U.S. Department of Energy 

Office of Inspector General 

Office of Audits and Inspections 

Audit Report 

Office of Secure Transportation 

Capabilities 

OAS-M-12-05 June 2012 
Department of Energy 

Washington, DC 20585 

June 29, 2012 

UN 

MEMORANDUM FOR THE ASSISTANT DEPUTY ADMINISTRATOR, OFFICE OF 

SECURE TRANSPORTATION 

FROM: George W. Collard 

Assistant Inspector General 

 for Audits 

Office of Inspector General 

SUBJECT: INFORMATION: Audit Report on "Office of Secure Transportation

Capabilities" 

BACKGROUND

The National Nuclear Security Administration's Office of Secure Transportation (OST) is 

responsible for safely and securely transporting nuclear weapons, weapon components and 

special nuclear material for customers such as the Department of Energy, Department of Defense 

and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Specifically, OST shipments support the nuclear 

weapons stockpile dismantlement and maintenance schedule as well as the consolidation of 

nuclear material storage. Accordingly, these shipments are highly guarded for the protection of 

the public and national security. Because of the critical nature of OST's cargo and its role as the 

sole provider of this unique capability, any interruption of OST's ability to complete its mission 

would result in an unacceptable impact on national security. 

The demand for OST services is expected to increase significantly over the next 7 years as a 

result of current Presidential initiatives and international nonproliferation efforts. For example, 

directives that were developed to support the President's Nuclear Weapons Stockpile Plan 

identify new life extension or refurbishment programs to the W78, B61 and W88 weapon 

systems. Additionally, as part of the implementation of the Plutonium Management and 

Disposition Agreement between the United States and Russia, thousands of nuclear weapons pits 

will be transported by OST from the Pantex Plant to the Savannah River Site. These various 

initiatives will require OST transportation of both material and weapon components. OST 

forecasts show an increase in mission demand through 2019. In fact, OST projected that Fiscal 

Year 2017 mission demand will be 144 percent of FY 2010 levels. Mission demand is calculated 

as the number of packages requested to be transported by OST. 

Due to the importance of its mission to safely and securely transport nuclear weapons, we 

performed this audit to evaluate the challenges OST faces in meeting future mission requirements. 

CONCLUSIONS AND OBSERVATIONS

We found that while OST has successfully met customer shipping requests in the past and 

expects to have capacity to meet future requirements, it faces several significant challenges. 
2 

These challenges include maintaining the reliability of existing equipment; ensuring that future 

Federal agent overtime levels are consistent with safe operations; and, validating essential 

resource planning data. Specifically: 

• Based on its own criteria, OST's entire fleet of armored tractors (tractors) is beyond its 

operational life as of December 2011; 

• Federal agents are currently incurring overtime at levels approaching those considered not 

to be sustainable over the long term; and, 

• Information provided by mission forecasts may not be sufficiently reliable to accurately 

estimate and plan for operational needs. 

Accordingly, management attention is needed to address these challenges to reduce the risk that 

OST will be unable to meet its future mission requirements. 

Armored Tractors

OST's existing fleet of operational tractors is beyond its operational life and may not be reliable 

to fulfill future required missions unless planned fleet improvements are successfully 

implemented. OST's Site Safeguards and Security Plan states that the useful life of a tractor is 10 

years or 500,000 miles, whichever occurs first. While the accrued average mileage of all tractors 

was 352,000 miles as of December 2011, OST's entire operational inventory of 43 tractors is 

beyond its operational life, with 33 of those tractors in service over 11 years as of December 

2010. In June 2011, OST officials completed a cost analysis for an Armored Tractor Life 

Extension Program (Extension Program) that consists of a more robust proactive vehicle part 

preventative replacement plan, and approved the Extension Program for one vehicle at an 

estimated cost of $60,000. This vehicle was in production and had not been completed as of 

December 2011. An OST official told us that a decision had been made to expand the Extension 

Program to 33 vehicles. According to OST management, the vehicle refurbishments are 

expected to extend useful lives of the tractors up to an additional 3 to 5 years. 

Successful implementation of the Extension Program is critical to the future reliability of the 

tractor fleet because plans to acquire a next generation tractor have been repeatedly delayed and 

there are currently no firm delivery dates for new tractors. Specifically, OST planned to submit a 

request for proposal for new tractors in FY 2008; however, the solicitation was not issued until 

FY 2012. Currently, OST does not expect production of new tractors to begin until 2014 and no 

date has been established for delivery of the first unit.

OST officials told us that the tractors were not replaced before the end of the useful lives due to 

competing management priorities and classification issues. Specifically, management placed a 

higher priority on other initiatives such as replacing part of the aviation fleet and upgrading the 

existing communications system. As a result of these prioritization decisions, funding that could 

have been made available for acquisition of next generation tractors was utilized on other 

projects. Additionally, with the anticipated production of the next generation tractor, OST 

management had considered increasing the classification of this vehicle to Confidential National 

Security Information due to the location of ballistic protection (Armor). According to an OST 
3 

official, this consideration added as much as six months to the procurement schedule. 

