Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation

House Energy & Water Appropriations FY 2007 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Summary

by Leonor Tomero [contact information]

June 6, 2006

The House Energy & Water FY 2007 Appropriations bill contained two significant milestones for nuclear non-proliferation efforts, and in particular for minimizing the threat of nuclear terrorism.

First, the House increased the funding for the Global Threat Reduction Initiative (GTRI) program by $41 million, a 38% increase, in Committee and in a floor amendment by Reps. Leach (R-IA) and Andrews (D-NJ), bringing the total to $148 million.  The GTRI program secures and disposes of vulnerable nuclear weapons-grade material that is scattered in 40 countries.  Given assessments by experts such as former Secretary of Defense William Perry that there is a 50% chance of nuclear terrorism by 2010, this increase in funding represents a much needed boost for accelerating and expanding efforts to secure material that is at risk of diversion by terrorists seeking to acquire material to make a nuclear weapon.  The floor vote was significant as it reflected a recognition by the House of the urgency of the need to secure vulnerable material and sent a clear message to the Administration that this non-proliferation program should be accelerated and given greater priority.

Second, through leadership from Reps. Hobson (R-OH) and Visclosky (D-IN), the House also acted to stem the availability of nuclear weapons-usable material by cutting the Administration's proposal for commercial spent fuel reprocessing and transmutation by $130 million, a decrease of 52%, bringing the funding for the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership (GNEP) to $120 million.  The proposal for reprocessing and transmutation would separate material from nuclear waste that could be processed to make nuclear weapons-usable material.  It would reverse a thirty-year policy due to proliferation risks and costs.  The House acted because of a lack of information from the Department of Energy on lifecycle costs of the program, and the risk and cost of building fast burner reactors. 

This cut in funding may significantly delay the development of a reprocessing and transmutation fuel cycle, and avert sending a message to the rest of the world that the United States is engaging in a practice that would undermine US efforts to convince countries not to acquire reprocessing technology.

HIGHLIGHTS OF THE BILL

Global Threat Reduction Initiative (GTRI)

• FY 2007 request: $107 million
• House Appropriated: $148 million (+$41 million)

The House provided $148 million, increasing the funding for securing and disposing of vulnerable fissile material by $41 million.  The added funds resulted from a $19 million increase in the Appropriations Committee and from a successful amendment (227-195 vote, with the support of 39 Republicans ) on the House floor proposed by Rep. Jim Leach (R-IA) and Rep. Andrews (D-NJ) to provide an additional $27.8 million to the program.  The successful $27.8 million offset came from the Department of Energy's administrative expenses account that pays salaries, the Office of the Secretary and other personnel.
This increase in funds and the floor vote on the amendment represented a net gain for accelerating and expanding efforts to secure vulnerable nuclear weapons-usable material around the world. 

The GTRI program secures and removes high-risk material that could be diverted by terrorists to make a nuclear or radiological weapon.  Specifically, it covers converting US research reactors to use low-enriched uranium (LEU) rather than nuclear weapons-usable highly enriched uranium (HEU), returning Russian and US-origin HEU spent research reactor fuel to Russia and the United States, disposing of Kazakhstan spent fuel, securing radiological material that could be used to make a dirty bomb, and removing and securing (through the emerging threats program) "gap" fissile material not covered by any other non-proliferation program. 

Commercial Spent Fuel Reprocessing

• FY 2007 request: $250 million
• House appropriated $120 million (-$130 million)

In its FY 2007 Energy & Water Appropriations bill, the House of Representatives cut $130 million from the President's $250 million-request for the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership (GNEP), $200 million of which was for demonstration projects of reprocessing technologies and fast reactors. 
The Energy & Water Appropriations Subcommittee cut $100 million and the Appropriations Committee subsequently agreed to cut an additional $30 million with agreement from Reps. Hobson and Visclosky.  A House floor amendment proposed by Rep. Ed Markey (D-MA) to cut an additional $40 million which would have decreased the reprocessing research funding to FY 2006 levels, failed 128-295.   While the vote failed by a wide margin, it was a slight improvement over last year's vote that lost 110-312 (gaining support from 10 Republicans).

