March 17, 2014

MONIZ OUTLINES DOE REORGANIZATION PLANS

By ExchangeMonitor

New Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz outlined his plans to reorganize the Department of Energy yesterday, suggesting that a newly created Under Secretary for Management and Performance would help the Department better achieve its mission. The new under secretary position would have responsibility for the Office of Environmental Management as well as oversight of major projects in the Department, including those that will still be managed by the National Nuclear Security Administration. “It’s great to focus on our big mission areas, which is why I came back to the Department: nuclear security, energy, science, climate. But if we don’t do the blocking and tackling and manage well, handle safety, handle security, it’s going to be a lot harder to do our job,” Moniz said at the State Department’s Generation Prague conference yesterday.

EM had been moved under the Under Secretary for Nuclear Security—who also serves as the NNSA administrator—under Energy Secretary Steven Chu several years ago, but Moniz said the new slot for EM would be a “more natural home” for the program. “DOE has got some really tough problems to handle, many of them dealing with the legacy of that weapons complex for many years,” Moniz said, referencing two of the most troubled projects, the Hanford Waste Treatment Plant and the Mixed Oxide Fuel Fabrication Facility being built at the Savannah River Site. “We’re going to try to elevate the whole focus on management and performance.” Moniz also confirmed he is merging the responsibility for energy and science into another under secretary position. “We need more integration of our energy and science programs,” he said. “For example in our science programs our biggest program is basic energy sciences. That’s what they do. We need to get more integration. That under secretary will then have responsibility for almost all the laboratories, all except the weapons labs and Savannah River. So there can be, we hope, a little bit of a new approach or revitalized approach to our laboratories. That’s one step that we think is a pretty important step.”

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