Management stated that it ultimately determined that the classification of the next generation 

tractor should not be increased. 

While we did not specifically review prioritization decisions and do not assert that these 

decisions were inappropriate, we do believe that continued management attention is needed to 

ensure that OST's tractor capability is adequate to meet future mission needs. The longer the 

current tractors are employed beyond the useful lives, the more likely significant vehicle 

reliability issues could develop which could impact OST's ability to complete its mission. 

Federal Agents

OST agents are working significant amounts of overtime to meet current mission requirements. 

In 2003, OST issued a Performance-Based 5-Year Resource Study (2003 Study) which noted that 

800 to 1,000 annual overtime hours per agent was not sustainable for the long term. Our analysis 

concluded that agents were working overtime hours approaching those levels. Specifically, 

during FY 2010, despite working 73 percent of their mission week capacity1

, OST agents 

averaged 712 hours of overtime and 38 percent of the agents averaged 902 hours of overtime. In 

our view, the overtime levels currently experienced by OST agents raises concerns about their 

ability to safely and securely meet the expected increases in workload over the next 7 years. 

Further, the 2003 Study noted that excessive overtime resulted in agent fatigue and associated 

safety and security concerns. 

To address overtime issues, the 2003 Study stated OST could increase the agent workforce which 

would reduce the overtime for current agents. Subsequent to the 2003 Study, OST increased the 

number of agents in an attempt to decrease the average number of overtime hours per agent. 

However, OST's mission demand also increased during this period. Based on our review of 

future customer shipping requirements, OST's workload is expected to significantly increase 

through FY 2019. Since OST agents are already incurring significant amounts of overtime to 

meet current mission requirements, the increased demand could exacerbate potential adverse 

impacts to safety and security due to agent fatigue. 

To help mitigate the impact of overtime required to conduct mission and training workload while 

addressing quality of life issues associated with extended periods of time on mission status, OST 

implemented a predictive schedule. According to OST management, the predictive schedule 

provides agents with an advance schedule which permits rest between mission and training and is 

an effective tool to improve agent quality of life. However, in our opinion, the ability of agent 

resources to safely and securely meet the expected increase in demand for OST services requires 

continued management attention given the significant amount of overtime currently incurred by 

the agents. 

Forecast Validation

OST's mission forecast methods may not permit the development of sufficient resource planning 

information. Department Order 461.1B Packaging and Transportation for Offsite Shipment of 

 

1

 Mission week capacity is the total number of weeks in a year where any given unit is available for a mission. In 

FY 2010, that amount was 107. 
4 

Materials of National Security Interest requires that OST forecasts be sufficient to meet both 

planning and operational needs. Additionally, the previously discussed 2003 Study pointed out 

that the lead time necessary to hire, clear and train agents; build equipment; and, update facilities 

requires OST to accurately forecast customer requirements several years in advance. 

OST however, has not consistently validated its mission requirements forecasts that are used to 

plan for hiring and training agents and acquiring additional equipment. Currently, OST uses the 

Transportation Resources Integrated Planning Suite (TRIPS) to forecast mission demands and 

plan for needed resources. However, with the exception of one limited manual validation of 

mission demands that compared FY 2006 shipping forecasts to actual FY 2006 shipments, OST 

has not validated the accuracy of its shipping forecasts. The limited validation of FY 2006 

shipments indicated that only 85 percent of forecasted shipments were actually shipped. 

According to an OST official, the manual validation was labor-intensive, time-consuming and 

subject to human error. 

Also, we noted that OST had not integrated TRIPS, its mission and resource forecasting system, 

with its mission execution system that tracks actual shipments. Specifically, there is not a 

common field between the forecasting system, TRIPS, and the execution system, Transportation 

Command and Control System (TCCS). Currently, TRIPS system utilizes a Campaign 

Identification Number (CID) as a unique identifier. However, TCCS does not contain any fields 

in common with TRIPS. This lack of a common field between these two systems makes the 

comparison and validation of information between TCCS and TRIPS significantly more difficult. 

To integrate the systems, a common field such as the CID could be added. The CID field could 

be queried to provide output that could then be used to validate the TRIPS forecasts. OST 

officials indicated that the addition of a common field would provide a means to validate 

forecasts. 

Because OST is not consistently validating mission forecasts, we could not verify that these 

forecasts were sufficient to meet both planning and operational needs. Accordingly, OST could 

be making decisions based on potentially invalid information, actions that could ultimately result 

in insufficient resources to meet mission needs. 

