National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA)

After a final brief filed Friday, a federal judge will soon decide whether to dismiss Nevada’s lawsuit seeking to force the Department of Energy to remove half a metric ton of weapon-usable plutonium from the Nevada National Security Site (NNSS). Nevada in August sought permission to modify its 2018 lawsuit in U.S. District Court to […]

Nevada should not be allowed to seek removal of one-half a metric ton of weapon-usable plutonium from its borders by amending a lawsuit it filed against the Department of Energy last year, according to the federal government. “With no success in convincing this Court that DOE’s transportation of plutonium into the state is so dangerous that […]

A local community advisory board wants the U.S. Department of Energy to complete a plutonium downblending mission at the Savannah River Site in South Carolina a decade earlier than the current projection for fiscal 2046. In a 19-0-1 vote Tuesday, the SRS Citizens Advisory Board (CAB) agreed to ask the Energy Department to apply more […]

The U.S. Department of Energy rejected a Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board (DNFSB) recommendation intended to better protect workers at the Savannah River Site’s tritium facilities from fires, explosions, and other accidents that could expose the public to radiation. In doing so, DOE and its semiautonomous National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) also rejected the independent […]

The National Nuclear Security Administration will keep its 2019 budget for a little less than two months of fiscal 2020, under a stopgap spending bill awaiting President Trump’s signature at deadline Friday for Nuclear Security & Deterrence Monitor. The Senate overwhelmingly approved the bill Thursday afternoon by a vote of 82-15. The House last week […]

Three U.S. senators — two Democratic presidential candidates and one of the party’s premier nuclear doves — urged House and Senate lawmakers negotiating the final version of the 2020 National Defense Authorization Act to tightly limit future U.S. production of plutonium nuclear-weapon cores. That is according to a letter dated Sept. 13 and delivered to […]

WASHINGTON —It will cost as much as $850 million to replace commercial capacitors deemed unsuitable for use in two refurbished nuclear weapons, a senior National Nuclear Security Administration official told lawmakers here this week. For the B61-12 gravity bomb, an ongoing homogenization of four different versions of the oldest deployed nuclear weapon, the costs will […]

Fluor, the Texas-based engineering and construction giant trying to reverse its worsening financial condition, said this week it will sell off its government contracting business that includes all its work for the Department of Energy. Long a major player in government services, the laboring Fluor now sees the business as a valuable property that can […]

WASHINGTON —It will cost as much as $850 million to replace commercial capacitors unsuitable for use in two refurbished nuclear weapons, a senior National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) official told lawmakers here. For the B61-12 gravity bomb, an ongoing homogenization of four different versions of the oldest deployed nuclear weapon, the costs will range from […]

The Senate will vote on whether to confirm U.S. Strategic Command Commander Air Force Gen. John Hyten to become the next vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the chamber’s senior Republican leader said Tuesday. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) affirmed in a floor speech Tuesday that by the end of the week, […]

The U.S. National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) will have to prepare at least one more environmental review of earthquake hazards to the Uranium Processing Facility under construction at the Y-12 National Security Complex in Oak Ridge, Tenn., a federal judge decided Tuesday. An agency spokesperson on Wednesday said that “construction of UPF will proceed,” following […]

The U.S. National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) and the Air Force in August completed three more flight tests of the B61-12 nuclear gravity bomb — a weapon whose first production date will be delayed because one of its non-nuclear components was not durable enough to last 30 years in the field. The latest three tests […]

The Department of Energy rejected a Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board (DNFSB) recommendation intended to better protect workers at the Savannah River Site’s tritium facilities from fires, explosions, and other accidents that could expose the public to radiation.  In doing so, DOE and its semiautonomous National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) also rejected the independent agency’s […]

Nevada should not be allowed to seek removal of one-half a metric ton of weapon-usable plutonium from its borders by amending a lawsuit it filed against the Department of Energy last year, according to the federal government. “With no success in convincing this Court that DOE’s transportation of plutonium into the state is so dangerous that […]

Former Los Alamos National Laboratory business manager Craig Leasure will become the full-time vice president for national laboratories at the University of California on Oct. 1, after about eight months on the job in an interim capacity. The university is a senior partner in the management contractors for two U.S. Energy Department nuclear-weapon labs. “I […]

