affirm that a nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought.  […]

James McConnell is the new No. 3 and top career civil servant at the National Nuclear Security Administration, the semi-autonomous Department of Energy nuclear-weapons agency said before New Year’s. McConnell was appointed associate principal deputy administrator in December, according to the National Nuclear Security Administration’s (NNSA) website. In that role he would backstop the agency’s […]

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission planned to meet in January to discuss increasing production of tritium for nuclear weapons in civilian reactors operated by the Tennessee Valley Authority, according to a notice posted online this week. “The purpose of this informational meeting between the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) and the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) is […]

On the heels of the arrival of the New Year, here’s a look at what to expect in 2022 at the National Nuclear Security Administration, its sites and its partners. Production Office Protest A bigger deal for industry perhaps than the Joe Biden administration’s imminent nuclear posture review — a type of review that in […]

The Senate this week passed the fiscal year 2022 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), approving a larger-than-requested budget for the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) that would not phase in until Congress reconciles competing appropriations bills produced by the full House and the Senate Appropriations Committee, neither of which provides the amount authorized by the […]

Nuclear Security & Deterrence Monitor will not publish on Dec. 24 in observance of the Christmas holiday or on Dec. 31 in observance of the New Year’s holiday. Look for the next issue in your inbox on Monday, Jan. 3. Happy holidays!

Radiological contamination was found on four workers at the Y-12 National Security Complex in recent weeks, including one person who tracked material into a facility housing enriched and depleted uranium operations, according to a report from a federal group that monitors Department of Energy sites. The four incidents stemmed from routine operations and maintenance, according […]

Ignoring the ex-Sandia National Laboratories employee’s plea for probation, a federal judge in New Mexico sentenced Joshua Cordova to nearly two years in prison for the four counts of fraud to which he admitted earlier this year. Cordova worked at the Albuquerque-based labs network from 2011 to 2019, instructing military and law enforcement personnel how […]

Citing COVID-19-related supply chain disruptions on the agency’s end, the Department of Energy has cancelled plans for Centrus Energy Corp., Bethesda, Md., to operate a new uranium enrichment centrifuge at the Portsmouth Site in Piketon, Ohio, next year, the company disclosed Friday. Under a DOE contract awarded in 2019, Centrus subsidiary American Centrifuge Operating was […]

An Aug. 8 experiment at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory’s National Ignition Facility that dazzled scientists, weapons-focused and otherwise, has the National Nuclear Security Administration rethinking plans to focus the facility more strictly on nuclear-weapons work. The experiment did not create a sustained nuclear fusion reaction, but it did set a new record for energy output […]

Groups led by BWX Technologies and Bechtel National have protested the National Nuclear Security Administration’s decision to award management and operations of the agency’s two main nuclear-weapons production sites to the Fluor-led Nuclear Production One. The Government Accountability Office filed notices online Monday that Strategic Nuclear Operators — which web searches show shares an address in Lynchburg, Va., with […]

Editor’s note: the following was adapted from remarks delivered Wednesday by retired Air Force Gen. Frank Klotz, administrator of the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) from 2014 to 2018, in a virtual forum organized by the Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies and the Advanced Nuclear Weapons Alliance Deterrence Center. The Exchange Monitor has abridged Klotz’s remarks and edited […]

The Joe Biden administration will nominate Texas A&M nuclear engineering professor Marvin Adams to be deputy administrator for defense programs at the National Nuclear Security Administration, the White House announced Wednesday. Adams, if approved by the Senate Armed Services Committee and confirmed by the full Senate, will replace Charlie Verdon, the last senior appointee left from […]

Sources said the management and operations contractor for the National Nuclear Security Administration’s two big nuclear-weapons production sites suspended its employee COVID-19 vaccine mandate this week after a federal judge in Georgia blocked the Joe Biden administration’s mandate for all federal contractors. A pair of other nuclear-weapon sites, however, said they would keep mandates in […]

Niowave, Lansing, Mich., will get $13 million from the National Nuclear Security Administration, under a cooperative agreement, to support  domestic production of the Molybdenum-99 medical isotope, the agency announced Dec. 3. This is the fourth and final round of congressionally mandated funding established by law in 2012 as part of the federal government’s efforts to […]

Two years into the pandemic, the Department of Energy could see most of its federal employees return to their pre-COVID-19 work locations by mid-February, according to a recent email message from agency leadership. The current “maximum telework” policy for DOE’s federal workforce will be phased out starting Jan. 18, Tarak Shah, chief of staff to […]

The National Nuclear Safety Administration announced this week Corey Hinderstein was sworn in as deputy administrator for defense nuclear nonproliferation at the National Nuclear Security Administration. The Senate unanimously confirmed Hinderstein Nov. 30. With her swearing in, the NNSA returns to its full complement of three Senate-confirmed senior managers. The swearing in was announced by National […]

With virtually all federal employees mandated to be vaccinated against COVID-19, the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board envisions a staff return-to-workplace date of Jan. 24, a spokesperson for the board said this week. “[P]lans may change, but this is our current plan,” Tara Tadlock, the associate director for board operations at the Defense Nuclear Facilities […]

A compromise version of the National Defense Authorization Act, passed Tuesday by the House and awaiting a vote in the Senate, would authorize funding for Department of Energy nuclear weapons programs at or above the requested level for fiscal year 2022. The National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA), DOE’s semi-autonomous nuclear-weapons agency, would get $20.3 billion: […]

The Air Force’s F-35A variant should still be certified to carry a pair of B61-12 bombs by fiscal year 2026 and the first flight test of a non-nuclear W87-0 warhead mockup should still fly on a Ground Based Strategic Deterrent missile in December 2023, the head of Air Force Global Strike Command said Thursday. And […]

A compromise stopgap budget bill signed Friday averted a government shutdown and kept Department of Energy nuclear weapons and waste budgets at 2021 levels past Valentine’s Day. President Joe Biden signed the measure Friday after the House and Senate swiftly passed it on Thursday. In the Senate 19 Republicans crossed party lines to approve the […]