Background

DOE is responsible for a diverse set of missions, including nuclear  security, energy research, and environmental cleanup. These missions  are managed by various organizations within DOE and largely carried out  by management and operating (M&O) contractors at DOE sites.  According to federal budget data, NNSA is one of the largest  organizations in DOE, overseeing nuclear weapons and nonproliferation- related missions at its sites. With a $10.5 billion budget in fiscal year  2011—nearly 40 percent of DOE’s total budget—NNSA is responsible for  providing the United States with safe, secure, and reliable nuclear  weapons in the absence of underground nuclear testing and maintaining  core competencies in nuclear weapons science, technology, and  engineering.
Under DOE’s long-standing model of having unique M&O contractors at  each site, management of its sites has historically been decentralized  and, thus, fragmented. Since the Manhattan Project produced the first  atomic bomb during World War II, NNSA, DOE, and predecessor  agencies have depended on the expertise of private firms, universities,  and others to carry out research and development work and efficiently  operate the facilities necessary for the nation’s nuclear defense. DOE’s  relationship with these entities has been formalized over the years  through its M&O contracts—agreements that give DOE’s contractors  unique responsibility to carry out major portions of DOE’s missions and  apply their scientific, technical, and management expertise.
Currently, DOE spends 90 percent of its annual budget on M&O  contracts, making it the largest non-Department of Defense contracting  agency in the government. The contractors at DOE’s NNSA sites have  operated under DOE’s direction and oversight but largely independently  of one another. Various headquarters and field-based organizations  within DOE and NNSA develop policies and NNSA site offices, collocated  with NNSA’s sites, conduct day-to-day oversight of the M&O contractors,  and evaluate the contractors’ performance in carrying out the sites’  missions.

	NNSA Does Not Have Reliable Enterprise- Wide Management Information on Program Budgets and Costs

As we have reported since 1999, NNSA has not had reliable enterprise- wide budget and cost data, which potentially increases risk to NNSA’s  programs. Specifically:  In July 2003 and January 2007, we reported that NNSA lacked a  planning and budgeting process that adequately validated contractor- prepared cost estimates used in developing annual budget requests.  Establishing this process was required by the statute that created  NNSA—Title 32 of the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal  Year 2000. In particular, NNSA had not established an independent  analysis unit to review program budget proposals, confirm cost  estimates, and analyze budget alternatives. At the request of the  Subcommittee on Energy and Water Development, Senate  Committee on Appropriations, we are currently reviewing NNSA’s  planning and budgeting process, the extent to which NNSA has  established criteria for evaluating resource trade-offs, and challenges  NNSA has faced in validating its budget submissions. We expect to  issue a report on this work later this year.
In June 2010, we reported that NNSA could not identify the total costs  to operate and maintain essential weapons activities’ facilities and  infrastructure. Furthermore, we found that contractor-reported costs  to execute the scope of work associated with operating and  maintaining these facilities and infrastructure likely significantly  exceeded the budget for this program that NNSA justified to  Congress.
We reported in February 2011 that NNSA lacked complete data on (1)  the condition and value of its existing infrastructure, (2) cost estimates  and completion dates for planned capital improvement projects, (3)  shared-use facilities within the nuclear security enterprise, and (4)  critical human capital skills in its M&O contractor workforce that are  needed to maintain the Stockpile Stewardship Program. As a result,  NNSA does not have a sound basis for making decisions on how to  most effectively manage its portfolio of projects and other programs  and will lack information that could help justify future budget requests  or target cost savings opportunities. uncertainty over future federal budgets.to compare or quantify total savings across sites because guidance  for estimating savings is unclear and the methods used to estimate  savings vary between sites.
We found that it was difficult  The administration plans to request $88 billion from Congress over the  next decade to modernize the nuclear security enterprise and ensure that  base scientific, technical, and engineering capabilities are sufficiently  supported and the nuclear deterrent can continue to be safe, secure, and  reliable. To adequately justify future presidential budget requests, NNSA  must accurately identify these base capabilities and determine their costs.  Without this information, NNSA risks being unable to identify return on its  investment or opportunities for cost savings or to make fully informed  decisions on trade-offs in a resource-constrained environment.
NNSA, recognizing that its ability to make informed enterprise-wide  decisions is hampered by the lack of comprehensive data and analytical  tools, is considering the use of computer models—quantitative tools that  couple data from each site with the functions of the enterprise—to  integrate and analyze data to create an interconnected view of the  enterprise, which may help to address some of the critical shortcomings  we identified. In July 2009, NNSA tasked its M&O contractors to form an  enterprise modeling consortium. NNSA stated that the consortium is  responsible for leading efforts to acquire and maintain enterprise data,  enhance stakeholder confidence, integrate modeling capabilities, and fill  in any gaps that are identified. The consortium has identified areas in  which enterprise modeling projects could provide NNSA with reliable data  and modeling capabilities, including capabilities on infrastructure and  critical skills needs. In addition, we recently observed progress on  NNSA’s development of an Enterprise Program Analysis Tool that should  give NNSA greater insight into its sites’ cost reporting. The Tool also  includes a mechanism to identify when resource trade-off decisions must  be made, for example, when contractor-developed estimates for program  requirements exceed the budget targets provided by NNSA for those  programs. A tool such as this one could help NNSA obtain the basic data  it needs to make informed management decisions, determine return on  investment, and identify opportunities for cost saving.