RECOMMENDATIONS

To help ensure the future mission requirements are satisfied, we recommend that the Assistant 

Deputy Administrator, Office of Secure Transportation: 

1. Ensure the timely replacement or accelerated refurbishment of the tractor inventory; 

2. Evaluate the impact of the agent overtime that will be needed to meet future mission 

needs safely and securely; 

3. Determine whether additional agent resources are needed to meet future mission needs 

based on the results of the overtime evaluation; and, 

4. Integrate TRIPS and TCCS to foster efficient forecast validation. 
5 

MANAGEMENT REACTION AND AUDITOR COMMENTS

NNSA management concurred with the report's recommendations and proposed corrective 

actions. Officials also indicated that planned corrective actions will be used to continue 

improving NNSA's secure and safe transport of nuclear weapons. Management acknowledged 

that it faces significant challenges as a result of the existing fiscal environment, including 

maintaining the reliability of existing equipment; ensuring that future Federal agent overtime 

levels are consistent with safe operations; and, validating essential resource planning. In 

response to our recommendations, management stated that OST plans to post a request for 

proposal for new tractors in June 2012 and continue an aggressive program to refurbish the 

tractor fleet; is working to improve workload modeling; and, will "right-size" the agent force 

based on future workload requirements. Regarding forecast validation, management stated that 

the forecasting and shipping systems could not be integrated because each one resides on a 

different classified system. However, OST plans to add a field to the TCCS to track the CID for 

material being transported. This field would provide a common piece of information between the 

forecasting and execution tools. Additionally, management stated that the TCCS is migrating to 

a commercial off-the-shelf system that offers opportunities to create additional fields for 

historical tracking. 

Management's proposed actions are responsive to the recommendations. Management's 

comments are included in Attachment 3. 

Attachments 

cc: Deputy Secretary 

 Associate Deputy Secretary 

 Administrator, National Nuclear Security Administration 

 Chief of Staff 
Attachment 1 

6 

OBJECTIVE, SCOPE AND METHODOLOGY 

OBJECTIVE 

The objective of the audit was to evaluate the challenges facing the Office of Secure 

Transportation (OST) in meeting future requirements. 

SCOPE 

This audit was performed between September 2010 and May 2012, at the OST Headquarters and 

Western Command, in Albuquerque, NM; as well as OST's Eastern Command, in Oak Ridge, 

TN. 

METHODOLOGY 

To accomplish the audit objective we: 

• Analyzed OST shipment transportation capacity, historical mission data and future 

demand; 

• Evaluated resources needed to meet mission requirements; 

• Analyzed armored tractor inventory useful life and compared it to time in service; 

• Evaluated armored tractor inventory contingency plans; 

• Reviewed Federal agent timesheets and overtime records; and, 

• Evaluated validation of OST's forecasting and execution systems. 

We conducted this performance audit in accordance with generally accepted Government 

auditing standards. Those standards require that we plan and perform the audit to obtain 

sufficient, appropriate evidence to provide a reasonable basis for our findings and conclusions 

based on our audit objective. We believe that the evidence obtained provides a reasonable basis 

for our findings and conclusions based on our audit objective. The audit included tests of 

controls and compliance with laws and regulations necessary to satisfy the audit objective. In 

particular, we assessed the implementation of the GPRA Modernization Act of 2010 and found 

that the National Nuclear Security Administration had established performance measures for 

OST capabilities. Because our review was limited, it would not necessarily have disclosed all 

internal control deficiencies that may have existed at the time of our audit. Finally, our audit 

relied on computer-processed data. We determined that the data was reliable for the purposes of 

our audit. 

OST management waived an exit conference. 
Attachment 2 

7 

PRIOR AUDIT REPORTS

• Audit Report on The National Nuclear Security Administration's Secure Transportation 

Asset (STA) Program (OAS-L-04-24, September 2004). The audit determined that 

although STA is able to meet current workload, we are concerned with the significant 

gap between customer planned shipments and actual performance. Additionally, there is 

a risk that STA may not meet projected workload requirements. However, there are 

several factors and processes in place that should help STA mitigate the possibility of 

not meeting its future customer requirements. Specifically, STA is hiring Federal 

agents, procuring additional vehicles, and will have the ability to adjust overtime and 

workload to better accommodate shipping demands. 

• Audit Report on Audit of Controls over Expenditures Within the Office of Secure 

Transportation (OST) (OAS-L-04-05, November 2003). The audit determined that OST 

routinely purchased goods and services that were appropriate to support intelligence, 

planning, communications, training, logistics and personnel functions. However, the audit 

disclosed that OST also expended funds for items that were not required or did not 

significantly contribute to the mission of the organization. Some of the expenditures were 

made, in part, because OST management wanted to increase professionalism and "esprit de 

corps" within its organization. 
Attachment 3 

8 

MANAGEMENT COMMENTS
Attachment 3 (continued) 

9 
Attachment 3 (continued) 

10 
IG Report No. OAS-M-12-05

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