UPF rebaseline ‘done,’ project on new schedule, NNSA official says

ARLINGTON, Va. — The scheduled rebaselining process is done at the Uranium Processing Facility at Y-12 National Security Complex in Oak Ridge, Tenn., an agency official told the Exchange Monitor here Monday.

The Uranium Processing Facility (UPF) is the National Nuclear Security Administration’s (NNSA) next-generation factory for nuclear-weapons secondary stages.

Audrey Beldio, principal assistant deputy administrator for production modernization and materials management at NNSA, told the Monitor that UPF is now on the new rebaseline, and is currently on schedule.

Beldio’s comments came after she spoke at a workshop preceding the Exchange Monitor’s Annual Nuclear Deterrence Summit. She told the room that Y-12 and the agency began shutting down some of the production lines at Building 9212, which would be repurposed in UPF.

At a conference in Knoxville, Tenn., in October, Brian Zieroth, the project manager for UPF with Bechtel National, told the Exchange Monitor that Y-12 was going through the approval process with NNSA for the rebaseline. At the time, Zieroth said the estimate was $10.3 billion for total cost, and he forecasted completed construction by late 2027 with transition to operations in late 2031. 

Beldio did not give a new estimate for cost or date.