GAO Studies Surplus Pu Disposal

In a report issued in September, 2017, the GAO described the results of its recent study of the DOE's strategies for disposing of 34 MT of surplus plutonium, pursuant to an agreement entered into with the Russians in 2000, by the Clinton Administration. This agreement mandated the conversion of weapons grade plutonium into mixed-oxide (MOX) fuel to be burned in specially designed nuclear reactors, for the purpose of generating electricity, and in order to render the plutonium unusable in new nuclear weapons. This process, once completed, was considered to be irreversible.

Alternately, the agreement, as later modified at the behest of the US, also allowed for the disposition of the surplus plutonium by any other means acceptable to the parties, if agreed upon in writing at some  future time.

NNSA began constructing the MOX Fuel Fabrication Facility (MOX facility) in 2007 at DOE’s Savannah River Site in South Carolina, under the G. W. Bush Administration.

In its fiscal year 2014 budget justification, DOE under the Obama Administration stated that pursuing the MOX approach might be unaffordable due to the growth in costs for completing the program, and it proposed a slowdown of program activities while it assesses other alternative plutonium disposition approaches. [Regarding things nuclear, it might be fair to say that the Obama Administration's views were a bit incoherent.]

In April 2014, DOE completed an analysis of plutonium disposition options that identified an alternative disposition approach that could significantly reduce the life-cycle cost of the Plutonium Disposition Program. This alternative would involve diluting the plutonium and disposing of it in a geologic repository.

Russia suspended its implementation of the agreement in October 2016, citing delays in the United States’ program.

It remains to be seen what the new Trump Administration will choose to do with the 34 MT of surplus plutonium, if anything.
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PLUTONIUM DISPOSITION
September 2017

United States Government Accountability Office (GAO)
Report to the Subcommittee on Strategic Forces, Committee on Armed Services, U.S. Senate  (By Summary Points)

Proposed Dilute and Dispose Approach Highlights Need for More Work at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant

Recent Cost Estimates for the MOX and Dilute and Dispose Approaches

WIPP and TRU Waste Volumes

DOE’s TRU Waste Planning

February 2014 Accidents at WIPP

DOE Capital Asset Acquisition Process

GAO Cost-Estimating Best Practices

DOE’s Revised Cost Estimate for Constructing the MOX Facility Substantially Met Best Practices, but NNSA Has Not Yet Applied Best Practices to the Revised Life-cycle Cost Estimate for Completing the Overall Program

DOE’s Revised Cost Estimate for Constructing the MOX Facility Substantially Met Best Practices and Can Be Considered Reliable

NNSA Has Not Yet Applied Best Practices When Revising Its Life-Cycle Cost Estimate for the Plutonium Disposition Program Using the MOX Approach

NNSA Is Developing a Life-cycle Cost Estimate for Completing the Plutonium Disposition Program Using the Dilute and Dispose Approach

NNSA Has Determined It Will Need to Expand Its Plutonium Preparation Capabilities for Dilute and Dispose

NNSA Has Determined It Needs Additional Equipment and Facilities to Dilute Plutonium and Is Estimating the Cost to Acquire It

NNSA Is Assessing Potential Costs Associated with Disposing of Diluted Plutonium at WIPP

WIPP Does Not Have Sufficient Space to Meet Current TRU Waste Disposal Needs, and Future Volumes May Exceed Statutory Capacity Even Without Diluted Plutonium

WIPP Will Need to Be Expanded to Dispose of Defense TRU Waste Already Planned for WIPP

DOE’s Inventory of TRU Waste Planned for WIPP Is Not Comprehensive, and Additional Waste Could Exceed WIPP’s Statutory Capacity

DOE Is Reviewing Alternative Waste Counting Methods That Would Allow It to Dispose of More Waste, including Diluted Plutonium, at WIPP without Exceeding the Statutory Capacity

DOE Has Not Developed Plans for Expanding WIPP’s Disposal Space and Changing the Waste Counting Method

Expansion of WIPP Disposal Space

Revision of Method for Counting Waste Volumes

Conclusions:

DOE is currently in the process of reevaluating the best approach for disposing of 34 MT of surplus weapons-grade plutonium.

DOE’s 2016 revised cost estimate of $17.2 billion for construction of the MOX facility substantially followed best practices, and we believe it can be considered reliable. However, NNSA’s revised life-cycle cost estimate for the Plutonium Disposition Program using the MOX approach of $56 billion does not yet incorporate cost estimating best practices as we have previously recommended. Reviews by NNSA and some outside experts found that the dilute and dispose approach has the potential to cost significantly less, but NNSA is still developing a life-cycle cost estimate for this alternative. If the decision is made to move forward with the dilute and dispose approach, DOE will need to ensure that there is sufficient disposal space and statutory capacity at WIPP to dispose of the diluted plutonium. WIPP is a geologic repository for defense TRU waste and will need to accommodate all such waste unless DOE pursues an additional repository.

DOE has not adequately planned for all possible waste that it may be expected to dispose of in WIPP, complicating its ability to determine whether the waste from the dilute and dispose approach can be disposed of at WIPP. In particular, DOE does not have a schedule for when TRU waste generator sites will complete the determinations on whether the potential waste identified in DOE’s annual TRU waste inventory report can be disposed of at WIPP. Without developing this schedule, DOE cannot be assured that it has timely information on whether to include this waste as part of its planning for WIPP’s future space and capacity needs. In addition, DOE’s TRU waste inventory report does not capture several possible future sources of waste, including waste from thedecontamination and decommissioning of facilities or waste that may be generated after 2050. DOE’s guidance for estimating future waste does not specify how possible future waste should be estimated and reported. Without developing guidance that helps sites produce a more comprehensive estimate for the volumes of TRU waste that may be generated in the future from cleanup operations, including estimates of buried waste, waste that may be generated from facility closure and cleanup, and other potential sources of TRU waste not currently reflected in the TRU waste inventory report, DOE will not have the information it needs to effectively estimate the need for future space for TRU waste disposal and ensure that its plans are in compliance with WIPP’s statutory capacity.

To address WIPP’s future space and capacity needs, DOE will need approvals from EPA and the New Mexico Environment Department. However, DOE is uncertain about the extent of approvals required and has not initiated planning efforts to obtain these approvals. DOE does not have plans to show how additional space will be excavated in time to prevent a disruption in waste shipments after the facility’s existing disposal space is filled in 2026. Without a long-term plan that includes the need for expanding WIPP’s disposal space and an integrated schedule that describes how DOE will complete the regulatory approval process and construction of new space before WIPP’s existing space is full, DOE does not have reasonable assurance that it will be able to expand the repository before waste shipments must be slowed or suspended. DOE also does not have a timeline for determining whether it will change its method of counting waste volumes and therefore does not know whether this action will be completed by 2020, when NNSA’s program requirements for the dilute and dispose approach assume that potential capacity constraints at WIPP will have been addressed. Without DOE developing a timeline to help determine whether it can change its method of counting waste volumes to meet NNSA’s 2020 milestone for resolving potential disposal space constraints at WIPP, DOE and other stakeholders may not have the information they need in a timely manner to know whether possible future waste, such as waste from the dilute and dispose approach, can be added to the waste planned for disposal at WIPP without potentially exceeding the facility’s statutory disposal capacity.

GAO Recommendations for Executive Action:

To ensure that DOE has a full understanding of the department’s long-term TRU waste disposal requirements and the capability of WIPP to meet those requirements, we recommend that the Secretary of Energy take the following four actions:
• Develop a schedule for deciding whether the volumes of “potential waste” identified in the annual TRU waste inventory report can be disposed of at WIPP.
• Develop guidance that helps sites produce a more comprehensive estimate for the volumes of TRU waste that may be generated in the future from cleanup operations, including estimates of buried waste, waste that may be generated from decontamination and decommissioning of nuclear facilities, and waste that may be generated past WIPP’s expected closure date of 2050.
• Develop a long-term plan for disposing of DOE’s TRU waste that includes:
• the need for excavating additional disposal space at WIPP and an integrated schedule that describes how DOE will complete the regulatory approval process and construction of new space before WIPP’s existing space is full, and
• a timeline to help determine whether DOE can change its method of counting waste volumes to meet NNSA’s 2020 milestone for resolving potential disposal space constraints at WIPP.

DOE Comments and GAO Evaluation:

We provided a draft of this report to DOE for review and comment. In written comments, reproduced in appendix VI, DOE concurred with the report’s recommendations. DOE stated that our recommendations were consistent with the department’s commitment to improve management of the national TRU waste program and to efficiently and effectively utilize WIPP for disposal of eligible TRU waste. DOE outlined actions that it intends to take in response to our recommendations, including developing disposal schedules for potential waste once certain prerequisite actions are taken that provide the basis for determining whether or not the waste is TRU waste that can be disposed of at WIPP; developing new guidance by December 2018 to assist DOE sites produce more comprehensive estimates of future TRU waste that may be generated from cleanup operations; and developing a long-term plan by December 2018 for disposal of DOE’s TRU waste, including an initial design for potential new waste disposal panels at WIPP and options for changing the method of counting waste volumes disposed of at WIPP. We believe that these steps, once implemented, would address our recommendations.

