United States Government Accountability Office

GAO Report to the Subcommittee on 

Investigations and Oversight, 

Committee on Science and Technology, 

House of Representatives 

DEPARTMENT OF 

ENERGY 

Office of Science Has 

Kept Majority of 

Projects within 

Budget and on 

Schedule, but Funding 

and Other Challenges 

May Grow 

May 2008 

 

GAO-08-641 
What GAO Found

United States Government Accountability Office

Why GAO Did This Study

Highlights

Accountability Integrity Reliability

May 2008

DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY 

Office of Science Has Kept Majority of Projects within 

Budget and on Schedule, but Funding and Other 

Highlights of GAO-08-641, a report to the Challenges May Grow 

Subcommittee on Investigations and 

Oversight, Committee on Science and 

Technology, House of Representatives 

The Department of Energy (DOE)

has long suffered from contract 

and management oversight

weaknesses. Since 1990 DOE 

contract management has been on

GAO’s list of programs at high risk

for fraud, waste, abuse, and 

mismanagement. In 2003 DOE’s 

Office of Science (Science)

unveiled its 20-year plan to acquire 

and upgrade potentially costly

research facilities. In light of DOE’s 

history and the potential cost of

this ambitious plan, GAO was 

asked to examine Science’s project 

management performance. GAO

determined (1) the extent to which 

Science has managed its projects 

within cost and schedule targets, 

(2) the factors affecting project

management performance, and

(3) challenges that may affect

Science’s future performance. GAO 

reviewed DOE and Science’s 

project management guidance and

42 selected Science projects and 

also interviewed DOE and 

laboratory officials. 

Of the 42 projects GAO reviewed that were completed by Science or under 

way from fiscal years 2003 through 2007, more than two-thirds were 

completed or being carried out according to original cost and schedule 

targets. Of the 27 projects that were completed during this period, 24 were

completed within the original committed cost. Science also largely succeeded 

in achieving its original committed schedules, with 21 of the 27 projects 

completed on or ahead of time. Two of Science’s completed projects were 

both over cost and late. Fifteen of the 42 projects reviewed were still under 

way in February 2008. Nine of these 15 projects appeared to be on track to 

meet their cost and schedule targets; the rest were likely to be completed over 

cost, late, or both. 

Science’s ability to generally achieve projects’ original cost and schedule 

targets is due in part to factors often considered fundamental to effective 

project management: leadership commitment to meeting cost and schedule 

targets; appropriate management and technical expertise; and disciplined, 

rigorous implementation of project management policies. Science’s frequent 

independent reviews, in particular, were cited by DOE officials as a key 

reason for Science’s project management performance. To achieve cost or 

schedule targets, Science also trimmed selected components from some 

projects, a practice that has sometimes raised concerns. Specifically, DOE’s 

Office of Engineering and Construction Management, which develops DOE’s 

project management policy, and DOE’s Inspector General have expressed the 

concern that changes in scope may not always preserve a project’s technical

goals. Construction Management officials told GAO that if a project’s 

technical goals are not detailed enough, it can be difficult to determine the 

effects of changes in scope. They are therefore considering clarifying project 

management guidance regarding this issue, perhaps by 2009. 

Given forecasts of increasingly constrained discretionary spending, plus a 

workforce fast approaching retirement, Science is likely to face two primary 

challenges to maintaining future performance: budgetary and market 

uncertainties, and a shrinking pool of qualified project management and 

technical expertise. First, achieving targets could become more difficult for 

Science as future federal budget constraints interrupt anticipated flows of 

funding to projects already under way or labor and commodity prices rise 

unexpectedly. Several projects GAO reviewed exceeded or will exceed their

cost targets because expected funding did not materialize or prices increased 

after cost and schedule targets had been established. Second, finding 

knowledgeable staff to lead and carry out projects may become harder, since 

an estimated 21 percent to 43 percent of Science’s engineers, scientists, and 

contract specialists will become eligible for retirement within the next 5 years. 

Similar large-scale retirements are expected at Science’s contractor 

laboratories. Science will need to remain diligent to ensure future success in 

the face of these potentially intensifying challenges. 

What GAO Recommends

GAO recommends that DOE 

(1) consider adopting, departmentwide, selected practices from 

Science’s independent project 

reviews and (2) review and

strengthen, as appropriate, DOE’s

departmentwide project 

management guidance to ensure

that each project’s technical goals 

are clearly defined. 