Andrea Thompson, the State Department’s point person for nuclear arms control, has left her post after 15 months on the job, Secretary of State Michael Pompeo announced late last week. “Andrea Thompson is a dedicated public servant who brought over 25 years of military experience to her role at the [State Department],” Pompeo wrote Friday […]

General Dynamics Electric Boat broke ground on a new 200,000-square-foot facility on Sept. 13 that will be dedicated to building the new Columbia-class ballistic missile submarine. Called the South Yard Assembly Building (SYAB), it will be on 7 acres of the company’s property at its Groton, Conn., facility and is the largest company construction project in […]

As Congress moves to fund Department of Energy conversion of the Mixed Oxide Fuel Fabrication Facility (MFFF) into a new nuclear-weapon parts plant, a federal attorney is urging the Supreme Court to bury a South Carolina lawsuit that seeks to block the government from shuttering the facility. Redeploying the same legal argument that helped seal […]

Senate appropriators could slow the National Nuclear Security Administration’s (NNSA) plan to award a uranium purification-and-conversion contract to BWX Technologies, according to a report accompanying the upper chamber’s fiscal 2020 energy and water spending bill. The planned contract is the semiautonomous Department of Energy branch’s way of ensuring it has enough uranium to complete scheduled nuclear […]

The U.S. National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) would be funded at an annualized level that is nearly 10% lower than requested for nearly the first two months of fiscal 2020, under a stopgap spending bill approved Thursday by the House of Representatives. In a 301-123 vote, with 76 Republicans joining 225 Democrats in support, the […]

The head of the U.S. National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) was briefly on President Donald Trump’s short list to replace John Bolton as national security adviser, media reported Tuesday. However, Trump on Wednesday announced via Twitter he had selected Robert O’Brien, the special presidential envoy for hostage affairs at the State Department and a former […]

As Congress moves to fund Department of Energy conversion of the Mixed Oxide Fuel Fabrication Facility (MFFF) into a new nuclear-weapon parts plant, a federal attorney is urging the Supreme Court to bury a South Carolina lawsuit that sought to block the government from shuttering the facility. Redeploying the same legal argument that helped seal […]

House lawmakers on Tuesday officially moved to start final negotiations with the Senate on the 2020 National Defense Authorization Act, but partisan gridlock in the Senate threatened to limit progress on budget negotiations this week to a stopgap spending bill, or continuing resolution. The House late Tuesday queued up a vote for either Thursday or […]

The head of the U.S. National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) was briefly on President Donald Trump’s short list to replace John Bolton as national security adviser, media reported Tuesday. However, Trump on Wednesday announced via Twitter he had selected Robert O’Brien, the special presidential envoy for hostage affairs at the State Department and a former […]

The Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site is delaying roofing repairs at its H Canyon nuclear materials processing facility, after stating at the start of the year construction would begin around midsummer. Repairs on the leaky roof are scheduled to begin “later this year,” Monte Volk, a DOE spokesman at the 310-square-mile facility near Aiken, […]

Senate appropriators could slow the National Nuclear Security Administration’s (NNSA) plan to award a uranium purification-and-conversion contract to BWXT Technologies, according to a report accompanying the upper chamber’s 2020 energy and water spending bill. The planned contract  is the semiautonomous Department of Energy branch’s way of ensuring it has enough uranium to complete scheduled nuclear […]

Consolidated Nuclear Security confirmed Wednesday it is investigating “potential discrepancies” between the hours employees at the Pantex Plant in Amarillo, Texas, say they worked and the hours recorded by badge readers at the nation’s only nuclear-weapons assembly site. The local NBC affiliate, KAMR-TV, first reported the news. The Bechtel National-led Consolidated Nuclear Security (CNS) in […]

With congressional negotiations set to begin next week on the fiscal 2020 National Defense Authorization Act, the White House asked the chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee not to cut development of new proliferation-detection technologies at the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA). The Senate’s version of the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), passed in […]

The U.S. National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) will flex up the Kansas City National Security Complex’s manufacturing capacity by leasing some 275,000 square feet of industrial space about a mile from the nuclear security enterprise’s main components shop, according to an environmental notice published Monday. The semiautonomous Department of Energy nuclear weapons agency plans to […]

The U.S. National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) would get every penny it seeks in fiscal 2020, and then some, under legislation advanced Thursday by the Senate Appropriations Committee. The energy and water bill sent to the full Senate would give the agency just under $17 billion for the budget year starting Oct. 1: about $425 million above […]