Publications: Nuclear Security & Deterrence Monitor

A building that handles high explosives at the Pantex Plant in Amarillo, Texas, briefly shut down earlier this month after a worker’s dosimeter showed up with an unusually high dose — after it was “inadvertently lost” in the facility by its wearer, a spokesperson for the plant said Tuesday. “It is believed that the employee’s […]

By April, both of the National Nuclear Security Administration’s next-generation plutonium-pit factories should reach the critical decision 1 milestone that solidifies the long-conceptualized designs of the facilities intended to manufacture new nuclear-weapon cores for most of this century. The semi-autonomous nuclear weapons agency is planning the Los Alamos Plutonium Pit Production Project at the Los […]

In a stark reminder that the pandemic is not over, even with confirmed cases falling across the nuclear security enterprise, two more National Nuclear Security Administration personnel died from COVID-19 this week. The two fatalities, one at the Savannah River Site in Aiken, S.C., and the other at the Nevada National Security Site, brought total […]

After winter weather crippled many parts of Texas’ electricity grid, the National Nuclear Security Administration’s nuclear weapons maintenance hub near Amarillo, Texas, decided to keep some personnel home during the first four days of this week. “In order to reduce energy consumption during the unprecedented winter storm impacting the Amarillo area, Pantex cancelled day, swing, […]

The Los Alamos National Laboratory signed a 10-year lease on an office building in downtown Santa Fe, N.M., about 35 miles southeast by road from the main laboratory campus.  As many as 75 people could occupy the office space, which includes the first-floor of the Dorothy McKibbin Conference Center. The leased space will support the […]

President Joe Biden plans to nominate David Turk as the deputy secretary of energy, according to a Wednesday White House news release. Turk, a member of Biden’s Department of Energy transition team, is currently deputy executive director of the International Energy Agency (IEA), where he has worked since 2016 after leaving the Barack Obama administration. […]

Amentum, Apex Systems and Leidos on Wednesday said they have formed Integrated ICBM Support Services, LLC, a joint venture aimed at capturing the Air Force’s next support contract for its current and future ICBM force. BAE Systems currently supports the ICBM Integration Support Contract (ISC), which is managed by the Air Force Nuclear Weapons Center […]

As of Tuesday, the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board and the Department of Energy are still tinkering with a draft memorandum of understanding about sharing information at nuclear-weapon sites while a Donald Trump administration order limiting DOE interactions with the board remains in effect. That’s according to a spokesperson for the independent federal board, which […]

The former head of the National Nuclear Security Administration is one of the hundreds of people who will be caught up in the Joe Biden administration’s purge of Pentagon advisory boards this month. Ex-Administrator Lisa Gordon-Hagerty got a spot on the Defense Policy Board during the eleventh hour of the Donald Trump administration, shortly after then-Secretary of […]

Jacobs Engineering, the Dallas-based parent of multiple nuclear-cleanup and nuclear-weapon site contractors, saw profits rise about $20 million in the first quarter of 2021, while revenue stayed flat, the company reported this week.  That accounts for adjustments related to the 2019 sale of the company’s Energy, Chemicals and Resources division to Australia’s Worley, and other […]

Although it picked up 101 new cases this week, COVID-19 recoveries continued to exceed new infections at the National Nuclear Security Administration as sites continued vaccinating personnel, an agency spokesperson said. There were 503 active COVID-19 cases among the nuclear-weapons agency’s contractors and federal personnel this week, down 75 from the prior week. Recoveries have […]

The National Nuclear Security Administration still has not awarded Nuclear Fuel Services a contract to purify uranium for nuclear weapons programs, but the City of Oak Ridge this week repeated its opposition to the move, which it continued to paint as a job-killer for the region. “The logistics and costs that would be required to […]