DOE generally agreed with these

recommendations. 

To view the full product, including the scope 

and methodology, click on GAO-08-641. 

For more information, contact Gene Aloise at 

(202) 512-3841 or aloisee@gao.gov.
Contents 

Letter 1

Results in Brief 4

Background 8

Office of Science Managed Majority of Projects within Committed 

Cost and Schedule Targets 11 

Several Factors Contributed to Science’s Cost and Schedule 

Performance 14

Maintaining Successful Project Performance in the Future Will

Require Continued Attention to Challenges Affecting Funding 

and Human Resources 24 

Conclusions 29

Recommendations for Executive Action 30 

Agency Comments and Our Evaluation 31 

Appendix I Scope and Methodology 32 

Appendix II Summary of Office of Science Projects Reviewed 35 

Appendix III Comments from the Department of Energy 39 

Appendix IV GAO Contact and Staff Acknowledgments 41 

Table 

Table 1: Projects Under Way or Completed from Fiscal Year 2003

through Fiscal Year 2007 35 

Figures 

Figure 1: The Five Critical Decision Points in DOE’s Project 

Management Process 10 

Figure 2: Expected or Actual Performance of 42 Reviewed Office of 

Science Projects, Fiscal Year 2003 through Fiscal Year 

2007 11

Page i GAO-08-641 DOE Office of Science Project Management
Abbreviations 

CERN European Organization for Nuclear Research 

DOE Department of Energy 

GLAST Gamma-Ray Large Area Space Telescope 

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. 

Page ii GAO-08-641 DOE Office of Science Project Management
United States Government Accountability Office

Washington, DC 20548 

May 30, 2008

The Honorable Brad Miller 

Chairman 

The Honorable F. James Sensenbrenner, Jr. 

Ranking Member 

Subcommittee on Investigations and Oversight 

Committee on Science and Technology 

House of Representatives 

The Department of Energy’s (DOE) Office of Science (Science) and its 

predecessor agency1

 have long served the nation in the quest for scientific 

knowledge and innovation. From the construction of long tunnels where 

subatomic particles collide with targets at nearly the speed of light to the

design and launch of a satellite telescope that reveals stellar explosions in 

the deepest parts of space, projects overseen by the Office of Science have

broadened our understanding of the cosmos and of the fundamental 

components of life on Earth. With a $4 billion annual budget, Science has 

historically been the nation’s single largest funding source for basic 

research in the physical sciences, energy sciences, advanced scientific 

computing, and other fields, most of which is carried out at 10 national

laboratories and 42 research and development facilities nationwide. 

Contractors to DOE—primarily research consortia or nonprofit 

institutions—perform the day-to-day operations at each of these 

laboratories and facilities. DOE site offices, located at or near the 

laboratories and facilities, are responsible for overseeing the laboratory 

and facility contractors, including monitoring the progress of scientific 

projects and the maintenance and upgrade of buildings. 

In 2003, Science unveiled an ambitious 20-year plan to upgrade its existing 

portfolio of research facilities and to pioneer the design and construction 

of potentially costly new scientific instruments and facilities. These 

projects include the Linac Coherent Light Source, an advanced, laserbased X-ray light source that will illuminate the structure of molecules 

never previously visible, and the International Thermonuclear 

Experimental Reactor, a facility to test the feasibility of fusion, a process 

 1

The predecessor agency to the Office of Science was the Office of Energy Research within 

DOE. 

Page 1 GAO-08-641 DOE Office of Science Project Management 
in which nuclei are combined to generate energy like that produced 

naturally by the sun. Science’s contractor laboratories and facilities will 

ultimately be charged with executing Science’s 20-year plan, which, if 

carried out in its entirety, could cost many billions of dollars. 

Since 1990, we have reported that the Department of Energy as a whole 

has suffered from substantial and continual weaknesses in overseeing 

contractors and managing large, expensive, and technically complex 

projects effectively. Some projects, such as DOE’s planned waste 

treatment and immobilization plant at its Hanford site in Washington State, 

have been fraught with problems that caused project expenses to soar 

beyond estimated costs and project schedules to exceed completion dates, 

sometimes by many years. DOE’s environmental cleanup and construction 

projects, in particular, have significantly and consistently overrun both 

cost and schedule targets, occasionally requiring cutbacks so severe that 

facilities do not function as intended or, worse, delaying projects so long 

that, upon completion, they no longer serve the intended purpose. Because 

of problems like these, GAO in 1990 included DOE’s contracting and 

project management on the list of federal programs and functions at high

risk of fraud, waste, abuse, and mismanagement. While DOE has since 

implemented various management improvements, including a 2000 policy 

directive outlining the steps required for project planning and execution,

some of the department’s projects continue to experience major cost 

overruns and delays. As of May 30, 2008, DOE contracting and project 

management remain on GAO’s high-risk list. 