	NNSA Needs to Make Further Improvements to Its Management of Major Projects and Contracts

A basic tenet of effective management is the ability to complete projects  on time and within budget. However, for more than a decade and in  numerous reports, we have found that NNSA has continued to experience  significant cost and schedule overruns on its major projects, principally  because of ineffective oversight and poor contractor management.  Specifically:  In August 2000, we found that poor management and oversight of the  National Ignition Facility construction project at Lawrence Livermore  National Laboratory had increased the facility’s cost by $1 billion and  delayed its scheduled completion date by 6 years. Among the many  causes for the cost overruns or schedule delays, DOE and Livermore  officials responsible for managing or overseeing the facility’s  construction did not plan for the technically complex assembly and  installation of the facility’s 192 laser beams. They also did not use  independent review committees effectively to help identify and correct  issues before they turned into costly problems. Similarly, in April 2010,  we reported that weak management by DOE and NNSA had allowed  the cost, schedule, and scope of ignition-related activities at the  National Ignition Facility to increase substantially., Since 2005,  ignition-related costs have increased by around 25 percent—from  $1.6 billion to over $2 billion—and the planned completion date for  these activities has slipped from the end of fiscal year 2011 to the end  of fiscal year 2012 or beyond.
We have issued several reports on the technical issues, cost  increases, and schedule delays associated with NNSA’s efforts to  extend, through refurbishment, the operational lives of nuclear  weapons in the stockpile. For example, in December 2000, we  reported that refurbishment of the W87 strategic warhead had  experienced significant design and production problems that  increased its refurbishment costs by over $300 million and caused  schedule delays of about 2 years. Similarly, in March 2009 we  reported that NNSA and the Department of Defense had not  effectively managed cost, schedule, and technical risks for the B61  nuclear bomb and the W76 nuclear warhead refurbishments. For the  B61 life extension program, NNSA was only able to stay on schedule  by significantly reducing the number of weapons undergoing  refurbishment and abandoning some refurbishment objectives. In the  case of the W76 nuclear warhead, NNSA experienced a 1-year delay  and an unexpected cost increase of nearly $70 million as a result of  its ineffective management of one the highest risks of the program— the manufacture of a key material known as Fogbank, which NNSA  did not have the knowledge, expertise, or facilities to manufacture.
In October 2009, we reported on shortcomings in NNSA’s oversight of  the planned relocation of its Kansas City Plant to a new, more modern  facility. Rather than construct a new facility itself, NNSA chose to  have a private developer build it. NNSA would then lease the building  through the General Services Administration for a period of 20 years.  However, when choosing to lease rather than construct a new facility  itself, NNSA allowed the Kansas City Plant to limit its cost analysis to  a 20-year life cycle that has no relationship with known requirements  of the nuclear weapons stockpile or the useful life of a production  facility that is properly maintained. As a result, NNSA’s financing  decisions were not as fully informed and transparent as they could  have been. If the Kansas City Plant had quantified potential cost  savings to be realized over the longer useful life of the facility, NNSA  may have made a different decision as to whether to lease or  construct a new facility itself.
We reported in March 2010 that NNSA’s plutonium disposition  program was behind schedule in establishing a capability to produce  the plutonium feedstock necessary to operate its Mixed-oxide Fuel  Fabrication facility currently being constructed at DOE’s Savannah  River Site in South Carolina. In addition, NNSA had not sufficiently  assessed alternatives to producing plutonium feedstock and had only  identified one potential customer for the mixed-oxide fuel the facility  would produce. In its fiscal year 2012 budget justification to Congress,  NNSA reported that it did not have a construction cost baseline for the  facility needed to produce the plutonium feedstock for the mixed-oxide  fuel, although Congress had already appropriated over $270 million  through fiscal year 2009 and additional appropriation requests totaling  almost $2 billion were planned through fiscal year 2016. NNSA stated  in its budget justification that it is currently considering options for  producing necessary plutonium feedstock without constructing a new  facility.
GAO, Nuclear Weapons: National Nuclear Security Administration’s Plans for Its  Uranium Processing Facility Should Better Reflect Funding Estimates and Technology  Readiness, GAO-11-103 (Washington, D.C.: Nov. 19, 2010).
Senate Committee on Appropriations. We plan to issue our report  next month.
As discussed above, NNSA remains on our high-risk list and remains  vulnerable to fraud, waste, abuse, and mismanagement. DOE has  recently taken a number of actions to improve management of major  projects, including those overseen by NNSA. For example, DOE has  updated program and project management policies and guidance in an  effort to improve the reliability of project cost estimates, better assess  project risks, and better ensure project reviews that are timely, useful and  identify problems early. However, DOE needs to ensure that NNSA has  the capacity—that is, the people and other resources—to resolve its  project management difficulties and that it has a program to monitor and  independently validate the effectiveness and sustainability of its corrective  measures. This is particularly important as NNSA embarks on its long- term, multibillion dollar effort to modernize the nuclear security enterprise.

	NNSA’s Oversight of Safety and Security in the Nuclear Security Enterprise Has Been Questioned