In addition, DOE highlighted the following two points:

• DOE’s Office of Environmental Management is focused on the WIPP mission as currently defined by law.
• DOE has not made a final decision to use the dilute and dispose approach to dispose of the 34 metric tons of surplus plutonium that the department previously decided to fabricate into mixed-oxide fuel.
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It remains to be seen what the new Trump Administration will choose to do with the 34 MT of surplus plutonium, if anything.

See my blogpost of March 31, 2016 entitled DOE Decides to Bury Its Waste for further info.

Citizens Thriving on Nuke Work

NM citizens thriving on nuclear weapons work inveigle NNSA/DOE for lucrative new LANL contract.

Residents of northern New Mexico, dependent on nuclear weapons work, are galvanized by the prospect of a new LANL contract:

As reported by Tris DeRoma for the Los Almos Monitor, on Friday, August 18, 2017

"Low contract fee could spell trouble for northern New Mexico, advisor warns"

"An advisor to the Regional Coalition of LANL Communities, John Jewkowski,  expressed concern about a one percent performance fee in the National Nuclear Security Administration’s draft request proposal for the Los Alamos National Laboratory’s management and operations contract. The one percent fee is two percentage points lower than what the current contract is now."

"The first point Jekowsky made is that the low fee may not be enough to attract the right type of company or organization that could run a nuclear laboratory effectively. He also doubted that even if the NNSA reestablished the three percent performance fee that is in the current contract the NNSA has with Los Alamos National Security LLC, it still might not be enough to attract the best and the brightest."

“ 'Even back in that timeframe, that 2012, 2014 timeframe, major corporate entities, CEOs, and major executives of major corporate entities were telling DOE (the Department of Energy), ‘look, three and a half percent does not cut it,' ” Jekowsky said. “ 'We’re all publically traded companies… we have shareholders and boards of directors we all have to report to. The work we do outside the DOE typically earns us, five percent, six percent, seven percent in terms of a profit or fee for that work. Three and a half percent just doesn’t cut it.' ”

"Jekowsky also said if the NNSA sticks to the one percent fee, that will mean less money if the management and operations contract goes to a consortium, and that will also mean less money the consortium would give back to the community in the form of support for non-profit efforts, education and partnerships."

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This is the latest of a series of articles in the Los Alamos Monitor describing a public debate about the size of the management fee to be specified by the new contract. The present fee is ~3% of the cost of the contract, ~$2.5 billion per year, so that the annual fee is now set at  ~$75 million. This contract has been in place since 2006, and the contractor, a for-profit entity LANS-LLC , was created expressly to advantage a small number of LANL senior managers, who became the principal owners of LANS-LLC. The CEO of LANS-LLC, also the LANL Director,  takes home ~$1.5 million, each year.

However, prior to 2006, and running all the way back to 1943, the contractor at LANL was the University of California, a not for-profit entity, who sometimes set its own management fee as low as $1. In early 2016, and with UC as the contractor, the LANL Director received an annual salary of just ~$200,000.

A little more history:

From 1943, and continuously until 2006, LANL had been managed by UC as a public service. In the earliest years, the Lab had a clear mission and a reason to exist. At that time, it was staffed by scientists and engineers who were said to be among the nation's best and brightest.

By 1950, many of the Lab's technical stars (Bethe and Fermi, to name two) had returned to academe, although often remaining affiliated with the Lab. However, a few became disillusioned with the use to which their technical work had been put, and severed all ties with the Lab (such as Leo Szilard.)

In the 1950's, the Lab became embroiled in a controversy over the development of thermonuclear weapons. These weapons, largely developed at LLNL (since its founding, in 1952, by Ernest Lawrence and Edward Teller, and until 2007, also managed by UC as a public service,) appeared to many to unnecessarily fan the flames of confrontation between the USA and the USSR. Even so, both LANL and LLNL retained their clear mission and reason to exist.

Subsequent to the fall of the Soviet Union, in 1991, following the cessation of underground nuclear weapons testing in 1996, and with ~30,000 nuclear weapons piled up in the US arsenal of nuclear weapons, DOE managers were moved to create a new mission for themselves and for the Labs. This was Science Based Stockpile Stewardship, an approach to maintaining the nuclear arsenal by means of computer simulations, along with ancillary sub-critical nuclear testing, in lieu of underground testing of intact nuclear weapons. The program has continued for the last ~25 years. Various outside technical advisory groups, such as JASON, have signaled to DOE their belief that the program has produced reliable technical results for the Labs.

SBSS is now known as Stockpile Stewardship, or SS, de-emphasizing the fact that predictions of future performance of nuclear weapons is now based entirely on the results of computer simulations, and laboratory-scale testing.

In spite of this apparent recent success, it may be that the Labs' current mission lacks sufficient appeal to attract today's best and the brightest into its service.

Meanwhile, the Labs, especially LANL, have had problems with safety and security. These problems began to interest the national press in ~1990, increasing in visibility throughout the Clinton Administration, and into the G W Bush Administration, where it was decided that the fault lay with shoddy UC management; the cure for which was judged to be a for-profit contractor who, motivated by a desire for lucre, would be a better manager.

Looking a bit more closely here, problems of apparent  Lab and DOE mismanagement seemed to rise in ~1995, when a Lab-wide RIF at LANL was devised as a means to cope with what was advertised as a funding short-fall, but one that never materialized. Morale of LANL staff plunged in the wake of the RIF, and staff paranoia grew. Next came the Wen Ho Lee affair, in 1999, aggravated by panicky reactions of  higher-ups in the Clinton Administration; e.g., especially, those of Attorney General, Janet Reno, and Secretary of Energy, Bill Richardson.

Then, during the Bush years (2000-2009,) DOE Secretary Spencer Abraham (2001-2005,) a former US Senator from Michigan and co-founder of the Federalist Society, appointed George Peter Nanos as LANL Director (2003-2005.) This former US Navy Vice Admiral seemed to believe that he would cure purported management problems at LANL, by teaching LANL's "butt-heads and cowboys" who was boss. One of his lasting accomplishments was to change the UC inspired practice of allowing retired LANL scientists to continue working on Lab science projects, in Lab-provided space, after retirement. Nanos said that his practice was an example of "bad academic culture" encouraged by UC, which led to the "coddling" of Lab scientists, who would be better off with a more military-style discipline.

Back to the present:

Several interested parties have spoken out about the RFP, put out recently by NNSA/DOE, as a guide to selection of the next LANL contractor. Many of these opinions have been described in the LAM, by Tris De Roma. Opinions expressed were those of: UPTE, RCLC, LAPS, LAC. Even though each has its own constituency, the points-of-view have not differed significantly among three of the four, the exception being of that of UPTE, who speaks only for the LANL technical staff. The other three groups represent the economic interests of the citizens of northern New Mexico who may or may not work at LANL, but whose quality of life could be affected by economic benefits brought into the local comuunity by the nuclear weapons industry. Among the three community groups, the Regional Coalition of LANL Communities expresses general interests of communities stretching northward from Santa Fe;  Los Alamos County has views limited by the boundaries of the County; and Los Alamos Public Schools is concerned with the LA public school system. However, all three groups are sure that their interests would be best served by a for-profit contractor working for a management fee of at least 3% of the total contract.

UPTE is distinct in advocating for a new not-for-profit contractor, one working for a management fee of just 1%, but focussed on the elaboration of a clear new Lab mission and on the protection of benefits and status for the technical staff. To be sure, in the last twenty years, the technical staff has lost much in the way of benefits and of status. For example, a defined benefit plan that once guaranteed a retirement benefit of 2.5% of the average salary earned over the three years prior to retirement has been replaced by a defined contribution plan paying an unguaranteed retirement benefit of 2.0% per year of employment. Similarly, a vacation benefit of five weeks paid vacation for every new hiree has been replaced by an initial benefit of two weeks paid vacation.

What is clear, however, is that all of these groups seem economically bound to the the continuation of the nuclear weapons industry in northern New Mexico. Indeed, in a public meeting about the RFP that took place in Los Alamos in late April, 2017, the Executive Director of the RCLC was asked by a member of the public if she (Andrea Romero) was at all reluctant to be advocating for the very dirty nuclear weapons industry. She answered simply, "People have to have jobs."

This seems to me to be both shocking and ordinary at the same time, and is part of the wrenching experience of living with nuclear weapons.

Addendum:

From the earliest days, in 1943, the Lab's work surged in spite of problems with both safety and security. As a result of safety failures, lives were lost; and as a result of security lapses, secret technical information was disseminated to the Russians. And yet the Lab's nuclear weapons work continued. The Lab had a clear mission then, led by a generation of old-timers, all of whom were "there at the beginning": J Robert Oppenheimer (1943-1945), Norris Bradbury (1945-1970), and Harold Agnew (1970-1979.)

One might say that the Lab entered the modern era with the arrival of Lab Director Donald Kerr (1979-1986,) and that modernizing trends continued with Director Sigfried Hecker (1986-1997.) It seems that during Hecker's tenure problems of safety and security began to attract the attention of a critical national press.