Although our recent work has focused on DOE projects experiencing cost 

and schedule difficulties at program offices other than the Office of 

Science—particularly the Office of Environmental Management and the 

National Nuclear Security Administration—in light of Science’s plan to 

invest billions of dollars in the coming years to acquire or upgrade 

facilities and equipment at its sites, we are reporting on (1) the extent to 

which Science manages its projects within cost and schedule 

commitments, (2) the key factors affecting Science’s project management 

performance, and (3) the main challenges that could affect Science’s 

ability to maintain project management performance in the future. 

In conducting our work, we reviewed DOE project management policies 

and guidance and interviewed headquarters officials at DOE’s Office of 

Engineering and Construction Management, which provides project 

management policy and oversight departmentwide, and at Science’s Office

of Project Assessment, which provides guidance and oversight for 

Science’s projects. We also obtained performance information on the 42 

Page 2 GAO-08-641 DOE Office of Science Project Management 
Science projects at 10 national laboratories that, from fiscal year 2003 

through fiscal year 2007, were either completed (27 projects) or still under 

way at the time of our study and for which Science had committed to cost 

and schedule targets (15 projects). Because we did not consider as fully 

reliable DOE’s Project Assessment Reporting System, the database DOE 

uses to track project performance, we obtained project cost and schedule 

data and other information directly from the laboratories responsible for 

the projects.2

 From these 42 Science projects, we selected for more 

detailed review a nongeneralizable sample of 12 projects overseen by four

laboratories with diverse scientific missions: Argonne National Laboratory 

and Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory in Illinois, Oak Ridge National

Laboratory in Tennessee, and the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center in 

California. We selected these 12 projects to ensure that our sample 

included completed and ongoing projects, scientific projects and 

infrastructure improvement projects, and a wide range of project costs. 

Together, the 12 projects represent about $2.9 billion, or 75 percent, of the 

total value of the 42 projects. To understand how these projects were 

managed and the reasons that projects did or did not meet their cost and 

schedule commitments, we visited the four laboratories, reviewed project 

data and documentation for the selected projects, and interviewed the 

contract laboratories’ project managers and Science’s on-site federal 

project directors.3

 For each of the 30 projects we did not review in depth, 

we obtained and analyzed project performance documentation from the 

responsible laboratories. In assessing whether projects had achieved their 

cost and schedule targets, we followed Office of Management and Budget

guidance and DOE performance goals, which regard projects completed at

less than 10 percent above their original cost targets as achieving 

satisfactory performance. Because Office of Management and Budget 

guidance includes performance standards for project schedule, we 

considered projects to be on time if they were or are expected to be 

completed at less than 10 percent past their original target completion 

date. DOE’s performance goals, developed in coordination with the Office 

of Management and Budget, do not address project schedule. To 

 2

GAO, Department of Energy: Further Actions Are Needed to Strengthen Project

Management for Major Projects, GAO-05-123 (Washington, D.C.: Mar. 18, 2005). 

3

Results from nongeneralizable samples, including the sample of 12 projects we selected 

for in-depth review, cannot be used to make inferences about Science’s project 

performance overall. Our interest was in gathering information on the selected Science

projects to identify material factors that may not exist across all projects but can help

expand our understanding of Science’s organizational strengths and potential future

challenges. 

Page 3 GAO-08-641 DOE Office of Science Project Management 
determine Science’s main future challenges, we interviewed officials at the 

four laboratories, DOE regional site offices, and DOE headquarters. We 

reviewed relevant studies on human capital planning by GAO, DOE’s 

Inspector General, and the National Science Foundation. We also reviewed 

recent GAO studies on federal budgetary constraints. Appendix I describes 

our scope and methodology in more detail, and appendix II summarizes 

the 42 projects we reviewed. We conducted this performance audit from 

June 2007 through May 2008 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 

objectives. We believe that the evidence obtained provides a reasonable

basis for our findings and conclusions based on our audit objectives. 

