South Carolina wants the U.S. National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) to raid its defense nuclear nonproliferation budget to pay $200 million in fines for failing to remove weapon-usable plutonium from the state, according to the latest filing in a long-running federal lawsuit.
The state claimed in last week’s filing in U.S. District Court that the NNSA’s own budget requests confirm that the agency’s Material Disposition account is a legally eligible bill payer for the fines.
Specifically, South Carolina argued, the NNSA has sought appropriations within the Material Disposition account to remove 1 metric ton of plutonium from the Savannah River Site by Jan. 1, 2020, as ordered by the District Court in another lawsuit. Also, the state asserted, the NNSA plans to use Material Disposition funding in 2020 to design and develop the infrastructure at the Savannah River Site the agency says is needed to remove more plutonium from the site.
Both requests, the state argued, show the NNSA believes the Material Disposition account has “a logical relationship” with plutonium removal. That makes the account fair game for “necessary expenses” associated with that removal, of which the fines are one, the filing says.
The Department of Justice had not filed a response with the court on the NNSA’s behalf at deadline for Weapons Complex Morning Briefing.
The state sued the NNSA in 2016 after the agency failed to begin processing weapon-usable plutonium at Savannah River using the now-canceled Mixed Oxide Fuel Fabrication Facility. Under federal law, the agency had until Jan. 1, 2016 to either begin processing the plutonium or remove it from the state.
When the deadline passed, South Carolina sued to collect fines that run $1 million a day for the first 100 days of every year that the NNSA does not remove plutonium from the state.