Following the debacle of the RIF of 1995, Hecker stepped down and was replaced by John Browne (1997-2003,) who himself may have been damaged by political fallout from the Wen Ho Lee affair. Next came the brief and troubled tenure of G P Nanos (2003-2005,) followed by the holdover year of Robert Kukuck (2005-2006.)

In 2006, a new for-profit LANL contract was let to LANS-LLC, and a form of nuclear weapons profiteering began at LANL., which continues to this day.

Even so, security problems continued under LANS-LLC, although abated; safety violations, however, led to injuries and down-time, approximately at the same rate as before. In any case, the Lab's problems with safety and security were certainly not cured by the addition of lucre as a contractor motivating force.

But, according to the consultant, J Jewkowski, hired by RCLC, the resolution of the Lab's problems must lie in the application of even more lucre.

DOE Decides to Bury Its Waste

 To be or not to be, that is the question!  Is the waste to be buried or the waste to be burned?

The DOE announced yesterday its intention to go forward with its plan to bury 6 metric tons (MT) of weapons grade, non-pit, plutonium at its WIPP site, in Carlsbad, New Mexico. This will be weapons grade plutonium obtained from a variety of sources, some of which are foreign. DOE's announcement refers to the down-blending methodology to be used, which may include conversion of the plutonium metal to an oxide powder, mixing with non-fissile isotopes of plutonium-oxide, and combining with other contaminants as well. (Final Surplus Plutonium Disposition Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement (Final SPD Supplemental EIS) (DOE/EIS-0283-S2, April 2015))

The DOE notes that its down-blending procedure renders the weapons-grade plutonium "not readily usable" for nuclear weapons; i.e., not without first removing the contaminants and chemically reducing the plutonium-oxide back to metal; in my opinion, not a very daunting process. Nevertheless, the Administration asserts that DOE's plan will make a significant contribution to nuclear non-proliferation. Hmm!

 DOE/NNSA Undersecretary for Nuclear Security Frank Klotz signed the decision on the plutonium plan Wednesday, saying WIPP has a “proven process” for storing this type of waste stream; viz., it already has received 5 metric tons of surplus plutonium from the Rocky Flats Plant in Colorado and the Hanford Site in Washington.

 New Mexico Governor S. Martinez has been quoted in the press as saying that she would welcome this latest addition to WIPP's inventory; i.e., as soon as DOE agrees that WIPP, now closed for emergency repairs, can be reopened. No surprise there!

 However, DOE does not refer to the fact that their latest scheme for dispositioning surplus plutonium does not accord with the agreement arrived at years ago with the Russians to permanently dispose of surplus plutonium by burning it in specially designed nuclear reactors. It seems that the present Administration has decided that it is simply too expensive now to go ahead with that program; but, no mention is made of what the Russians may do as a result.

 Meanwhile, the question remains of how to dispose of an additional 7 MT of plutonium from nuclear weapons pits. If the Administration is successful with its present plan, then it may be encouraged to bury this next installment of surplus plutonium at WIPP.

 For the future, and of great potential concern to the citizens of New Mexico, the next Administration will have to grapple again with the problem of the disposition of high-level waste from nuclear power plants. Perhaps DOE will push  to bury this dangerous long-lived waste at WIPP too. If so, then perhaps New Mexico's two US Senators will manage to push back?
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Concerning the Obama administration's work on the non-proliferation of nuclear weapons and/or the achievement of nuclear weapons security for the USA, here are excerpts from an article in today's NYT:

As Obama Hosts Nuclear Security Summit, the Focus Is on China

By MARK LANDLER
MARCH 31, 2016
NYT

WASHINGTON — President Obama gathered more than 50 world leaders here on Thursday to discuss one of his favorite topics: locking down nuclear weapons.

“The entire premise of American foreign policy as it relates to nuclear weapons for the last 70 years has been focused on preventing the proliferation of nuclear weapons,” Benjamin J. Rhodes, deputy national security advisor, said. “That has been the position of bipartisan administrations, of everybody who has occupied the Oval Office.”

However, domestic politics and regional concerns both seemed to crowd out any discussion of global efforts to secure nuclear materials.

The terrorist attack in Belgium last week also cast a shadow over the gathering, particularly after reports that fighters for the Islamic State were seeking to penetrate a nuclear facility to obtain material for a so-called radioactive dirty bomb.

While the Democratic front-runner, Hillary Clinton, supports Mr. Obama’s nonproliferation policies, she has evinced little of his fervor for a nuclear-free world.

But as the leaders arrived for a dinner at the White House past an honor guard lined up along the South Lawn, Mr. Obama could claim one achievement: An amendment to a treaty that stiffens standards for protecting nuclear materials was signed by 102 nations.

The original protection agreement dates to 1987, but it has long been considered weak. The amendment, proposed after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, specifies minimum requirements for physical protection of civilian nuclear stocks, and for securing them when they are transported.

As part of an effort to be more open about its nuclear inventory, the United States announced that its stockpile of highly enriched uranium declined 20 percent, to 585.6 metric tons in 2013 from 740.7 metric tons in 1996. The decline was modest, but it was the first time in 15 years that the government released these numbers.

A senior administration official, who declined to speak on the record ahead of the president’s announcement, said that the amendments to the physical protection agreement are “the closest thing we have to legally binding standards for nuclear security.”
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So, concerning the non-proliferation of nuclear weapons, and/or the achievement of nuclear weapons security for the USA, it seems that very modest progress has been made, but that the underlying existential threat remains. In summary, it is fair to say, in the words of the Poet::

And thus the native hue of resolution
is sicklied over, with the pale cast of thought,
and enterprises of great pitch and moment,
with this regard their currents turn awry,
and lose the name of action.

DOE Declares a Preference

On December 30, 2015, I received a postcard in the US mail from the Department of Energy, announcing:

                                       "Notice of Preferred Alternative"
    "Final Surplus Plutonium Disposition Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement"

which refers to the latest addition to an accumulation of documents which began as a trickle in 1996, and surged ahead in 2007, regarding the disposition of Pu declared surplus from the United States nuclear weapons program. The postcard also directs attention to the following DOE web address:  http://nnsa.energy.gov/aboutus/ouroperations/generalcounsel/nepaoverview/nepa/spdsupplementaleis.

Wherein lies a multi-volume collection of historical observations, past and present ruminations and speculative conclusions, relating to the disposition of surplus US plutonium. But, this can be boiled down to just a few essentials:

1) On 24 Dec, 2015, DOE announced that:

"With regard to the 6 metric tons (6.6 tons) of surplus non-pit plutonium, DOE/NNSA’s Preferred Alternative is to prepare this plutonium for eventual disposal at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) near Carlsbad, New Mexico."

Presumably, the Pu waste would be prepared in a mixed state, thus deterring theft and later recovery as weapons usable Pu; or at least deterring it a little.  And maybe the actual mixing operation could be defined and carried out at LANL, whose management (LANS-LLC) has already learned how to  prepare mixtures for disposal at WIPP!

2) Unfortunately, DOE says that it does not know when, if ever, WIPP will be reopened for business; a small problem. And, they want to remind us that,

  " ... DOE’s recovery effort [continues] at the DOE Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) following two February 2014 incidents at the facility near Carlsbad, New Mexico."

3) Finally, disappointingly, DOE still does not know what to do with 34 metric tons of weapons-grade Pu, to be obtained from decommissioned, disabled, and disassembled nuclear weapons. This is the surplus Pu concerning which the US agreed with the Russian Federation, in 2007, to dispose of by converting to MOX fuel and burning in nuclear reactors. That is, according to DOE,

  " ... the Plutonium Management Disposition Agreement [2007] between the USA and the Russian Federation calls for each nation to dispose of no less than 34 metric tons of surplus weapons-grade Pu by irradiating it as MOX fuel in nuclear reactors or by any other method that may be agreed by the Parties in writing."

But, let's not forget that, in 2013, a presidential commission was created to suggest ways to avoid having to carry out this agreement, at least insofar as the burning of MOX fuel was concerned, which was turning out to be very costly in  dollars, as well as in political capital. Now the commission has reported back their conclusions (Report of the Plutonium Disposition Working Group, April 2014) but there is still no action on the part of DOE, or of the Administration. Well, darn! Some things are really just too hard!

Clearly, the surplus Pu conundrum bedevils this Administration, will probably plague the next Administration, and perhaps the one after that too.

Meanwhile, come all you young scholars and gather round for a really good read, courtesy of DOE: http://www.nnsa.energy.gov/sites/default/files/nnsa/04-14-inlinefile/SurplusPuDispositionOptions.pdf.

NAS Misleads on Peer Review at Nuke Labs

Regarding the recent report of a committee of the National Academy of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine entitled "Peer Review in the Nuclear Weapons Laboratories":

Opinions expressed in this report suggest an unwarranted enthusiasm for nuclear weapons on the part of the NAS committee. Perhaps this bias was imposed by members of the National Nuclear Security Administration, which was the "sponsor" of the committee's work. (See news article in Physics Today, issue of Dec, 2015, quoting NNSA's chief scientist, Dimitri Kusnezov, regarding the NAS report: "How do you take the best out of this in terms of enhancing peer review ... against the backdrop that the decisions are not entirely ours to make ...  .  Because the work we do sits at the intersection of science and policy.")

