“This year’s $858 billion military budget is the largest in memory. And the National Nuclear Security Administration, the Energy Department branch that oversees nuclear weapons, received $22.3 billion, a bump from the $20.7 billion it got last year.”
BY SCOTT WYLAND, THE SANTA FE NEW MEXICAN | January 4, 2023 stripes.com
(Tribune News Service) — Los Alamos National Laboratory’s record $4.6 billion budget for this fiscal year will give officials an unprecedented amount of money for its nuclear weapons program, which still makes up the bulk of the lab’s spending.
The lab’s hefty funding was part of the U.S. Energy Department’s budget request tucked into the recently passed $1.7 trillion omnibus spending package, which will cover the costs of agencies and programs through this fiscal year, ending in October.
Roughly 70 percent of the lab’s funding is for its nuclear weapons program, which includes research, computer testing and pursuing the goal of producing 30 plutonium bomb cores or “pits” per year by 2026.