U.S. Energy Secretary Rick Perry on Thursday expressed his opposition to continuing sales of excess government uranium to help finance cleanup of the Portsmouth Gaseous Diffusion Plant in Ohio, an issue that is holding up confirmation of Anne Marie White to head the Energy Department’s Office of Environmental Management.
The topic came up in the final minutes of Perry’s two-hour testimony before the House Appropriations energy and water subcommittee on DOE’s fiscal 2019 budget plan.
“One last question, to get it on the record,” panel Chairman Mike Simpson (R-Idaho) said. “You are opposed to the uranium sales to continue the funding of Portsmouth?”
“That is correct,” Perry replied.
“I wanted that on the record because I wanted somebody who is not here, that might be listening, because I think we need to get your undersecretary for EM confirmed as soon as possible,” Simpson said.
Simpson was apparently alluding to Sen. John Barrasso (R-Wyo.), who has placed a hold on White’s nomination to lead DOE’s $6.5 billion annual cleanup program of its nuclear sites as assistant secretary for environmental management. Barrasso wants the energy consultant and DOE to commit to ending the agency’s uranium barter program, which he says undercuts the already anemic domestic uranium production industry in Wyoming and elsewhere.
In recent days, DOE officials, perhaps including Perry himself, have communicated with Barrasso in hopes of convincing the senator to allow a Senate vote on White’s nomination, a source said this week.
The Department of Energy did not respond to an email and phone call on whether Perry had personally reached out to Barrasso. The senator’s office also did not respond to phone and email inquiries.
Last May, Perry approved DOE’s reduction of the annual uranium barter from 1,600 metric tons to 1,200 metric tons. The initial fiscal 2019 budget documents released by DOE in February don’t specifically mention the uranium barter program. The cleanup budget for the Portsmouth Site would rise to $415 million, or $33 million above 2017 enacted spending, for decontamination and decommissioning and additional remediation at the old uranium enrichment site.
At one point during the hearing, Rep. Nita Lowey (D-N.Y.) chided Perry for the Energy Department’s failure to publish a detailed budget justification document a month after its latest budget request was issued. While some parts of the fiscal 2019 DOE budget justification have been released, the environmental management justification has not. Perry listened to the criticism without comment.
If Barrasso is ultimately successful in having DOE curtail or eliminate the uranium barter program, it could create some funding questions for Portsmouth cleanup. “Where is the money going to come from” in such a situation, a second source said Thursday.
The White House sent White’s nomination to the Senate on Jan. 8, and she has advanced through both the Senate Energy and Natural Resources and Armed Services committees toward an up or down vote on the Senate floor.