While expressing general support for the concept of nuclear fuel "recycling" and favoring an option that would solve the nuclear waste problem and would obviate the need to identify and open additional permanent geologic repositories, the House report stated "the Committee has serious reservations about GNEP as proposed by the Administration. The overriding concern is simply that the Department of Energy has failed to provide sufficient detailed information to enable Congress to understand fully all aspects of this initiative, including the cost, schedule, technology development plan, and waste streams from GNEP."

The House report recommended the distribution within the Advanced Fuel Cycle Initiative of the allocated $120,000,000 as:

$11,000,000 for separations technology development; $9,000,000 for advanced fuels development; $6,000,000 for transmutation engineering; $10,000,000 for systems analysis; $20,000,000 for the advanced fuel cycle facility; $39,000,000 for technology development in support of the several UREX+ processes; and $25,000,000 for the advanced burner reactor. No funds were provided for transmutation education. The Committee also expressed its lack of support for the development of small modular reactors for export.

The Appropriations Committee stated that none of the appropriated funds were to be spent on design or implementation of a demonstration project using Urex+ reprocessing technology, thereby making clear that such a demonstration project was premature in light of the uncertainty about the reprocessing and transmutation proposal.

While a handful of Senators have expressed concern about the proliferation risks and costs of reprocessing and transmutation, the program has benefited from the public support of Sen. Pete Domenici (R-NM), chair of the Senate Energy & Water Appropriations Subcommittee.

Reliable Replacement Warhead (RRW)

• FY 2007 request: $27.7 million
• House appropriated: $52.7 million (+$25 million contingent on the Department of Energy providing the Appropriations Committee a transformation plan for the nuclear weapons complex)

The House fully funded the RRW program and added $25 million above the Administration's request contingent on the DOE submitting to Congress a plan for implementing the recommendations that the Task Force within the Secretary of Energy's Advisory Board (SEAB) made in 2005.  (These recommendations included design of an RRW, establishment of a consolidated nuclear production center, consolidation of special nuclear materials, accelerated warhead dismantlement and the creation of an office of transformation within the NNSA.)
The report also provides for the JASON Defense Advisory Group to act as an "outside peer reviewer to evaluate the competing RRW designs" and to assess whether the RRW "can be designed and produced and certified for use and deployed as an operationally-deployed nuclear weapons without undergoing an underground nuclear explosion test."

The deadline for the JASON report is March 31, 2007.

It is likely that the Senate will fund the Administration's funding request for RRW, with a possible provision that the RRW program not require nuclear testing.

Consolidated Nuclear Production Center

• House appropriated $100 million
• FY 2007 request: $112.4 million (chemistry and metallurgy research and activities associated with pit production)

The House Appropriations provided $100 million for "transition planning, site selection, and preliminary design and development for a consolidated nuclear production site for reliable replacement warheads and stockpile support," supporting the recommendation to consolidate production and dismantlement activities.

The House for Energy and Water Appropriations Subcommittee cut construction funding by $100 million to $12.4 million for a new Chemistry and Metallurgy Research Replacement Project (CMRR), which would perform metallurgy studies on uranium and plutonium at Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) replacing the 50-year old outdated facility at LANL.  DOE proposed to build a Consolidated Plutonium Production Center by 2022 and to move plutonium and other special nuclear materials to LANL by 2022.  Because construction of the CMRR would not be completed before 2014, with a price tag of up to $1 billion, the Committee concluded that it would be operational for only eight years before being replaced by the new Consolidated Center and that this planning was "irrational."  Absent a guarantee that the Plutonium Production Center would be sited at LANL and given its preference to co-locate RRW production with radiological chemistry and metallurgy research, the House Appropriations directed DOE to terminate the CMRR project and plan to consolidate weapons production.

It is likely that Senator Pete Domenici (R-NM) will restore funding to LANL for this project and support the siting of the Consolidated Plutonium Production Center at LANL.