Another underlying reason for the creation of NNSA was a series of  security issues at the national laboratories. Work carried out at NNSA’s  sites may involve plutonium and highly enriched uranium, which are  extremely hazardous. For example, exposure to small quantities of  plutonium is dangerous to human health, so that even inhaling a few  micrograms creates a long-term risk of lung, liver, and bone cancer and  inhaling larger doses can cause immediate lung injuries and death. Also,  if not safely contained and managed, plutonium can be unstable and  spontaneously ignite under certain conditions. NNSA’s sites also conduct  a wide range of other activities, including construction and routine  maintenance and operation of equipment and facilities that also run the  risk of accidents, such as those involving heavy machinery or electrical  mishaps. The consequences of such accidents could be less severe than  those involving nuclear materials, but they could also lead to long-term  illnesses, injuries, or even deaths among workers or the public. Plutonium  and highly enriched uranium must also be stored under extremely high  security to protect it from theft or terrorist attack.
In numerous reports, we have expressed concerns about NNSA’s  oversight of safety and security across the nuclear security enterprise.  With regard to nuclear and worker safety:  In October 2007, we reported that there had been nearly 60 serious  accidents or near misses at NNSA’s national laboratories since  2000. These incidents included worker exposure to radiation,  inhalation of toxic vapors, and electrical shocks. Although no one was  killed, many of the accidents caused serious harm to workers or  damage to facilities. For example, at Los Alamos in July 2004, an  undergraduate student who was not wearing required eye protection  was partially blinded in a laser accident. Accidents and nuclear safety  violations also contributed to the temporary shutdown of facilities at  both Los Alamos and Livermore in 2004 and 2005. In the case of Los  Alamos, laboratory employees disregarded established procedures  and then attempted to cover up the incident, according to Los Alamos  officials. Our review of nearly 100 reports issued since 2000 found  that the contributing factors to these safety problems generally fell into  three key categories: (1) relatively lax laboratory attitudes toward  safety procedures; (2) laboratory inadequacies in identifying and  addressing safety problems with appropriate corrective actions; and  (3) inadequate oversight by NNSA.
We reported in January 2008 on a number of long-standing nuclear  and worker safety concerns at Los Alamos.included, among other things, the laboratory’s lack of compliance with  safety documentation requirements, inadequate safety systems,  radiological exposures, and enforcement actions for significant  violations of nuclear safety requirements that resulted in civil penalties  totaling nearly $2.5 million.
In October 2008, we reported that DOE’s Office of Health, Safety, and  Security—which, among other things, develops, oversees, and helps  enforce nuclear safety policies at DOE and NNSA sites—fell short of  fully meeting our elements of effective independent oversight of  nuclear safety.independently was limited because it had no role in reviewing  technical analyses that help ensure safe design and operation of  nuclear facilities, and the office had no personnel at DOE sites to  provide independent safety observations.