 In particular, I refer to Conclusion 4 and Recommendation 4 of the committee, which are (quoting from the committee's report):

 "In contrast to the robust state of peer review at the NNSA laboratories, the state of design competition is not robust."

 "In order to exercise the full set of design skills necessary for an effective nuclear deterrent, the NNSA should develop and propose the first in what the committee envisions as a series of design competitions that include designing, engineering, building, and non-nuclear testing of a prototype. The non-nuclear components produced by Sandia should be integrated into the design and fabrication of the prototype. This should be done with the clear understanding that this prototype would not enter the stockpile."

 "The committee is deeply concerned about the state of design competition at all three laboratories. There have been no full design competitions for Nuclear Explosive Packages (NEPs) since the 1992 moratorium on the testing of nuclear explosions. The Department of Defense (DOD) has not asked for any fundamentally new warhead designs, and for a considerable time Congress limited work on new designs."

 However, as the committee makes clear in its report, their advised  new design ought to be inspired by real military requirements, arising from real  military doctrine.

 Furthermore, when the United states became a signatory to the Nuclear non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) in 1970 it promised to: 1) work to reduce the numbers of nuclear weapons in its arsenal; 2) work to reduce the importance of nuclear weapons in its military doctrine; 3) cooperate in negotiating the elimination of nuclear weapons from the arsenals of all nations. Naturally, the success of 3) would depend upon sustainable progress being made toward 1) and 2).

 In this context, it is difficult to see why the US would authorize its national laboratories to proceed toward a new nuclear weapon design, one that was connected to a new military mission, or one that was a "novel design to address a threat", as proposed by the committee in footnote 2, on p4 of its report.

  In fact, Congress's enabling legislation, to which the Committee, alludes (Public Law 112-239, the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2013, Sec. 3144.), asks for guidance on peer review and design competition, as presently practiced at the nuclear weapons laboratories, but does not suggest that the committee consider the question of a new nuclear weapon design.

 It appears that by making its Recommendation #4 the committee has slipped into the field of politics. This may have been an honest blunder on the part of the committee, or a deliberate step in response to a portion of its mandate not included in its report; e.g., explicit instructions received from the NNSA, which was the "sponsor" of the study.

  In my opinion, this attempt by the committee to bolster one side of the ongoing political debate concerning the nature of the work performed by the nuclear weapons laboratories is ill-advised and diminishes the value of technical judgments contained in their report.

 For another sign of the committee's bias, see their remark on p52, under "Summary Comments: "Implementation of the above four recommendations would help ensure that the most important asset - a competent workforce with demonstrated skills and judgment - is being developed and maintained and that all stakeholders (including our adversaries) have confidence in that workforce."

  The committee's suggestion that "our adversaries" would be deterred if we develop new nuclear weapons designs hearkens back to the Cold war, and could only deter the building of trust between nations needed to move toward world-wide nuclear disarmament, as envisaged by the NPT.

Manhattan Project National Historical Park

An article in the Los Alamos Monitor today described the latest developments in the Manhattan Project National Historical Park. Summarizing from this article:

"The Manhattan Project National Historical Park passes another milestone Tuesday when Secretary of Interior Sally Jewell and Secretary of Energy Ernest Moniz sign a memorandum of agreement formally establishing the Park."

"The Park is the culmination of 10 years of effort by the three communities included within its boundaries: Los Alamos, New Mexico, Oak Ridge, Tenn., and Hanford, Wash."
................

Concerning which I am moved to wonder:

What should the Manhattan Project National Historical Park memorialize and what should it attempt to teach  to future visitors?

1) That the march of science toward the discovery of new sources of energy, combined with unstoppable advances in military technology, have enabled the creation of ever more powerful weapons. Today, this unfortunate ongoing synergy makes it seem likely that the next global war will involve the destruction of larger civilian populations than before, and will create even more human suffering than before.

2) The Manhattan Project enabled the quick death by incineration and the slow death by radiation poisoning of ~200,000 civilian residents of Hiroshima and Nagasaki; a triumph of science and technology since this slaughter occurred during just two air raids, in each of which only one bomb was dropped. Of course, we shouldn't forget the earlier deaths of hundreds of thousands of civilians in both Japan and Germany by allied bombing raids, in which thousands of conventional incendiary bombs were dropped. We continue today to justify these attacks by proclaiming that "war is hell" and that, anyway, it was the Japanese and the Germans who started it.

3) Moving beyond WW II, the Manhattan Project enabled the creation of a Balance of Terror which weighed on civilian psychologies during the Cold War (1950-1990) and under which the entire world continues to labor today. One has only to try to imagine the magnitude of the misery that the next global war will produce, perhaps involving nuclear weapons attacks on major population centers, to know the reason for this lack of martial fervor on the part of the world's nervous Neds and Nellies.

But, perhaps this is also a reason to think that wars of the future will be of limited extent and that global wars are a thing of the past. Albert Einstein himself said that he thought that this would have to be so if mankind was to survive; however, there is no guarantee that it will be so. Moreover, considering the history of politics and of warfare, it doesn't seem very likely.

Looking at this question more abstractly, the Marxist historian Eric Hobsbawn pointed out in his last book, that the future is unknown, and may not be peaceful, unless politicians strive continually to maintain the peace. Or, as Karl Marx put it, ~150 years ago: the future may be one of socialism or barbarism, dependent upon politics and politicians.

Today, politics has led to the commissioning of the Manhattan Project National Historical Park. But, will politicians be able to force inclusion in the Park of material describing the dark side of the nuclear fire unleashed at Los Alamos?

More concretely, how will future visitors to the  Manhattan Project National Historical Park feel about American  ingenuity if the barbarians of ISIS obtain a weapon akin to the one first built at Los Alamos in 1945? Will they be proud or will they be ashamed? Will they be gratified or will they be horrified?

To MOX or Not to MOX

The Santa Fe New Mexican published an article today by Patrick Malone describing a recent Union of Concerned Scientists report entitled, "DOE Study Concludes MOX Facility More Expensive, Much Riskier than Disposing of Surplus Plutonium at New Mexico Repository." In this article, related concerns of some New Mexico citizens regarding the WIPP site were also discussed.

Considering the by now well-known options of whether to MOX or to bury, one can say with confidence that both the technical and political complexities of either option are large. However, an important part of the problem of changing now from MOX to burial is that the agreement previously arrived at with the Russians would have to be breached or renegotiated; namely, according to that agreement, Pu disposition must be irreversible, and underground storage, even with so-called down-blending, would not be so.

Moreover, it seems to me peculiar that the anti-nuclear groups, in their apparent zeal to thwart an advantage to the nuclear power industry provided by a continuation of the MOX program, would be willing  to promote underground burial of Pu when underground burial itself has two clear disadvantages: 1) burial, even of down-blended material, is reversible so that the Pu could be resurrected and reconstituted at some future time, perhaps for use in some future nuclear war; 2) burial of any radioactive and/or toxic chemical waste involves environmental hazards.

It's hard for me to understand their view but, to some, it seems that nuclear power is a clearer threat than nuclear weaponry.

Nuclear Energy & Democracy

The democratic process is one in which ordinary citizens become involved in issues of government. For example, there are important issues deriving from scientific research. In particular, experience has shown that some scientific discoveries, the result of government sponsored research,  can have negative impacts. The New York Times recently addressed this subject in four short opinion pieces:

NYT /28 May, 2015
\direct quote\
Alexander M. Capron
The Lessons of Asilomar for Today’s Science
ALEXANDER M. CAPRON, PROFESSOR OF HEALTH CARE LAW
Four decades ago, concerns about the science of recombinant DNA led to a global moratorium on cutting-edge research.

Alta Charo
The Case of Embryonic Stem Cell Research
ALTA CHARO, MEMBER, INSTITUTE OF MEDICINE
By getting ahead of the technology, the scientific community established a norm that is still observed by most in the U.S. and abroad.

Pilar Ossorio
The Role of Patents in Limiting Scientific Research
PILAR OSSORIO, PROFESSOR OF LAW AND BIOETHICS
The existence of a patent could let an institution prevent some uses of the invention that are deemed unethical.

Celia Wexler
Bring Back the Office of Technology Assessment
CELIA WEXLER, UNION OF CONCERNED SCIENTISTS
The information that office provided was used by both parties to make smart and applicable regulation.
..............................................................................

 Another example of problematic scientific research is that of government sponsored research into nuclear energy; viz., some of the uses to which nuclear energy have been put have been fraught, to say the least.

 In 1943, in the midst of a world war, the US federal government decided that the creation of a nuclear weapon was both possible and prudent. Two years later, that weapon was used to bring the war in the Pacific to a close, but at the cost of the lives of ~200,000 Japanese citizens. It is still argued today that that was an acceptable, even good, outcome since the number of battlefield deaths resulting from an American invasion of the Japanese homeland would have been far greater. Perhaps.

