Complex-wide plutonium modernization is up slightly, with Los Alamos plutonium funding shifting to operations from modernization, in the House’s first draft of the Department of Energy’s 2025 budget.
The full House Appropriations Committee was to debate and vote on the legislation Tuesday during a multi-bill markup scheduled to begin on Capitol Hill at 9:00 a.m. Eastern time.
Los Alamos Plutonium Modernization, a line that funds training and installation of new equipment at the lab’s planned pit factory, would receive $1.6 billion for 2025, according to the bill report: 5.4% more than the White House requested but down 10.6% year-over-year from the 2024 appropriations.
At the same time, Los Alamos Plutonium Operations would get $1.07 billion, up nearly 28% year-over-year and about 11.5% more than requested. NNSA officials earlier this year said they planned to start casting pits at Los Alamos this spring that could eventually be certified as war-reserve. Certification would not begin until December, after Los Alamos expected to complete the W87-1 first-production-unit pit.
Pits are the fissile first stage cores of nuclear weapons. The National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) is preparing to cast new pits for W87-1 warheads to be used in future Sentinel intercontinental ballistic missiles some time next decade.
Among the continued plutonium modernization investments planned for Los Alamos under the bill to be marked up Tuesday are machines needed for high-volume pit production. The lab hopes to hit 30 pits annually in 2028.
“Within available funds the Committee recommends $10,000,000 for next-generation machining and assembly technology development for high volume pit production,” the bill report said, referring to the added funding for plutonium pit production the subcommittee referred to in the bill summary posted June 27.
As for the NNSA’s other planned pit factory, the White House and House appropriators agreed this year on the funding for the Savannah River Plutonium Processing Facility, which would get the requested $1.2 billion under the bill. That is about $200 million more than the 2024 budget.