Of the 42 projects we reviewed that were completed by Science or under

way from fiscal year 2003 through fiscal year 2007, more than two-thirds 

were completed or being carried out in accordance with original cost and 

schedule targets. Of the 27 projects that were completed during this 

period, 24 (89 percent) were completed within the original committed 

cost. For purposes of this analysis, given DOE’s performance goals and 

Office of Management and Budget guidance, we considered any Science

project completed at less than 10 percent beyond its original cost or 

schedule baseline as completed within the committed cost and schedule 

targets. These completed projects represented a wide range of efforts—

from conventional construction projects costing a few million dollars, 

such as improvements to heating and air-conditioning systems, to the 

design and construction of sophisticated scientific equipment costing 

more than a billion dollars. Science also largely succeeded in achieving its

original committed schedules, with 21 (78 percent) of the 27 projects 

completed on or ahead of time. Two (7 percent) of Science’s completed 

projects, however, were both over budget and late. These projects 

included one to construct a device to measure the activity of subatomic 

particles called neutrinos and another to upgrade the performance of an 

existing particle accelerator. Fifteen of the 42 projects we reviewed were 

still under way as of the end of February 2008. Nine of these 15 projects 

appear to be on track to meet both their cost and schedule commitments, 

whereas 4 of them are expected to finish late, and 2 are expected to miss 

both their cost and schedule commitments. 

Results in Brief 

Science’s ability to manage a majority of projects within original cost and 

schedule commitments is due in part to factors generally considered 

fundamental to effective project management: leadership commitment to 

Page 4 GAO-08-641 DOE Office of Science Project Management 
meeting cost and schedule targets; appropriate management and technical

expertise; and disciplined, rigorous implementation of project 

management policies through processes that focus on results. Science’s 

practice of trimming selected technical or other components from projects 

also sometimes played a role in achieving cost and schedule commitments, 

although this practice has raised some concerns. 

• Strong leadership commitment to meeting cost and schedule targets:

Science’s leadership is strongly committed to holding projects to their 

original cost and schedule baselines and has made it clear to the rank and 

file at its laboratories that they are accountable for staying within these 

limits. Officials we spoke with said that requesting additional funding was 

normally not an option if problems arose. 

• Appropriate project management and technical expertise: Science and 

laboratory officials said that finding experienced staff to manage and carry 

out projects can be challenging, but they have generally succeeded by

implementing recruitment and retention incentives, collaborating with 

other Science laboratories to secure the expertise and management skills 

lacking on the project team, and training skilled scientists in effective 

project management techniques. For example, Oak Ridge Laboratory 

officials said they initially had problems attracting people with the right 

skill mix to work on the Spallation Neutron Source, including finding a 

capable management team. As a result, the laboratory developed a “human

resources tool kit,” which provided recruiting and retention incentives that 

allowed the lab to efficiently hire needed personnel. Furthermore, both the 

Oak Ridge and Fermi laboratories have obtained additional scientific 

expertise by partnering with other Science laboratories and arranging for 

knowledgeable staff to work from their home laboratories rather than 

relocate. 

• Disciplined, more-rigorous application of DOE policies: Science has 

developed more-rigorous project oversight policies and processes than 

required under a DOE project management directive issued in 2000.4

 This 

rigor enhanced Science’s ability to identify potential problems and to take 

timely corrective actions to help keep projects on track. DOE’s directive

requires independent internal reviews at key decision points—all told, one 

or two reviews during a project’s life span. Science, however, conducts 

 4

DOE Order 413.3, Program and Project Management for the Acquisition of Capital 

Assets (Oct. 13, 2000), and the update, Order 413.3A (July 28, 2006), establish a framework

for managing projects costing over $5 million. 

Page 5 GAO-08-641 DOE Office of Science Project Management 
reviews much more often, with some projects receiving as many as 17

reviews each, depending on the project’s nature and complexity. Science’s 

independent review panels consist of as many as 30 technical and 

management experts from other Science field sites, including contractor 

laboratories external to the project. The review panels rigorously assess 

management, cost, schedule, technical, and safety issues. Lessons that 

panel members have learned from experience on prior projects often lead 

to specific actions to address emerging problems, such as potentially 

difficult procurements and technical design issues or overly optimistic 

initial cost estimates. 

In addition, Science’s practice of occasionally trimming away selected 

components from a project’s scope (the sum total of a project’s 

requirements and features) when facing budgetary constraints also helped 

to achieve cost or schedule targets. Such reductions to scope are 

permitted, with the proper DOE or laboratory approval, as long as the 

changes do not adversely affect Science’s key technical goals for a project. 