 Nevertheless, and as an expression of the law of unintended consequences, the world today is divided between those countries that possess an arsenal of nuclear weapons and those that don't. Among those countries that have nuclear weapons, there seems to be an insatiable desire to have better nuclear weapons, and in some cases, to have more nuclear weapons. Among those countries still without nuclear weapons, there are those that seem to be working toward the construction of their own nuclear arsenal.

 It is said that no one in their right mind wants a nuclear war; nevertheless, preparations to fight and win nuclear wars seem to be  widespread. It is also said that increasing numbers of hate-filled non-state actors aspire to exterminate their enemies by exploding nuclear bombs. However, the more that nuclear bombs are accepted as the currency of national defense, and the more that the science and technology of nuclear weapons becomes a common scientific currency, then the more likely it seems that a nuclear weapon will find its way into the hands of an eccentric.

 While trying to cope with this nuclear weapons conundrum, the US federal government has decided to celebrate. The sites where the original nuclear weapons were created, at Los Alamos, New Mexico, in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, and in Hanford, Washington, will be turned into US national parks where all the world can assemble and marvel at the power of American ingenuity, and the unintended consequences of nuclear technology be damned!

 And then there is the unresolved problem of the long-term storage of waste from the nuclear weapons industry and from nuclear power plants. Recently, this has been the subject of reports by New Mexico media elements.
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Rio Grande Sun 27 May, 2015
Sherry Robinson Commentary

"Nuclear Waste still a confounding issue"
\paraphrased\
In early 1990's, Mescalero Apache's considered contracting with the federal gov't to store hi-level nuclear waste on tribal land. However, a strong pro-waste faction led by the tribal president Wendell Chino was unable to overcome the objections of a determined anti-waste faction. Finally, US Senator from NM, Jeff Bingaman, intervened by "pulling the plug on federal funding."

Today, Holtec International is attempting to contract with the federal government, and with Eddy and Lea Counties in NM, to store hi-level nuclear waste, on an interim basis, at a site within 10 miles of the WIPP site. The NM State government led by Governor Susanna Martinez supports this proposal; however, NM's two US Senators are opposed.
..............................................................................
\direct quote\
Nuclear Energy Institute
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: Apr. 29, 2015
Contact: media@nei.org, 202.739.8000 or 703.644.8805 (after hours and weekends)

NEI Congratulates Holtec and NM Counties on Consent-Based Used Fuel Storage Solution
WASHINGTON, D.C.—The Nuclear Energy Institute today welcomed a consent-based approach in New Mexico to manage used nuclear fuel from U.S. commercial reactors. Holtec International announced a memorandum of agreement with two New Mexico counties to establish a consolidated interim storage facility in southeastern New Mexico.

The announcement took place in Albuquerque and included support from New Mexico Gov. Susana Martinez. Earlier this year, Texas-based Waste Control Specialists announced its intent to design and license an interim consolidated storage facility that could be used by the federal government to store commercial used nuclear fuel until a federal disposal facility becomes operational.

Holtec’s agreement with the Eddy and Lea counties in New Mexico will include the design, licensing, construction, and operation of an interim used fuel storage facility modeled on Holtec’s HI-STORM UMAX storage system, which stores high-level radioactive waste in steel and concrete containers below ground. The agreement would develop an interim site “to store all of the used nuclear fuel produced in the United States and all canisters currently licensed in dry storage in the country.”

NEI Senior Vice President for Governmental Affairs Alex Flint told the Albuquerque community today that it has a special history and understanding for meeting so significant a policy challenge.

“The nuclear industry has tremendous respect for the political leaders in New Mexico, who for years have been at the forefront of understanding nuclear issues. Where others see challenges, they see opportunities. That has been New Mexico’s history since the beginning of the nuclear era. This is one more example of New Mexicans who see an opportunity to lead by creating a valuable business.

“The United States needs a sound used fuel program. That program should include a permanent geologic repository and consolidated storage, developed concurrently.”

In articulating support for her state as a willing host site, Martinez, in an April 10 letter to U.S. Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz, said that, “There is a significant and growing national need for such an interim storage facility. Millions of taxpayer dollars are currently being spent on monitoring and oversight of spent fuel each year, and millions more are being spent on settlement payments related to waste disposition.”

The U.S. Department of Energy estimates the total liability for the federal government for its failure to manage used nuclear fuel at $27.1 billion, including $4.5 billion already paid out of the U.S. Treasury’s Judgment Fund. This estimate assumes that the DOE begins accepting used nuclear fuel in 2021. The agency has contracts with energy companies to take uranium fuel from nuclear energy facilities for disposal.
.......................................................
\direct quote\
Nuclear Storage May Be Coming to Hobbs

May 01, 2015
By Zora Asberry
NewsWest 9

HOBBS - The Eddy-Lea Energy Alliance are partnering with Holtec International to make Lea County the site for nuclear storage of spent rods.

The proposed nuclear waste site would be 35 miles west of Hobbs and 35 miles east of Carlsbad. Moving forward, Eddy and Lea County hope that the site will bring great economic opportunities to the area.

Despite the revenue and jobs the proposed facility could bring, some residents of Hobbs aren't sure they want to have nuclear storage in their city.

"I'm not well informed on that but it is scary to know that that is coming to our town," said Hobbs Resident, Mena Ramos."I'm a little afraid, a little uneasy. I would like to know more about it. Maybe we'll have a commissioners meeting or something like that to check on it," said Carol Luck, another resident of Hobbs.

Sam Cobb, Mayor of Hobbs, says that a lot of people have coined the term "waste" but that is far from what the facility will do.

They hope to store spent fuel rods that will be recycled into nuclear energy in the future.

"These canisters have been tested for head on collisions at 60 miles per hour so I think the two most important things are that it's not waste and it's going to be contained in the safest containers we can currently provide," said Cobb.

Holtec International chose the site because of its geological stability, as it will be just 10 miles from the already established WIPP Plant.

By bringing nuclear interim storage to Hobbs, it will also bring a great deal of revenue to the Lea County.

"We can use that revenue for economic development, local infrastructure, quality of life project and those kind of things. We think it's a great opportunity for use to have a sustainable stream of revenue," said Cobb.
......................................................
\direct quote\
Editorial: Southeast NM could lead in nuclear waste storage

By Albuquerque Journal Editorial Board
PUBLISHED: Sunday, May 3, 2015

At some point the leaders of the free world are going to have to stop kicking the radiation canister down the road and pick a real nuclear waste storage site.

Because continuing to allow the nation’s nuclear waste to be kept in temporary facilities in 39 states – some sites adjacent to rivers or on top of water tables – is irresponsible at best.

For the second time in three years, southeastern New Mexico has stepped up to offer an arid, sparsely populated, underground site for some of the country’s more than 70,000 metric tons of used reactor fuel. Lea and Eddy counties and the cities of Carlsbad and Hobbs have signed a memorandum of agreement with Holtec International Inc.

The company already owns the 32 acres the proposed depository would sit on, will cover the $80 million licensing process and $200 million in first-phase building operations, and could expand to equal all the planned storage capacity at the politically shuttered $15 billion Yucca Mountain storage site.

Despite widespread support by those who live in the area, New Mexico’s senators in Washington, D.C., are against private enterprise investing hundreds of millions of dollars in their state and on behalf of their nation’s security. It’s disappointing but not surprising; their former majority leader, Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., has kept underground storage facility Yucca Mountain in limbo for decades, using various appointment and appropriation movidas to keep its 2008 licensing application on hold at a $15 billion cost to taxpayers.

Sen. Martin Heinrich wants to delay any interim site here “until we are sure that there will be a path forward to permanent disposal.” And Sen. Tom Udall says, “I don’t think we should be talking about this at all while the state and the Department of Energy are still addressing the serious accident and radiation release at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant.”

Yet both must know the Holtec “interim” site is designed for 100-year storage, that a “path forward to permanent disposal” has been blocked by Reid and that a significant, non-carbon-producing energy source continues to churn out radioactive waste from power plants across the nation, and that waste has to go somewhere.

On the same day Heinrich and Udall voiced their opposition, the state and DOE cut a $73 million deal regarding WIPP and agreed the problems that led to the radiation release – and low levels of contamination – occurred at Los Alamos National Laboratory, where the canisters were packed, not at WIPP, where they were stored.

That Holtec has a 35-year safety record in this business and uses containers that can withstand direct artillery strikes and the potential impact of two rail cars smashing head-on into each other at 60 mph, and that those containers in turn will be stored in concrete cavities that can withstand a crashing aircraft or a missile attack, speaks to the safety and security of the proposed operation and should allay WIPP leak critics.

And that a company considered a major player in the global spent-fuel storage industry is interested in southeastern New Mexico speaks to the region’s terrain and expertise. The proposed site is dry and desolate, situated between Carlsbad and Hobbs, about 12 miles north of WIPP and in the so-called nuclear alley that includes the $4 billion Urenco USA uranium enrichment plant in Eunice, a proposed $100 million International Isotopes plant to process spent uranium from the Urenco plant, and a proposed spent-fuel storage facility run by Waste Control Specialists and French firm AREVA Inc just across the Texas state line. (It’s of note AREVA wanted to partner with southeastern New Mexico in 2012 but has since decided the grass is greener in Texas and will instead be competing with New Mexico and Holtec.)

