Staff Reports
NS&D Monitor
4/04/2014
The National Nuclear Security Administration’s Red Team has reached a “strong consensus” on an alternative plan to the Uranium Processing Facility, according to Oak Ridge National Laboratory Director Thom Mason, the team leader. Mason said the Red Team made its second on-site visit to the Y-12 National Security Complex last week in order to do follow-up interviews and request additional information related to the uranium operations at the Oak Ridge site, with a particular focus on the technologies used in the processing of highly enriched uranium.
During the last part of the site visit, the Red Team—which reportedly includes more than 25 experts in various field—sifted through their findings and came to a consensus on what the alternative strategy would look like, Mason said. He said he was pleased that people with different backgrounds and expertise from different parts of the DOE complex could come together on a strong consensus of what needs to be done. “Now whether or not it’s better, that will be the judgment of the NNSA,” Mason said in an interview this week. “Obviously, the UPF concept had a lot of attractive options in terms of the maximum consolidation [of uranium operations], minimum footprint, operational flexibility from getting everything in one facility. And, in some of those dimensions, almost anything else is going to be less optimum. It’s really a question of balancing the risk and the resources and the time. At the end, that’s what we really put the focus on … to move with a certain set of urgency.”
Red Team to Propose Only One Approach
Mason emphasized that the Red Team won’t be recommending multiple approaches. “There’s not going to be a minority report,” he said, although noting the proposed strategy for getting the job done will have multiple components. “To some extent, we would be doing NNSA and [acting Administrator] Bruce Held a disservice if we just threw out without consideration a whole series of ideas for different studies. You could spend an infinite amount of time and not move forward.”
Mason said the report will probably be longer than the original target of 10 to 12 pages, but he said it should be delivered to Held by April 15. The ORNL director was tapped for the Red Team task by Held earlier this year and asked to assemble a team in quick order and evaluate alternatives to the UPF concept that would allow the government to get out of the old 9212 uranium-processing complex by 2025 and do it at a cost of no more than $6.5 billion. According to some reports, the UPF plan had become unwieldy and too expensive, with estimates that it could $10 billion or more, far above the earlier projections by NNSA contractors.
Not a Finished Product
UPF was envisioned as a major production center that would consolidate all of Y-12’s work with weapons-grade uranium. But the schedule got stretched out as the project encountered one obstacle after another, including a design effort that proved to be a failure, not providing sufficient space for all of the required equipment. The Red Team’s focus was to come up with the quickest way to get out of the 9212 complex—the plant’s old uranium hub that was constructed during the World War II Manhattan Project—and allow Y-12 to carry out its missions safely and securely. Getting out of 9212 by 2025 isn’t as easy as it might sound, Mason said, “especially when you look at all the things that need to be done.”
The findings of the Red Team won’t be a finished product. Mason there’ll be a framework but a lot of additional analysis will still need to be done. “I think we learned a lot,” Mason said. “I have to say we probably tested the patience of the Y-12 team in terms of all our requests for additional information.” Because of its size and varied expertise, the Red Team broke into groups—for such things as management issues, technology, regulatory drivers—and Mason emphasized that everyone contributed and will play a role in the final report. “There’s not a single author,” he said. “Everyone has a piece of it.”
9215, Beta-2E Can Be Extended
The plan will focus on getting out of 9212 and making best use of the infrastructure and other facilities in place at Y-12. The original UPF concept included plans to incorporate weapons activities that currently take place in Beta-2E—where warhead parts are assembled and taken apart and inspected—and Building 9215, where uranium machining takes place. While those facilities will need to be replaced at some point, Mason noted, “Beta-2E is in pretty good shape. With some prudent investments to continue to improve the facility, there’s no reason it can’t have a reasonably long life.”
Mason noted that Building 9215 is roughly of the same age as 9212, but it’s not in as bad shape because of the type of operations conducted there. “Just less nasty in terms of the impact [operations have had] on their facility,” he said. There are apparently plans to recommend extending the life of 9215 as well, although not as long as Beta-2E.
Activist Group Raises Concerns Over Process
Meanwhile, the Oak Ridge Environmental Peace Alliance this week expressed concerns about what its coordinator Ralph Hutchison called the “secret process” of the Red Team’s work. “Almost all of what the Red Team is doing is secret—the names of the Team members have not been revealed,” Hutchison wrote in a letter to Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.), the ranking member of the Senate Energy and Water Appropriations Subcommittee. “Only a very few things are known, and we know them because Red Team Director Thom Mason granted interviews before the Red Team began.”
Hutchison said failure to involve the public in developing a “new” UPF will compromise political support for the big project and “eventually lead to project delays and rising costs.” Before any more money is spent, two “fundamental” questions should be answered, he said:
- Is the work projected for the UPF necessary?
- Is it necessary for the work to be done in Oak Ridge?
Asked for comment, Alexander’s press secretary, Brian Reisinger said, “Senator Alexander wants to see the Uranium Processing Facility completed under budget and on time. He plans to participate in an April 30 budget hearing that will be open to the public, and he will encourage the National Nuclear Security Administration to publicly release as much information as possible on the Red Team review without undermining national security.”
