The $6.5 billion fiscal 2020 budget request for the Energy Department’s Office of Environmental Management would resume the practice of “bartering” excess government uranium in order to defray cleanup costs at the Portsmouth Gaseous Diffusion Plant in Piketon, Ohio.
Sen. John Barrasso (R-Wyo.), who chairs the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works, helped win a suspension of the practice for the current fiscal 2019, and opposes its resurrection in the federal budget year starting Oct. 1. Likewise, Sen. Rob Portman (R-Ohio) prefers having sufficient money appropriated for the work at the former uranium enrichment complex without leaning on barter funds.
Wyoming is a domestic producer of uranium, and Barrasso has complained the government barter program undermines market prices.
“Chairman Barrasso has previously requested Portsmouth cleanup activities are fully funded through the appropriations process,” a spokesperson said Wednesday. “Congress has supported the Chairman on this policy the previous two years. Chairman Barrasso will work to continue that policy again this year.”
“I will continue to support the cleanup activities at Piketon, and will again fight to fully fund the cleanup without layoffs,” Portman said in a statement issued through his office. “As I have said before, relying on the barter program has resulted in uncertainty in funding for Piketon and is not a long-term solution. I look forward to working with my colleagues to secure the resources needed to ensure this site is cleaned up for future redevelopment.”
The DOE budget request would decrease the Uranium Enrichment Decontamination and Decommissioning (UED&D) Fund appropriation for Portsmouth, from $408 million in fiscal 2019 to roughly $356 million in fiscal 2020.
The “decrease reflects an offset by the resumption of uranium transfers (barter) pending renewal of Secretarial Determination needed to continue deactivation of the second Process building (X-333),” according to text in the full Environmental Office budget justification released this week.
The overall UED&D fund would decrease from $841 million in the current fiscal year to $715 million in fiscal 2020. The Environmental Management budget request for Portsmouth would decline from $476 million to $426 million.
The overall administration budget request for DOE nuclear cleanup would decline from about $7.2 billion in fiscal 2019.