Licensing the Holtec site is expected to take at least three years, and legal clarification is needed on allowing the company to transport and store spent fuel at an interim site. Heinrich and Udall could take leadership roles and ensure New Mexico is at the forefront of this part of the new energy economy – as they have done with wind and solar.

Or they can stick with the group that keeps kicking the radiation canister down the road.

This editorial first appeared in the Albuquerque Journal. It was written by members of the editorial board and is unsigned as it represents the opinion of the newspaper rather than the writers.
...................................................................................
For more discussion of  the interesting subject of nuclear waste management, see my previous blogpost, "DOE Holds Forth." The technical difficulties being experienced here partly derive from our inability to predict the distant future, and are another example of the law of unintended consequences. That the political problems being encountered here are a case of the NIMBY phenomenon seems clear.

The Obama Administration is attempting to deal with the technical problems by delegating more responsibility to the DOE (paving a technical path toward a politically acceptable solution,) and with the political problems by advocating for more democratic action (opening a political path toward a technically achievable solution.) We'll see how that goes.

DOE Holds Forth

For much interesting chat concerning the world of nuclear waste, see: Department of Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz's remarks on “A Look Back on the Blue Ribbon Commission on America’s Nuclear Future,” dated March 24, 2015.

Abstracted from these remarks are these summarized facts, all according to DOE:

1. The DOE is committed to sustaining nuclear energy’s role in America’s low carbon future.

2. Part of that commitment is offering solutions for the disposition of used nuclear fuel and high-level radioactive waste based upon the recommendations of the Blue Ribbon Commission for America's Nuclear Future (Final Report, 26 January, 2012.)

3. Any workable solution for the final disposition of used fuel and nuclear waste must be based not only on sound science but also on achieving public acceptance at the local, and state and tribal levels.

4. Today, President Obama authorized the Energy Department to move forward with planning for a separate repository for high-level radioactive waste resulting from atomic energy defense activities.
..............................................

Concerning which remarks, the following are my own (KL's) comments:

1. DOE claims to be "committed to sustaining nuclear energy's role in America's low carbon future," but DOE seems to be doing precious little to promote this claim. While the number of operating nuclear power plants in the U. S. continues to decline, DOE shuttered the Yucca Mountain Nuclear Waste Repository, before any nuclear waste could actually be delivered but after $ billions had been spent to prepare the site.

Moreover, DOE has back-pedaled on previously agreed upon plans to burn MOX fuel in TVA nuclear reactors, at once foregoing possible technical advances in commercial nuclear power generation while annoying the Russians, their MOX fuel negotiating partner. Now DOE talks glibly about burying this weapons grade nuclear waste in deep boreholes; but, this involves an unproven technology and will not satisfy Russian demands that this dangerous material be rendered entirely unavailable for future use in nuclear weapons.

2&3. In spite of the Blue Ribbon Commission's advice, the notion that nuclear waste ought not be put into a permanent repository, even on federal lands, without prior expressions of deep satisfaction from neighboring populations (a "consent-based approach"), seems to me to be at least a recipe for more delay. Also, the fact that DOE features the tribes so prominently, in this context, is suspicious. After all, tribal lands held in trust by the U. S. government amount to only 2.5% of the total U. S. land area, or just 9% of federal land holdings. Might it be that DOE yearns to dump its nuclear waste largely onto tribal lands?Alternately, is DOE again just trying to make friends?

 Most recently ,DOE has tried to avoid its nuclear waste policy impasse by entering into an agreement with Waste Control Specialists to store defense nuclear waste, on an interim basis, although in insufficiently large quantities, on privately owned land (but, in Texas.)

 Finally, in the person of Director E. Moniz, DOE talks charmingly about how it intends to move forward on several fronts, gaining control of the presently chaotic world of nuclear waste, perhaps partly by means of its superior powers of analysis combined with its poignant hopes for a better future.

Why am I not much impressed?

St Valentine's Thoughts for New Mexico

   

    The article by Patrick Malone, in today's Santa Fe New Mexican entitled "Repository's future uncertain but New Mexico town still believes," provokes thought:

     Malone points out the dependency developed by the Carlsbad, NM community on the income provided by the WIPP site, since it first opened for business in 2003. The fact that WIPP has been closed for repairs for the last year, and may remain closed for several more years, is of great concern to WIPP workers, as well as to members of the Carlsbad business community. In fact, whether or not WIPP will ever reopen is uncertain.

     Malone reminds us of the role played by Los Alamos National Laboratory in the debacle unfolding at WIPP; e.g., which began with two events in February of 2014. This role was elucidated by the DOE in its recent studies of the failed safety culture at WIPP, and the failures of management at LANL. Of course, the history of management problems at LANL, stretching back over at least the last 20 years, is well-known.

     It appears that DOE has assigned the truck fire that occurred on 5 February, 2015, in the WIPP underground, to a failure of safety practices at WIPP. However, the barrel of radioactive waste stored in the WIPP underground, which burst open nine days later, on St valentine's Day, had been packaged and vouched for by LANL. Hence, DOE ascribed this failure to LANL prime contractor LANS-LLC, which responded to criticism by reassigning several managers from LANL's EM Directorate.

     Although speculations as to the physical cause of the barrel explosion have been much discussed, no attempt to recreate the environment thought to exist inside the culprit barrel has led to an explosion.

     Meanwhile, by blaming its WIPP contractor for the truck fire, and LANS-LLC for the burst barrel, DOE has been able to deflect media and congressional attention from itself, and from its own history of management failures.
   
     In his evolving series, Malone, has drawn a portrait of an important part of the nuclear weapons industry, and the role it plays in the daily life of New Mexico's citizens. Whether WIPP succeeds or fails, ultimately we will all have to play our part in "taking out the garbage" of the nuclear weapons industry.

     But, we do seem currently to be headed off in the wrong direction.

     Just recently, it was announced with jubilation by the offices of NM senators Udall and Heinrich, and the office of US Rep. Lujan, that their eagerly sponsored legislation, creating a National Nuclear Weapons Park, had finally been passed by both houses of Congress. Henceforth, we can look forward to endless celebrations of our creation of the world's first nuclear weapons (how clever some of us were,) used by some others of us to incinerate ~200,000 Japanese civilians, in the summer of 1945.

     This pompous program of national self-promotion will take place in an international atmosphere of uncertainty and fear regarding the role of nuclear weapons in international relations.

     Instead of trying to further wind down the nuclear weapons industry, the present Administration seems willy-nilly to be allowing it, perhaps even encouraging it, to re-inflate. Dog help us all!

USA Memorializes Its Creation of Nukes

                                               CastleBravo test; Bikini Atoll; 1 March,1954

The following has been excerpted from: "The Nuclear Past is Present", by Dawn Stover, in The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists (issue of 1/6/15.)
...........................................
President Obama signed legislation on December 19, 2014 to create the Manhattan Project National Historical Park, which will include portions of the Hanford Site in Washington state, Oak Ridge in Tennessee, and Los Alamos in New Mexico.

Unfortunately, the way in which the Manhattan Project park was created is characteristic of a dysfunctional and regressive Congress that has slashed funding for parks, abused the defense budget authorization process, failed to meet its obligations to clean up nuclear waste, and allocated billions to breathe new life into the nuclear arms race of the Cold War.

Meanwhile, the federal government is underfunding the cleanup of Hanford and other defense sites contaminated by nuclear waste generated during weapons production. Cleanup has been Hanford’s main mission since the late 1980s, with more than $40 billion spent so far, but the 30-year cleanup plan is way behind schedule, and completion is not expected for 70 years or more. The Department of Energy has already announced that it won’t meet the agreed-upon deadline for emptying leaking waste tanks at the
site..

The creation of the Manhattan Project park reflects the last Congress’ warped values, which unfortunately are not likely to change under the new one. The most worrisome thing about the park is not that it celebrates the development of nuclear weapons, but rather that it suggests such activity is a thing of the past.

The same Congress and president that approved the creation of the Manhattan Project National Historical Park also approved huge new expenditures to refurbish nuclear weapons and keep the nation’s weapons laboratories at full operation. As the Bulletin noted last year, “post-Cold War reductions of nuclear weapons have slowed” and “the nuclear nations have undertaken ambitious nuclear weapon modernization programs that threaten to prolong the nuclear era indefinitely.” The Obama administration approved an upgrade to the B61 nuclear bomb that will effectively create a guided standoff weapon. Its price tag is expected to top $10 billion.

These are clear signs of a US government lacking in leadership and foresight when it comes to nuclear weapons.

Start of Year 2015 Thoughts

Recapping some of DOE's recent doings:

The DOE Office of Enforcement issued a Notice of Intent to investigate potential nuclear safety noncompliances at DOE’s Los Alamos National Laboratory.