With regard to security:  In June 2008, we reported that significant security problems at Los  Alamos had received insufficient attention. The laboratory had over  two dozen initiatives under way that were principally aimed at  reducing, consolidating, and better protecting classified resources but  had not implemented complete security solutions to address either  classified parts storage in unapproved storage containers or  weaknesses in its process for ensuring that actions taken to correct  security deficiencies were completed. Furthermore, Los Alamos had  implemented initiatives that addressed a number of previously  identified security concerns but had not developed the long-term  strategic framework necessary to ensure that its fixes would be  sustained over time. Similarly, in October 2009, we reported that Los  Alamos had implemented measures to enhance its information  security controls, but significant weaknesses remained in protecting  the information stored on and transmitted over its classified computer  network. A key reason for this was that the laboratory had not fully  implemented an information security program to ensure that controls  were effectively established and maintained.
In March 2009, we reported about numerous and wide-ranging  security deficiencies at Livermore, particularly in the ability of  Livermore’s protective force to assure the protection of special nuclear  material and the laboratory’s protection and control of classified  matter. Livermore’s physical security systems, such as alarms and  sensors, and its security program planning and assurance activities  were also identified as areas needing improvement. Weaknesses in  Livermore’s contractor self-assessment program and the NNSA  Livermore Site Office’s oversight of the contractor contributed to these  security deficiencies at the laboratory. According to one DOE official,  both programs were “broken” and missed even the “low-hanging fruit.”  The laboratory took corrective action to address these deficiencies,  but we noted that better oversight was needed to ensure that security  improvements were fully implemented and sustained.
We reported in December 2010 that NNSA needed to improve its  contingency planning for its classified supercomputing operations. All three NNSA laboratories had implemented some components of a  contingency planning and disaster recovery program, but NNSA had  not provided effective oversight to ensure that the laboratories’  contingency and disaster recovery planning and testing were  comprehensive and effective. In particular, NNSA’s component  organizations, including the Office of the Chief Information Officer,  were unclear about their roles and responsibilities for providing  oversight in the laboratories’ implementation of contingency and  disaster recovery planning.
In March 2010, the Deputy Secretary of Energy announced a new effort— the 2010 Safety and Security Reform effort—to revise DOE’s safety and  security directives and reform its oversight approach to “provide  contractors with the flexibility to tailor and implement safety and security  programs without excessive federal oversight or overly prescriptive  departmental requirements.” We are currently reviewing the reform of  DOE’s safety directives and the benefits DOE hopes to achieve from this  effort for, among others, the House Committee on Energy and  Commerce. We expect to issue our report next month. Nevertheless, our  prior work has shown that ineffective NNSA oversight of its contractors  has contributed to many of the safety and security problems across the  nuclear security enterprise and that NNSA faces challenges in sustaining  improvements to safety and security performance.