US Warhead Dismantlement

• FY 2007 request: $75 million
• House: $105 million (+$30 million)

The House appropriated $105 million for the warhead dismantlement program, $30 million over the Administration's request, to destroy excess warheads from the Cold War era.

This funding increase (over the Administration's request and last year's appropriations) was made in anticipation of the objectives set by the forthcoming Dismantlement Infrastructure Report.  As in FY 2006, the Energy & Water Appropriations Committees (and especially under influence from Rep. Hobson) increased the funding for dismantlement, characterization of components, and disposal of retired warheads at Pantex.

The Weapons Dismantlement and Disposition program is part of the Directed Stockpile Work.

International Nuclear Materials Protection and Cooperation (Russia) and Port/Border monitoring

• FY 2007 request: $413.2 million
• House appropriated: $583.2 million (+$170 million)

The House provided $583.2 million for the Materials Control and Accounting (MPC&A) program, a 41% increase above the Administration's request. 
This program focuses on working with Russia to secure its facilities that process or store nuclear weapons material by installing monitoring equipment, accounting for the material, and building a viable and lasting security infrastructure and culture to safeguard this material, and to install monitoring and detection systems at border crossings and ports. 

Within this program, $121.5 million ($65 million beyond the Administration's request) are allocated to upgrade or secure the Russian facilities. 

Most of the funding ($493 million, with the House appropriating $210 million over the Administration's request) will go towards the Second Line of Defense and the Megaports initiatives to install monitoring systems on Russian borders and at major ports worldwide in an attempt to monitor potential smuggling of nuclear material. 

While this program is important to prevent smuggling of nuclear material, it is crucial that the Administration and Congress maintain and increase funding for securing nuclear material at the facilities, as the likelihood of successfully securing or disposing of the material at the site of origin is greater than successfully tracking and intercepting the material if it is diverted.

Elimination of weapons-grade plutonium (Russia)

• The House funded the Administration's request of $206.7 million

The program funds the elimination of weapons-grade plutonium, and will be used to shut down the plutonium-producing reactor at Zheleznogorsk in Russia to meet a December 2010 completion date.

US Fissile Material Disposition (MOX fuel fabrication facility and US HEU blend-down)

• FY 2007 request: $603.3 million
• House: $282.65 million (- $320.6 million)

The House provided $282.65 for fissile material disposition.  The House terminated the US MOX fuel fabrication program and Pit Disassembly and Conversion at Savannah River Site.  The House Appropriations report notes that "there is no longer any justification for proceeding unilaterally with the US MOX program for disposing of US surplus plutonium," given that the liability disagreements have stalled any progress on the parallel US-Russian plutonium disposal through the joint MOX project, and as both Russia and the United States are now proposing to use fast reactors rather than a MOX fuel approach.  The House Appropriations Committee report also noted "the accumulation of substantial unobligated balances in the Fissile Material Disposition account, including over $500 million in the MOX construction project alone" and mentioned the Government Accountability Office and the DOE Inspector General reports on cost overruns and management deficiencies.  Similar to FY 2006, it is likely that the Senate will provide at least part of the funding for the MOX program, a difference which will be resolved in conference.

The House Appropriations provided instead $111 million for a conceptual and preliminary design of a plutonium disposition facility using immobilization technology. 

The funding also goes to HEU blend-down into LEU.

Nonproliferation and Verification Research and Development

• FY 2007 request: $268.8 million
• House appropriated: $308 million (+$39.2 million)

The House provided $308 million for Nonproliferation and Verification R&D, $39.2 million over the Administration's request.  This program includes proliferation detection, explosion monitoring, treaty monitoring and other activities.

Nonproliferation and International Security

• House funded Administration request of $127.4 million

This program includes activities supporting nuclear nonproliferation policy, international safeguards, export controls, treaties and agreements. 

SOURCES

Roll call for Leach-Andrews amendment on the Global Threat Reduction Initiative is available online.   

Roll call for Markey amendment on spent fuel reprocessing is available online.