November, 2014 --- The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) issued a Notice of Intent to investigate to Los Alamos National Security, LLC, their decision to conduct an investigation into the facts and circumstances associated with the remediation of selected transuranic waste drums at Los Alamos National Laboratory and its potential relationship to the airborne radiation release and subsequent shutdown at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant.

... OK, good!

Review of the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant Conduct of Maintenance Recovery Plan

December, 2014 --- The Office of Nuclear Safety and Environmental Assessments, within the U.S. Department of Energy’s independent Office of Enterprise Assessments, conducted a limited scope review of the current status of Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) plans and activities outlined in the WIPP Recovery Plan in the area of Conduct of Maintenance and the associated planned maintenance program enhancements, including engineering support program. The onsite portion of the review occurred during June 23-27 and July 21-25, 2014.

... OK, also good!

Review of the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant Recovery Plan for Operating Diesel Equipment with Available Underground Airflows.

December, 2014 --- The Office of Nuclear Safety and Environmental Assessments, within the U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Enterprise Assessments, conducted an independent review of the adequacy of the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant plan for safely operating diesel equipment underground to support ongoing recovery and rehabilitation efforts during significantly restricted underground airflow conditions. The onsite review was conducted during the period of June 10-12, August 12-13, and October 14-16, 2014.

... OK, again good!

Energy Department Issues Path Forward for Closing Additional Radioactive Waste Storage Tanks in H Tank Farm at Savannah River Site

December, 2014 --– The Department of Energy reached a major milestone in efforts to clean up the Cold War legacy at the Savannah River Site (SRS) in South Carolina, and took a step forward to closing additional radioactive tanks at the site.

Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz signed a determination today that allows SRS to complete cleanup and closure of the underground liquid waste tanks in the H Tank Farm as they are emptied and cleaned.  Prior to the determination, the Department and SRS conducted extensive technical environmental analysis, public review and comment, and consultation with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. The State of South Carolina and the Environmental Protection Agency also provided input as part of the review process.

“Today’s announcement is an important step in the effort to close tanks at the Savannah River Site, and is a result of hard work and sustained collaboration between partners at the local, state, and federal level,” said Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz. “We are now able to move forward to safely, effectively and efficiently clean up and close these tanks in the H Tank Farm, as we work to achieve the key mission of cleaning up the environmental legacy of the Cold War.”

The first tank closed in the H Tank Farm will be Tank 16, which is the only one at Savannah River that historically leaked to the environment.  This will be followed by the closure of Tank 12. The determination also allows for the closure of 27 additional tanks after cleaning, following public review and state approval.

Workers have removed more than 99 percent of the waste in Tanks 12 and 16.  Next steps include grouting the interiors with a cement-like material to stabilize the tanks and immobilize the remaining residual waste, to minimize future risk and protect human health, safety and the environment.

SRS was constructed in the early 1950s to produce basic materials used in the fabrication of nuclear weapons in support of our nation's defense programs.  Tanks 12 and 16, two of the many nuclear facilities constructed at the site to support the United States Cold War effort, were built in the 1950s to store radioactive liquid waste generated through the site’s nuclear weapons material processing (spent fuel reprocessing.)

... OK, now this seems especially good!

But, wait a minute!

 As 2015 gets underway, DOE remains focused on its clean up of legacy waste, and on its efforts to eliminate system failure from its legacy waste operations (the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics notwithstanding.)

 But, what has DOE been doing recently about the clean up of nuclear waste generated by US commercial nuclear power plants? In fact, this technically pressing matter has been given short shrift by the present Administration. Could the politics of nuclear waste depend on whether the waste was generated in secret, by public money (nuclear bomb waste,) or generated in the open by private money (nuclear waste from electric power generation)?

 We have to go back two years in order to find traces of any new US government policy regarding high-level nuclear waste: DOE Strategy for the Management and Disposal of Used Nuclear Fuel and High-Level Radioactive Waste

January, 2013 --- The DOE Strategy for the Management and Disposal of Used Nuclear Fuel and High-Level Radioactive Waste is a framework for moving toward a sustainable program to deploy an integrated system capable of transporting, storing, and disposing of used nuclear fuel and high-level radioactive waste from civilian nuclear power generation, defense, national security and other activities.

Testimony of Ernest Moniz, Secretary of Energy
Before Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee
 7-30-13_Ernest_Moniz FT SENR.pdf

Testimony of Ernest Moniz, Secretary of Energy
Before the Subcommittee on Environment and the Economy - House Energy and Commerce Committee
 7-31-13_Ernest_Moniz FT HEC.pdf

 But, since 2013 there's been no progress on this issue. For example, today, on the Nuclear Regulatory Commission's website we find a notification of vacancies for part-time administrative judges, which has not been changed since July, 2013.

 This seems in accord with fact that the present Administration has not accomplished anything on the important subject of nuclear waste disposal from commercial nuclear power plants since Ernie Moniz's spoke at House and Senate hearings in July, 2013!

 Does the President really have a plan for disposing of high-level nuclear waste? Maybe he has a plan, but it's  too "deep" to be shared publicly?

 Meanwhile, some of the president's supporters could find themselves recalling that old tune:

 Oh well, I'm uh, sitting here la, la
Waiting for my ya, ya, a hm, ahm ...

Lee Dorsey 1961 /

End of Year 2014 Thoughts

Two recent Defense Nuclear Facility Safety Board letters to Department of Energy officials describe failures of  Los Alamos National Laboratory  to: 1) follow prescribed safety procedures; 2) follow through on a previous safety commitment made to DNFSB.

1) 9 December, 2014 / The packaging of transuranic (TRU) waste at LANL's Technical Area-54 has proceeded without a proper safety basis. Although packaging of TRU waste at TA-54 is now suspended due to the inability of the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant to accept any new waste, this situation will eventually be resolved. Before that time, existing safety problems at TA-54 must be fixed.

2) 17 December, 2014 / LANL has not pursued a promised study of the possible failure of containment at it's Plutonium Facility-4 installation, in the event of a worst case accident following earthquake beneath the Pajarito Plateau and/or wildfire in the surrounding Jemez mountains.

Needless to say, the nuclear weapons industry is dangerous, but no complex operation is without its hazards, and periodic lapses in safety and security at LANL are to be expected. Right? But, what about accidents in our own backyard, Española, NM?

 New York Times /December 28, 2014 / Marshall Islanders bring suit in World Court over failure of nuclear powers to rid themselves of nuclear weapons, as per their commitment made when they signed the Nuclear non-Proliferation Treaty. Is this commitment in any sense legally binding? The World Court may choose to decide. If the Court decides in the affirmative, will it's decision be enforceable? Would the nuclear powers ignore a decision by the World Court restricting access to nuclear weapons and/or limiting the development of new nuclear weapons technology?

In the past, haven't the nuclear weapons states behaved with impunity with regard to their nuclear weaponry?

29 December, 2014 / In a letter to LANL staff, Director Charles McMillan admits that a 90% reduction will be imposed by DOE to the annual bonus pay for LANL managers, for 2014, because of poor performance in the cleanup of hazardous TRU waste from LANL's nuclear weapons operations. However, McMillan insists that DOE continues to recognize LANL for its good performance in developing the nuclear weapons stockpile, thereby generating still more hazardous waste.

 The New Yorker's Talk of the Town /December 22&29, 2014 / Lack of any great public concern being generated by release of summary version of US Senate report on CIA torture of 9/11 prisoners worries New Yorker writer Jane Mayer, who says: "Nothing predicts future behavior as much as past impunity."

What does the American public, evidently unfazed by internal threats such as DOE's continued nuclear weapons development and CIA's torture regimen, currently fear most? Is it the external threat posed by renewed Al Qaeda attacks; or the menaces of North Korea; or the nightmare of another cold war, one which could turn hot?

DOE Blames SNL Management

In a Summary Report by the Department Of Eenergy-Office of the Inspector General (DOE-OIG) dated 7 November 2014, the OIG describes findings obtained from an investigation of charges that Sandia National Laboratory (SNL) managers did illegally attempt to interfere with Sandia Corp's ongoing contract negotiations with the DOE's National Nuclear Security Administartion (NNSA,) by means of actively lobbying the DOE, as well as the US Congress, for a non-competitive contract extension. As a part of this illegal lobbying effort, Sandia Corp hired outside consultants, one of which was Heather Wilson, LLC. Sandia Corp is the for-profit management entity that manages SNL for the NNSA.

 It is clear in the US Code that the lobbying of US goverment agencies, such as the DOE or the US Congress, by contractors to the US government, such as Sandia Corp, is illegal, when conducted for the purpose of affecting contract negotiations.

 Nevertheless, Sandia Corp managers actively engaged in such lobbying efforts, which began in March, 2009 and have been ongoing until very recently.

 In its Summary Report, which is available to the general public, the OIG does not assign blame to individuals, beyond noting that, pursuant to the effort by Sandia Corp to influence ongoing contract negotiations with the NNSA:

1) a Contract Strategy Team was formed at SNL by Sandia Corp managers;

1) a consultant, Heather Wilson LLC, was hired by Sandia Corp;

2) altogether, three consultants were hired by Sandia Corp.