Sen. Martin Heinrich (D-N.M.) will leave the Senate Armed Services Committee and join the chamber’s Appropriations Committee, keeping intact an important legislative shield for nuclear sites in the Land of Enchantment. I’m looking forward to serving as Vice Chair of the Joint Economic Committee as well as a member of the Appropriations Committee. I’ll also […]

A review of nuclear modernization is among the top items for Kathleen Hicks, if the Senate confirms her as Deputy Secretary of Defense. Hicks, 50, has been involved on the inside and outside of the Pentagon since 1993, most recently as a senior vice president of the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS). She […]

The New START nuclear arms-control treaty is officially extended through Feb. 5, 2026, giving the U.S. time to pursue more arms control agreements with Russia, and possibly with China, Secretary of State Anthony Blinken said this week in a press release. “The United States will use the time provided by a five-year extension of the […]

A year into the pandemic, the Department of Energy is officially in the market for routine COVID-19 tests for employees who work at the agency’s Washington area headquarters, according to a request for information posted online this week. “It is anticipated that testing and support services will be required for an initial six-month period, with […]

Jennifer Granholm, President Joe Biden’s nominee for Secretary of Energy, easily cleared the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee Wednesday with a 13-4 bipartisan vote, setting her on course for a floor vote that had not been scheduled at deadline Friday for Nuclear Security & Deterrence Monitor. Sens. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) and Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.), […]

Two more people in the National Nuclear Security Administration’s workforce died from COVID-19 this week, as recoveries continued to outpace new infections and more nuclear weapons workers got vaccinated.  One of the two fatalities this week was at the Los Alamos National Laboratory. It was the fourth fatal case for the lab during the pandemic. […]

The National Nuclear Security Administration racked up more than 200 new confirmed cases of COVID-19 this week, but recoveries again outpaced new infections, with vaccinations continuing throughout the enterprise. As of Friday the semiautonomous Department of Energy nuclear weapons agency had 604 active cases of the disease caused by the coronavirus that broke out in […]

Consolidated Nuclear Security is seeking a subcontractor to build the National Nuclear Security Administration’s High Explosives Science and Engineering facility at the Pantex Plan in Amarillo, Texas, according to a procurement note posted online. The three-building High Explosives Science and Engineering facility is one part of the National Nuclear Security Administration’s (NNSA) Primary Capability Modernization […]

Moscow this week approved an official request by the U.S. to extend the New START nuclear arms control treaty with the Russian federation for five years. The U.S. officially proposed an extension on Tuesday after the Joe Biden administration telegraphed the move last week. “On behalf of the United States of America, the Embassy proposes […]

The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists kept their metaphorical Doomsday Clock at 100 seconds to midnight on Wednesday, citing development of hypersonic weapons, missile defense systems and dual-use weapons-delivery systems over the past 12 months, the dove-ish, Chicago-based group said during its annual clock unveiling. “By our estimation, the potential for the world to stumble into […]

James Biggins is now listed as the acting general manager of the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board, according to an organizational chart released late last week. Biggins has served as a special assistant to the chair of the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board (DNFSB) since September 2018 and has also served as general counsel and acting general […]

The energy and defense mix on the House Appropriations Committee, at least its leadership, will remain essentially unchanged in the 177th Congress, according to rosters released by Democrats and Republicans this week. Reps. Marcy Kaptur (D-Ohio) and Mike Simpson (R-Idaho) will remain chair and ranking member, respectively, of the House Appropriations energy and water development […]

Kim Budil will become the 13th director of the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California on March 2, the younger of the two U.S. nuclear-weapons design laboratories announced Thursday. Budil was mostly recently Livermore’s director of weapons complex and integration, responsible for the lab’s major weapon refurbishments, including the W80-4 air-launched cruise-missile warhead and the […]

The National Nuclear Security Administration barely rated as a blip this week in the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee’s hearing to examine President Biden’s nomination of Jennifer Granholm as Secretary of Energy. In her written testimony, Granholm said enhancing American security through DOE’s semiautonomous National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) and “clean-up of our Cold War […]