The head of the National Nuclear Security Administration was scheduled to testify Tuesday at 9 a.m. before the House Armed Services strategic forces subcommittee, where she will take questions on the agency’s fiscal 2024 budget request.
NNSA Administrator Jill Hruby will be joined by John Plumb assistant secretary of defense for space policy, Deborah Rosenblum assistant secretary of defense for nuclear, chemical, and biological defense programs, Gen. Thomas Bussiere, head of Air Force Global Strike Command and Vice Adm. Johnny Wolfe, the Navy’s director of strategic systems.
The panel has been called to testify on the Biden administration’s fiscal 2024 budget request for their various departments and how they mutually support U.S. nuclear weapon and warhead modernization and sustainment plans.
The House Armed Services strategic forces subcommittee oversees Department of Energy and Defense Department nuclear weapons, missile defense, space and other programs.
For nuclear weapons programs at the NNSA, the White House seeks some $23.8 billion for 2024, up about $1.5 billion from 2023.
Hruby will be defending a budget that includes major investments in plutonium pit production at two sites to reach the goal of 80 pits per year as close to 2030 as possible.
To hit near that target, the budget calls for a boost in staffing at Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico, where workforce shortfalls contributed to a delay of up to four years for equipment needed to produce the 30 pits annually that the lab will contribute.
The budget also includes funding to staff up construction at the Uranium Processing Facility at the Y-12 National Security Complex in Oak Ridge, Tenn. Instead of an estimated $6.5 billion, NNSA now expects the facility to cost as much as $8.9 billion and come online by March 2029, about three years later than planned as recently as a year ago.