 Also, in its Summary Report, the OIG asserts that consultant fees, as well as other costs related to the illegal lobbying effort, which had been charged to the DOE by Sandia Corp, are to be reimbursed to the DOE.

 As a part of Sandia Corp's management response to these charges, as described in an Attachment to the Summary Report, Sandia Corp management said: "The Sandia Field Office conducted a review of fees paid to a consultant named in this report and, as a result, Sandia Corp reimbursed NNSA $226,378 in April 2013."

 Sandia Corp also said: "The Sandia Field Office will evaluate the outcome of the reviews conducted to determine allowability of salaries and/or fees paid by Sandia Corp for activities of the SNL Contract Strategy Team to determine if any adjustment to performance fees is warranted ... The estimated completion date for this action is March 2, 2015."

 It would be of interest to the general public to know the depth of involvement in this illegal lobbying effort by Sandia Corp individual senior managers; i.e., especially as might pertain to the Sandia Corp Director, and the Sandia Corp Associate Directors. This group of individuals takes home lucrative salaries and bonuses every year, and it would be in their particular interest to perpetuate the highly remunerative arrangement that Sandia Corp has with the DOE; e.g., to the tune of $2.4 billion per year, as mentioned in the Summary Report. In fact, the Sandia Corp Director alone recieves an annual total compensation package in excess of $2 million.

 Sandia Corp is a wholly owned subsidiary of Martin Marietta, merged since 1995 with the Lockheed Corp to form the Lockheed Martin Corp.

DOE Blames LANL Management

The U.S. Department of Energy's Office of the Inspector General issued DOE/IG-0922, dated September 30, 2014, entitled: "Management Alert / Remediation of Selected Transuranic Waste Drums at Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) – Potential Impact on the Shutdown of the Department of Energy's Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP)." See www.doe/oig for the entire report.
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 This latest "Management Alert" is part of DOE's ongoing attempt to cope with a radiation release, which occurred at its Carlsbad, NM, WIPP facility, in February 2014. Although still uncertain of the exact cause of that release, DOE is sure that the spontaneous rupturing of a stored drum, containing radioactive waste previously packaged at LANL, was the proximate cause.

 Moreover, since this was the first publicly acknowledged radiation release from WIPP, it is especially important for DOE to take prompt corrective actions. Consequently, even though still unsure as to which chemical reactions inside the drum led to drum rupture, DOE now blames the fact of drum rupture on management failures in LANL's Environmental Management Directorate. LANL's Director McMillan  seems to agree, since he has just reassigned four senior LANL EM managers.

 Indeed, LANL has had a many year-long history of critical problems. It had even once been thought that such problems were really local management problems, the result of a defective local management culture. Moreover, it was hypothesized that such problems were also owing to ineffective oversight by the long-time LANL contract manager, the University of California (UC.)

 UC, under contract to the federal government, had been managing LANL since its inception in 1943, until termination of its contract in 2006. UC had executed this contract for ~60 years as a public service, and often at a financial loss.

 During the early years of the George W. Bush Administration, however, it was argued that management problems at LANL were really the result of inadequate management incentives; i.e., low management salaries. Subsequently, the contract was passed from UC to a for-profit entity, LANS-LLC, led by Bechtel Corp.

 With LANS-LLC, local management incentives increased sharply. For example, the LANL Director's annual compensation package moved up from ~$200,000, under UC, to ~$1.2 million, under the new for-profit contractor. The number of senior managers also increased sharply. In order to pay for this management windfall, which amounted altogether to ~$10 million, ~100 non-management LANL employees had to be dismissed. Nevertheless, the frequency of occurrence of critical problems at LANL did not seem to change.

 Interestingly, in its zeal to privatize functions of the federal government, the G. W. Bush Administration also moved the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) contract from UC, where it had been since the founding of that Laboratory in 1953, to a private sector entity. Just as at LANL, senior management salaries and bonuses soared at LLNL, when the contract with UC ended in 2007. However, one would be hard put to notice any change in LLNL performance as a result of the new management incentives.

 One should also not fail to notice the situation at Sandia National Laboratory (SNL.) Here, local management problems had never been of much public interest, and the SNL contract had long been let in the private sector. Nevertheless, during the G. W. Bush Administration senior manager compensation at SNL lurched upward, in order to bring it up to the new levels being set at LANL and LLNL. Today, the SNL Director takes home in excess of $2 million each year.

 Thus, aspiring managers' interest in the nuclear weapons industry has been very well maintained.

 Meanwhile, critical problems at LANL seem to continue unabated. Perhaps the local management culture has somehow not yet been corrected. Or maybe DOE is looking for a convenient scapegoat, in order to deflect renewed attention from its own well-known management failures.

Conflicted and Confounded over Nukes

Let's try to imagine a person moving in opposite directions at the same time. This is familiar behavior in the quantum mechanical world, fathomable by quantum mechanicians. However, to ordinary joes like you and me, such behavior is usually forbidden; i.e., unless, we happen to be acting like politicians.

 But, as for President Barack Obama, can he be both anti-nuke and pro-nuke at the same time? Consider the facts:

 In 2008 Obama ran for President for the first time while expressing his "Goal of a Nuclear-Free World [To] Show the world that America believes in its existing commitment under the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty to work to ultimately eliminate all nuclear weapons. [However,] America will not disarm unilaterally." Less than a year into his presidency, he addressed an international forum in Prague, saying that his government “will take concrete steps towards a world without nuclear weapons.”  In 2010, he made a first  step is this direction by signing a treaty with the Russians to reduce the number of deployed nuclear warheads in the
arsenals of the two ersatz superpowers to below 1550 warheads each, within seven years. However, as a means of ensuring that this agreement would be ratified by  the US Senate, the President promised congressional weapons enthusiasts that he would also lead a program of refurbishing of the  US nuclear weapons establishment; e.g., nuclear weapons factories and R&D centers, "spending $85 billion over 10 years to modernize the nation’s nuclear weapons complex" (NYT,) as well as other side-agreements written into the treaty, at Republican insistence, such as that "he would follow through on development of missile defense in Europe, despite Russian resistance" (NYT.)

 The FY 2015 budget recently submitted by the Administration to Congress showed clearly that Pres. Obama intends to make good on his promise to congressional hawks, and then some; e.g., he also intends the replacement of aging nuclear weapons delivery systems, submarines, planes, and missiles, within the next 10-20 years. At the same time, no further reductions in the size of the US arsenal of nuclear weapons seem to be in the offing. For this unfortunate circumstance, says the Administration, we have only the bad behavior of the Russians to blame; i.e., especially as regards their latest actions in the Ukraine.

 As a way of further justifying its apparent new-found enthusiasm for nuclear weapons, the Administration notes the fact that other nuclear weapons states are upgrading and expanding their arsenals of nuclear weapons; viz., the Pakistanis, and the Indians, both according to their own public statements. Of course, the North Koreans are trying to enhance their status as a nuclear weapons power, too, and the Iranians are suspected of trying to move in the same direction. The Administration says that it is the responsibility of the United States, as the sole surviving super-power, to help keep the world safe from more nuclear weapons states, and from more nuclear weapons, by continuing to maintain and improve the reliability of its own arsenal of nuclear weapons.

 Not only does the Administration seem conflicted in its plans for its arsenal of nuclear weapons, but it seems confounded in its plans for the disposition of the chemically toxic waste and radioactive waste produced by its nuclear weapons industry, not to mention the enormous quantity of hi-level radioactive waste produced by the nation's nuclear power plants. As pointed out previously in this blog, the President began his tenure by closing the Yucca Mt repository for high-level nuclear waste, before a single Curie of radioactive material had been assigned there for storage, but after an expenditure of ~$10 billion, for planning and construction. As yet, no other facility for the storage of high-level radioactive waste is so much as in the planning stage.

 The only fully operational storage facility for low-level nuclear waste from nuclear weapons factories is the WIPP site, in Carlsbad, NM. However, the WIPP site is now closed for repair, owing to the occurrence ~eight months ago of a mysterious accident which led to the release of radiation into the local environment. According to DOE, the cause of this accident is still not completely understood.

 Therefore, by way of dealing with this pressing problem, the DOE has announced the reassignment of four senior managers at Los Alamos National Laboratory's Environmental Management unit. Evidently, even though all of LANL's EM functions are already funded entirely by DOE's EM money, which money does not pass through NNSA coffers, the actual management of EM activities at LANL is performed locally. According to the latest press reports, this situation will now change: DOE's EM management team will now have direct day-to-day control over LANL's EM activities.

 Perhaps this management change will make all the difference, due to the imposition at LANL of DOE EM's highly touted matrix management system, and in spite of the Obama Administration's sharp reduction in money budgeted for DOE EM, in its US 2015 budget.

 Finally, I will only point out once again the debacle of the MOX fuel program. The Administration is closing down this complex program after already having spent ~$10 billion in planning and construction, and years working out technical and political details with the Russians. The safe and secure disposition of weapons grade plutonium, declared surplus by the nuclear weapons program, will once again become a matter of great national concern.