POGO is Shocked by Wasteful Spending in DOE Budget

In the midst of initiating a federal spending freeze, it is shocking that President Obama’s FY 2011 Budget Request released this week pours billions of dollars into two unnecessary nuclear weapons construction projects. There is no demonstrated requirement for either the Uranium Processing Facility (UPF) at the Y-12 National Security Complex nor the Chemical and Metallurgical Research Replacement Nuclear Facility (CMRR-NF) at the Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL).

“Contrary to the spin, neither of these facilities are needed to ensure the safety, security and effectiveness of our weapons,” says Peter Stockton, POGO Senior Investigator.

In addition, DOE does not even have an estimated cost for completing the projects, as the budget describes their total costs as “TBD.” “To Be a Disaster,” is what POGO fears that term means, based on DOE’s atrocious record of soaring construction costs and overruns. For example, the cost of the Highly Enriched Uranium Manufacturing Facility (HEUMF) at Y-12 ballooned from $97 million to $549 million. The National Ignition Facility (NIF) project also experienced dramatically increased costs and delayed completion dates. The Department of Energy sold the NIF to Congress in the early 1990s with a reported cost estimate of $700 million and an original completion date of 2002, yet its most recent cost estimate is $5-6 billion with a completion date of 2010 — more than 600 percent over budget and at least 8 years behind schedule.

Despite the 10 percent spending increase on the nation's nuclear weapons budget, one of the only areas to see reduced growth is the budget for weapons dismantlement, which was sliced almost in half.

“When it comes to nuclear weapons, Obama talks one way, but walks another,” says Peter Stockton, POGO Senior Investigator. “How will we move towards a world free of nuclear weapons, when the budget for dismantling our excess warheads is decreased?”

POGO hopes Congress will enact its own spending freeze on these costly and unnecessary construction projects, and restores funding to the important task of dismantling excess warheads.

-- Ingrid Drake

Comments

[Project On Government Oversight]

a comment, fyi

[erich]

John Fleck just wrote saying:

It ran on the front page of all editions. On line, linked off the Journal home page:

http://www.abqjournal.com/news/state/022238179074newsstate02-02-10.htm

[erich]

Excellent. I suspect POGO staff knows this, but your readers may want some NM sites that track LANL and CMRR closely:

www.nukewatch.org and www.lasg.org

Nuke Watch's Jay Coghlan was on Democracy Now today (Feb 2) and the 10 min clip is here:

http://www.democracynow.org/2010/2/2/despite_non_proliferation_pledge_obama_budget

John Fleck wrote an excellent piece for the ABQ Journal which quoted Greg Mello of the Los Alamos Study Group, but so far the story has only appeared in the North (Los Alamos) section, and not online or in the greater metropolitan area. One could contact him directly at:

[email protected]