January 22, 2012

By Rob Pavey
From the Augusta Chronicle

The government’s $4.8 billion quest to rid itself of tons of high-grade plutonium from old nuclear bombs is veering in new directions this year.

The broad plan is to build a mammoth mixed oxide, or “MOX” plant at Savannah River Site, where the material will be rendered forever unusable in weapons by blending it into commercial nuclear reactor fuel.

January 17, 2012

By H. Darr Beiser
From the USA TODAY

HANFORD SITE, Wash. – Seven decades after scientists came here during World War II to create plutonium for the first atomic bomb, a new generation is struggling with an even more daunting task: cleaning up the radioactive mess.

The U.S. government is building a treatment plant to stabilize and contain 56 million gallons of waste left from a half-century of nuclear weapons production. The radioactive sludge is so dangerous that a few hours of exposure could be fatal. A major leak could contaminate water supplies serving millions across the Northwest. The cleanup is the most complex and costly environmental restoration ever attempted.

And the project is not going well.

For Immediate Release: January 12, 2012

Contact:  Tom Clements, Columbia, SC, 803-834-3084

KatherineFuchs, Washington, 202-544-0217

 

Washington, DC – Under growingbudgetary stress, the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) announced that it is amendinga troubled program to dispose of surplus weapons plutonium[i].  DOE aims to eliminate a costly new facility fordisassembling plutonium cores (pits) from nuclear bombs and is considering processingthe pits in existing facilities at the Savannah River Site (SRS) in SouthCarolina and the Los Alamos National Lab in New Mexico. 

Facing a host of hurdles, DOE aims to turn the separated plutonium into controversial new mixed uranium-plutonium oxide fuel (MOX) for use in unnamed nuclear power reactors.  Today’s notice reveals that DOE is widening its search for utilities willing to accept MOX and states that they “will analyze use of MOX fuel in a generic reactor in the United States to provide analysis for any additional future potential utility customers.”  

A new agreement between the state Environment Department and Los Alamos National Laboratory would accelerate shipments of radioactive waste to the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in Carlsbad (pictured)—but would also leave more than half the waste on the hill indefinitely.

Los Alamos National Laboratory is trumpeting a new radioactive waste cleanup agreement that would allow it to leave half of its radioactive waste in place indefinitely—and defy federal environmental protection guidelines.

January 4, 2012

By William Hartung

From The Talking Points Memo Cafe

Tomorrow morning the Obama administration will present the findings of its latest national security strategy review. The review has been undertaken with an eye towards scaling back Pentagon spending in a way that best provides for the defense of the country. This "strategy first" approach to defense reform makes good sense. The question is whether the administration will put forward a strategy that is in keeping with the threats we now face, or whether it will attempt to pass off minor adjustments as a major policy shift.

A new strategy is long overdue. The most recent Quadrennial Defense Review (QDR) - the U.S. government's official, public strategy document - was in many respects just a laundry list of missions that the U.S. military was expected to carry out, including counterinsurgency, counter-terrorism, protection of allies from conventional or nuclear attack, curbing the spread of nuclear weapons, ensuring freedom of the seas, promoting economic development, providing military assistance, participating in disaster relief operations, and carrying out humanitarian interventions. To make matters worse, the QDR process makes no attempt to estimate the cost of doing all of these jobs, much less determining whether some of them might be better addressed through non-military means.

Jan 5, 2012 

By John Fleck

From the Albuquerque Journal

Federal officials this week awarded a Bechtel-University of California team $83.7 million for its management of Los Alamos National Laboratory in 2011, plus a one-year extension of its lab management contract as a bonus, but refused to release the performance evaluation report on which the decisions were based.

The one-year extension means the current team will be in charge at Los Alamos through 2017.