	Concluding Observations

NNSA faces a complex task in planning, budgeting, and ensuring the  execution of interconnected activities across the nuclear security  enterprise. Among other things, maintaining government-owned facilities  that were constructed more than 50 years ago and ensuring M&O  contractors are sustaining critical human capital skills that are highly  technical in nature and limited in supply are difficult undertakings. Over  the past decade, we have made numerous recommendations to DOE and  NNSA to improve their management and oversight practices. DOE and  NNSA have acted on many of these recommendations, and we will  continue to monitor progress being made in these areas. In the current  era of tight budgets, Congress and the American taxpayer have the right  to know whether investments made in the nuclear security enterprise are  worth the cost. However, NNSA currently lacks the basic financial  information on the total costs to operate and maintain its essential  facilities and infrastructure, leaving it unable to identify return on  investment or opportunities for cost savings. NNSA is now proposing to  spend decades and tens of billions of dollars to modernize the nuclear  security enterprise, largely by replacing or refurbishing aging and  decaying facilities at its sites across the United States. Given NNSA’s  record of weak management of its major projects, we believe that careful  federal oversight will be critical to ensure this time and money are spent  in as an effective and efficient manner as possible.
With regard to the concerns that DOE’s and NNSA’s oversight of the  laboratories’ activities have been excessive and that safety and security  requirements are overly prescriptive and burdensome, we agree that  excessive oversight and micromanagement of contractors’ activities is not  an efficient use of scarce federal resources. Nevertheless, in our view,  the problems we continue to identify in the nuclear security enterprise are  not caused by excessive oversight, but instead result from ineffective  oversight. Given the critical nature of the work the nuclear security  enterprise performs and the high-hazard operations it conducts—often  involving extremely hazardous materials, such as plutonium and highly  enriched uranium, that must be stored under high security to protect them  from theft—careful oversight and stringent safety and security  requirements will always be required at these sites  It is also important in an era of scarce resources that DOE and NNSA  ensure that the work conducted by the nuclear security enterprise is  primarily focused on its principal mission—ensuring the safety and  reliability of the nuclear weapons stockpile. DOE has other national  laboratories capable of conducting valuable scientific research on issues  as wide-ranging as climate change or high-energy physics, but there is no  substitute for the sophisticated capabilities and highly-skilled human  capital present in the nuclear security enterprise for ensuring the  credibility of the U.S. nuclear deterrent.
Chairman Turner, Ranking Member Sanchez, and Members of the  Subcommittee, this completes my prepared statement. I would be  pleased to respond to any questions you may have at this time.

	GAO Contact and Staff Acknowledgments

If you or your staff have any questions about this testimony, please  contact me at (202) 512-3841 or aloisee@gao.gov. Contact points for our  Offices of Congressional Relations and Public Affairs may be found on  the last page of this statement. GAO staff who made key contributions to  this testimony are Allison Bawden, Ryan T. Coles, and Jonathan Gill,  Assistant Directors, and Patrick Bernard, Senior Analyst.
This is a work of the U.S. government and is not subject to copyright protection in the  United States. The published product may be reproduced and distributed in its entirety  without further permission from GAO. However, because this work may contain  copyrighted images or other material, permission from the copyright holder may be  necessary if you wish to reproduce this material separately.

