FY 2014
Nuclear Watch New Mexico’s compilation of the National Nuclear Security Administration’s FY 2014 budget request which in real terms includes a 16.7% increase for nuclear weapons programs over FY 2013...
Search Results for: lanl
Senate Appropriations Cuts Nuclear Bomb Life Extension Program; NM’s Tom Udall Tries to Restore Funding to Bloated Program
Santa Fe, NM – Today the Senate Energy and Water Development Appropriations Subcommittee reported that it cut funding for the National Nuclear Security Administration’s B61 nuclear bomb Life Extension Program...
The NNSA/DoD “3+2” strategy – hold on to your wallets
John Harvey is Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Nuclear, Chemical, and Biological Defense Programs, where “he advises on plans, policy and oversight of the U.S. nuclear weapons program.”...
The Lab’s New, $400 million, Plutonium Laboratory Springs Its First Leak
The Lab’s New, $400 million, Plutonium Laboratory Springs Its First Leak On January 22, 2013 representatives of the Los Alamos National Laboratory discovered the presence of a diesel spill from...
Lab lacks ability to estimate emergency response as it also underestimates risk
The Health Safety and Security Office (HSS) of Safety and Emergency Management Evaluations performed this independent review to evaluate emergency response capabilities at the Lab and how the Lab maintained them in a state of readiness in case of a severe natural phenomena event. The review showed that LANL would have trouble responding quickly with the appropriate emergency response in the case of a serious natural event. As one of the conclusions states – “LANL does not have an adequate means for determining quickly whether an event occurring at the CMR facility, a criticality event at TA-55 PF-4 facility, or a severe natural phenomena event at either facility involves a significant quantity of HAZMAT and requires implementation of corresponding onsite protective actions or issuance of appropriate offsite protective action recommendations.”
It is still annual compensation paid for by the taxpayers
I’d like to respond to the news stories out lately concerning the Director’s salary at the Los Alamos National Laboratory. Following our press release Wednesday, the Lab released their reply....
Two Upcoming Events
Two upcoming events Sunday Mornings @ The Travel Bug April 22, Sunday, 11 am 839 Paseo de Peralta, Santa Fe Jay Coghlan, Executive Director Of Nuclear Watch New Mexico in...
Defense Dept. Memo Criticizes Cost of Nuclear Weapons Labs While Los Alamos Director’s Salary Nearly Triples
Nuclear Watch New Mexico had been independently compiling data on the salaries of the three laboratory directors, as presented in the table below. It shows that the salary of the Los Alamos Director has nearly tripled since for-profit management began in June 2006, even as the Lab is cutting some 600 jobs. As seen in the chart below, privatization of the nuclear weapons labs’ management contracts has resulted in directors’ salaries far above average in both the federal government and the private sector.
The Risk to Waste Stored at Area G
We pride ourselves here at Nuclear Watch New Mexico on trying to stick to the facts as we best we know them and not being alarmist. That said, the Las...
CMRR FY2012 Budget Request – Blank Check or Black Budget?
CMRR FY2012 Budget Request – Blank Check or Black Budget? The FY2012 budget request shows $300 million for the Chemistry and Metallurgy Research Replacement (CMRR) Project, which is now estimated...
Regarding NNSA’s Defense Nonproliferation Programs and MOX
I think it would be a big mistake to give unqualified support to restoring funds for NNSA’s Defense Nonproliferation Programs. In my view the best thing that could be done...
CMRR is Key to Expanded Plutonium Pit Production
While being narrowly correct, LANL PR man Kevin Roark is misleading when he claims [in a June 25, Letter to the Editor of the Santa Fe New Mexican newspaper] that...
Revised Estimates for Safer Gloveboxes Hurt Budget
On the heels of a GAO report made public Monday, which stated that accounting procedures used by various branches of the U.S. nuclear weapons complex are preventing NNSA from pinpointing...
Curating the Stockpile: Remanufacturing Fogbank
I only now happened to run across the article below from the Los Alamos National Laboratory Nuclear Weapons Journal about how the remanufacturing of Fogbank was reestablished. As dated as...
Power of the Purse over DOE Projects
I was in Washington, DC last week and heard a number of congressional offices express support for the CMRR-Nuclear Facility, indicating what we already know, that it will be very...
Three Huge New Facilities Rebuild U.S. Nuclear Weapons Production Capacity
Modern nuclear weapons are comprised of three general types of components: plutonium pit primaries, uranium/lithium secondaries that are triggered by the primaries, and the 1,000’s of non-nuclear components that create...
A Tale of Two Cross-Sections
At the recent LANL Hazardous Waste Permit Hearings, the public was presented with two cross-sections of the current understanding of the geology under the Lab's largest nuclear waste disposal area, Tech Area 55. These cross sections are important because the NM Environment Department, with public input, will soon have to decide the final disposition of the over 800,000 cubic yards of radioactive and hazardous waste buried there. The options range from leaving the waste in place with some sort of cover to exhuming the waste.
The CMRR-Nuclear Facility Is All About Expanding Plutonium Pit Production Capacity
In response to a question by Senator Jeff Bingaman at a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing on April 14, 2010, NNSA Administrator Tom D’Agostino stated “We will not make pits...
What the New Definition of “New” Is
On March 16 I met with a senior congressional staff members. I raised the issue of what is “new.” I specifically pointed to an earth-penetrating variant of the B61 gravity...
New Plutonium Facility Estimate Embraces $4.5 Billion
Buried in Volume 1 of the Department of Energy’s FY 2011 Congressional Budget Request are the Details of Project Cost Estimate for LANL’s proposed Chemistry and Metallurgy Research Building Replacement...
Sandia Claims Technology Supports the CTBT While Modernizing Weapons
Above its masthead the hard copy 12/4/09 Sandia Lab News has a cool NNSA/DoD “W76-1/MK4A” badge with a black submarine and a vertical warhead above it with a slanted trident...
Update – Lab Shipment Scare at Sunport
Phil Parker at the Journal gives an update. The package was labeled “explosives” on the inside, so the cargo handlers were rightfully concerned when their alarms went off. The cargo...
Lab’s Cyber Security Still Not Trustworthy
A GAO Report released Friday the 13th found that “significant information security control weaknesses remain on LANL’s classified computer network. LANL had vulnerabilities in several critical areas, including (1) identifying...
Complete excavation of Area G now estimated at only $9.1 billion
Q: How much does it cost to cleanup a 65-acre, 50-year-old, nuclear weapons laboratory unlined dump full of low-level radioactive waste (LLW), radioactively contaminated infectious waste, asbestos contaminated material, transuranic...
Operations at Plutonium Facility stood down due to fire suppression system
In the latest of a string of fire system deficiencies on Wednesday September 30th, LANL management declared the fire suppression system inoperable in PF-4 at TA-55. Facility activities were placed...