But concerns have been raised by DOE’s Office of Engineering and 

Construction Management and its Inspector General that changes in scope 

may not always preserve a project’s technical goals. For example, the 

Spallation Neutron Source project team cut a number of items from the 

project’s scope—including 5 scientific instruments—to achieve its cost 

baseline. The Inspector General and the Office of Science disagreed over 

the effect these changes had on the project’s technical goals, in part 

because those technical goals were so broadly defined that it was unclear 

how acquiring the 5 instruments, rather than the 10 described in the 

project baseline, may have affected the facility’s performance, if at all. 

Although we did not find other projects where concerns about scope 

reductions appeared, we did find differences in the level of detail spelled

out in projects’ technical goals, even among similar projects. Office of 

Engineering and Construction Management officials we spoke with are 

concerned enough about this vulnerability departmentwide that they are 

considering clarifying project management guidance on defining projects’

technical goals, perhaps by 2009. 

Given continued budgetary pressures, which have been forecast to 

increasingly constrain the nation’s discretionary spending, plus an aging

workforce nearing retirement, Science is likely to face two primary 

challenges to its project performance in the future: heightened funding and 

market uncertainties and a shrinking pool of qualified people to manage 

projects. 

Page 6 GAO-08-641 DOE Office of Science Project Management 
• Uncertainties in funding and market forces: Achieving cost and schedule 

targets could become more difficult for Science in the future if growing 

federal budgetary constraints further interrupt anticipated flows of 

funding to projects already under way. Some projects we reviewed 

experienced interruptions in funding for two primary reasons: tightened 

federal budgets reduced discretionary funding available to support the 

projects, or an international partner failed to provide support as planned. 

Given that federal budgets are likely to remain tight, Science can expect to

face continued funding difficulties. Science’s fiscal year 2008 

appropriations, for example, totaled less than the amount required to 

support the year’s anticipated expenditures for ongoing projects. A 

number of Science’s projects already under way could be delayed as a 

result, possibly raising total costs. Since a sudden increase in prices can 

render well-considered cost estimates obsolete, uncertainties in prices for 

labor and manufactured goods, which have sometimes fluctuated widely, 

may make it still more difficult to achieve cost and schedule targets. A 

project to implement seismic and utility upgrades at the Stanford Linear 

Accelerator, for example, has faced unanticipated labor price increases in 

the San Francisco Bay Area, which, according to federal officials, has 

threatened the project’s ability to achieve its original cost and schedule 

targets. 

• Shrinking pool of experienced and knowledgeable staff: Although Science 

and laboratory officials said that to date they have generally been able to 

find experienced and knowledgeable staff to lead and carry out projects, 

doing so may become increasingly difficult in the future, as an estimated 

21 percent to 43 percent of Science’s workforce becomes eligible for 

retirement by 2011. Similar large-scale retirements are expected at 

Science’s contractor laboratories. Of the 12 projects we reviewed in depth, 

Science officials reported that for 2 of them, contractors initially had

trouble securing adequately experienced project managers, although only 

1 breached its cost and schedule baseline as a result. Experienced 

management personnel were unavailable for this project—to create and 

study the behavior of subatomic particles called neutrinos—because they

had been assigned to other, higher-priority projects. This issue is of 

substantial concern to DOE’s Inspector General, who in 2007 identified 

human capital as a “significant management challenge” requiring priority 

long-term attention. 

We are recommending that the Secretary of Energy consider whether 

other program offices would benefit from adopting selected practices from

Science’s independent project reviews, such as the frequency and focus of 

reviews for technically complex projects. We are also recommending that

DOE review and strengthen, as appropriate, its project management 

Page 7 GAO-08-641 DOE Office of Science Project Management 
guidance to help better ensure each project’s technical goals, including the

project’s expected scientific performance and functionality of its facilities 

and infrastructure. 

We provided a draft of this report to DOE for its review and comment. 

DOE generally agreed with our findings and stated that it would consider 

incorporating recommendations as part of its Root Cause Analysis: 

Corrective Action Plan to improve contract and project management. 

DOE also provided a number of general and project-specific comments 

that we incorporated throughout this report as appropriate. 

