The Senate Armed Services Committee wants to require the Department of Energy to pick two to four possible sites for a new domestic uranium enrichment facility for defense programs, according to a bill report published Monday.
The report was appended to the panel’s version of the 2025 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), which the Senate Armed Services Committee announced Monday it passed 22-3. No floor vote was set as of Monday evening.
The report also shows that the committee wants the secretaries of energy and defense to brief Congress if either plans a warhead other than a W80 variant on a planned nuclear-armed, sea-launched cruise missile (SLCM-N).
The SLCM-N briefing would have to detail the benefits and cost expectations of any alternative, according to the bill report accompanying this version of the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA). It would also require the Secretary of the Navy to establish an office for the program for the weapon.
The directives for domestic uranium enrichment are more far-reaching.
In the NDAA report, the committee said it would require the Secretary of Energy to assess locations best suited for what they called a modular, scalable, uranium enrichment facility.
“The committee is concerned that the inability of the United States to domestically produce unencumbered enriched uranium undermines the national security of the United States, and that existing programs within the Department of Energy to explore various enrichment technologies are not advancing at an adequate pace,” Senate authorizers said in the report.
The Secretary of Energy would have to report the results of the assessment to the congressional defense committees, which would include cost estimates for beginning construction by 2027 and finishing by 2035.
Though it has enough unencumbered uranium to meet naval propulsion needs into the 2050s and other defense needs into the 2040s, DOE’s National Nuclear Security Administration has said it wants to start enriching defense-usable uranium by 2030 or so.
Unencumbered uranium refers to all-domestic material that contains no peaceful use restrictions, as defined under a series of international agreements to which the U.S. adheres.
