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 after Moscow invaded Ukraine in February, and COVID-19. Both countries suspended inspections in 2020 after the pandemic hit.
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) discovered a minor security violation at the Tennessee Valley Authority nuclear reactors that produce tritium for U.S. nuclear weapons, according to a letter from the civilian nuclear power regulator to the government-owned corporation.
The commission did not disclose the nature of the violation, citing federal law that permits the agency to withhold security related information. It was a severity level IV violation, NRC wrote in the letter. That is among the least severe the commission tracks.
Jill Hruby, administrator of the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) and Colin Kahl, under secretary of defense for policy, each addressed the review conference of the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) in New York last week.
On Aug. 5, according to an official Pentagon report, Kahl said that an unclassified version of the Joe Biden administration’s Nuclear Posture Review should be ready “in the near future.” Hruby, in her prepared remarks, said NNSA was “committed to supporting strong and verifiable future arms control agreements,” including by developing verification technologies that could be useful in a more “complicated, unpredictable, and technologically advanced environment.”
Days after speaking at the NPT conference in New York, Hruby on Aug. 9 visited Hiroshima, Japan, which was the second of two cities destroyed by the U.S. with a nuclear weapon in the final days of World War II. The U.S. bombed Hiroshima on Aug. 6, 1945 and Nagasaki on Aug. 9, 1945.
After her visit to the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum and Memorial Cenotaph, Hruby, the head of the NNSA and the steward of the U.S. nuclear arsenal, said in prepared remarks the visit was a “a reminder of the seriousness of our mission,” and that “[a]s long as nuclear weapons exist, the National Nuclear Security Administration will be a responsible steward of the U.S. nuclear deterrent without nuclear explosive testing for the protection of the American people and our allies.”
A Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board (DNFSB) inspector wrapped up a tour of Oak Ridge and returned to agency headquarters in Washington, the independent federal watchdog for DOE nuclear sites said.
Matthew Duncan is back from Oak Ridge, according to a weekly report the board published recently. It was Duncan’s third rotation to a DOE site. He previously served at the Savannah River Site in South Carolina and the Pantex Plant in Amarillo, Texas, according to the board.