Summary:
Why GAO Did This Study

The National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA), a separately organized agency within the Department of Energy (DOE), is responsible for managing its contractors nuclear weapon- and nonproliferation-related national security activities in laboratories and other facilities, collectively known as the nuclear security enterprise. GAO designated DOEs management of its contracts as an area at high risk of fraud, waste, and abuse. Progress has been made, but GAO continues to identify problems across the nuclear security enterprise, from projects cost and schedule overruns to inadequate oversight of safety and security at NNSAs sites. Laboratory and other officials have raised concerns that federal oversight of the laboratories activities has been excessive. With NNSA proposing to spend tens of billions of dollars to modernize the nuclear security enterprise, it is important to ensure scarce resources are spent in an effective and efficient manner.
This testimony addresses (1) NNSAs ability to produce budget and cost data necessary to make informed management decisions, (2) improving NNSAs project and contract management, and (3) DOEs and NNSAs safety and security oversight. It is based on prior GAO reports issued from August 2000 to January 2012.
DOE and NNSA continue to act on the numerous recommendations GAO has made in improving budget and cost data, project and contract management, and safety and security oversight. GAO will continue to monitor DOEs and NNSAs implementation of these recommendations.

What GAO Found

NNSA has successfully ensured that the nuclear weapons stockpile remains safe and reliable in the absence of underground nuclear testing, accomplishing this complicated task by using state-of-the-art facilities as well as the skills of top scientists. Nevertheless, NNSA does not have reliable enterprise-wide management information on program budgets and costs, which potentially increases risk to NNSAs programs. For example, in June 2010, GAO reported that NNSA could not identify the total costs to operate and maintain essential weapons activities facilities and infrastructure. In addition, in February 2011, GAO reported that NNSA lacks complete data on, among other things, the condition and value of its existing infrastructure, cost estimates and completion dates for planned capital improvement projects, and critical human capital skills in its contractor workforce that are needed for its programs. As a result, NNSA does not have a sound basis for making decisions on how to most effectively manage its portfolio of projects and other programs and lacks information that could help justify future budget requests or target cost savings opportunities. NNSA recognizes that its ability to make informed decisions is hampered and is taking steps to improve its budget and cost data.
For more than a decade and in numerous reports, GAO found that NNSA has continued to experience significant cost and schedule overruns on its major projects. For example, in 2000 and 2009, respectively, GAO reported that NNSAs efforts to extend the operational lives of nuclear weapons in the stockpile have experienced cost increases and schedule delays, such as a $300 million cost increase and 2-year delay in the refurbishment of one warhead and a nearly $70 million increase and 1-year delay in the refurbishment of another warhead. NNSAs construction projects have also experienced cost overruns. For example, GAO reported that the cost to construct a modern Uranium Processing Facility at NNSAs Y-12 National Security Complex experienced a nearly seven-fold cost increase from between $600 million and $1.1 billion in 2004 to between $4.2 billion and $6.5 billion in 2011. Given NNSAs record of weak management of major projects, GAO believes careful federal oversight of NNSAs modernization of the nuclear security enterprise will be critical to ensure that resources are spent in as an effective and efficient manner as possible.
NNSAs oversight of safety and security in the nuclear security enterprise has also been questioned. As work carried out at NNSAs sites involves dangerous nuclear materials such as plutonium and highly enriched uranium, stringent safety procedures and security requirements must be observed. GAO reported in 2008 on numerous safety and security problems across NNSAs sites, contributing, among other things, to the temporary shutdown of facilities at both Los Alamos and Lawrence Livermore National Laboratories in 2004 and 2005, respectively. Ineffective NNSA oversight of its contractors activities contributed to many of these incidents as well as relatively lax laboratory attitudes toward safety procedures. In many cases, NNSA has made improvements to resolve these safety and security concerns, but better oversight is needed to ensure that improvements are fully implemented and sustained. GAO agrees that excessive oversight and micromanagement of contractors activities are not an efficient use of scarce federal resources, but that NNSAs problems are not caused by excessive oversight but instead result from ineffective departmental oversight.