Created in 1977 from diverse agencies, DOE manages the nation’s nuclear 

weapons production complex, cleans up the environmental legacy of 

nuclear weapons development, and conducts research in both energy and 

basic sciences. DOE carries out its work at numerous sites and facilities 

around the country, primarily through private entities that manage the 

facilities and implement program and project activities under contract to 

DOE. About 90 percent of DOE’s annual budget of $24 billion goes into 

contracts. The department has established an extensive network of site 

offices to directly oversee the work of these contractors. 

DOE’s Office of Science is one of several program offices within the 

department. It is the third largest in annual funding, after the Office of 

Environmental Management, which leads the national effort to clean up 

toxic and nuclear waste sites left by nuclear weapons manufacture, and 

the National Nuclear Security Administration, which conducts nuclear 

weapons research and manages the nation’s nuclear weapons stockpile. 

Science’s $4 billion in annual funding is used primarily to support 

scientific research conducted under contract with private entities, many of 

which are educational or other nonprofit institutions. For example, UTBattelle—a limited-liability partnership formed by the University of 

Tennessee and Battelle Memorial Institute—manages and operates the 

Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee. In addition to managing 

research, contractors are responsible for carrying out major repairs or 

upgrades to existing facilities, equipment, and site infrastructure; 

fabricating or procuring needed technological components; and designing 

and constructing additions to the facilities. The vast majority of the 

scientists, engineers, and others who manage research funded by the 

Office of Science work directly for the facility contractors. 

DOE has a consistent record of poorly estimating costs and managing

projects. We reported in 1997 that over a 16-year period, 80 DOE projects 

Background 

Page 8 GAO-08-641 DOE Office of Science Project Management 
costing over $100 million were started, but only 15 were completed, with 

most of these experiencing cost overruns and delays. Thirty-one of the 80 

projects were terminated before completion. For example, we reported 

that the Office of Environmental Management’s efforts to clean up a 

disposal area for hazardous waste at the Idaho National Laboratory were 

running 2 years behind schedule and that estimated costs had nearly 

doubled to $400 million. Problems were so severe that DOE eventually

terminated all work on this project. The cleanup effort has recently been 

renewed—more than 10 years after we first reported problems—as the 

state of Idaho enforces DOE agreements to mitigate hazardous wastes 

buried at the site. DOE’s Office of Engineering and Construction 

Management was established in 1999 mainly to implement project 

management reforms that would address such problems. The Construction 

Management office is responsible for providing consistent guidance on

project management policy and processes and for facilitating oversight of 

the department’s project management efforts. As part of these

responsibilities, the office in 2000 issued DOE Order 413.3, Program and 

Project Management for the Acquisition of Capital Assets, which was 

updated in 2006. All DOE program offices must comply with the updated

order if their projects involve acquisitions totaling $20 million or more, 

although the principles set forth in the order apply to projects costing 

$5 million or more. This directive defines DOE’s project management and 

oversight principles, including requirements for both external project 

reviews led by the Construction Management office and internal project 

reviews led by DOE program offices; these internal and external reviews 

assess each project’s costs, schedule, and technical issues. The order also 

prescribes a series of DOE management reviews and approvals, called 

critical decision points, required to move a project forward (see fig. 1). In

general, DOE management reviews and approvals at these decision points 

are to ensure that the project requirements are met. 

Page 9 GAO-08-641 DOE Office of Science Project Management 
Figure 1: The Five Critical Decision Points in DOE’s Project Management Process 

Project planning and design Implementation

Critical decisions

0

Identify 

need

1

Define 

project

2

Establish the 

baseline

3

Begin 

construction

4

Complete the

project

Is there a

mission-related

need that can be

fulfilled only by

acquiring new

facilities,

technologies, or

services?

What project

would meet the

need, and

roughly how

much would it

cost?

What will be the

project’s

committed cost,

schedule, work

scope, and

technical

performance

targets?

Are planning and

design complete,

so that

construction,

fabrication, or

procurement can

begin?

Is the project

complete or

ready for

operation? Were

the cost,

schedule, scope,

and performance

targets met?

Sources: GAO and DOE.

Before a project may begin construction, the sponsoring DOE program 

office must develop and obtain departmental approval for the project’s 

“performance baseline.” This baseline represents the organization’s 

commitment to completing a project at a certain cost and by a specific 

date. Also included as part of the performance baseline are the project’s 

technical goals, which define the scope of work and the project’s expected 

performance at completion. The scope and performance standards define 

in general terms what facilities and equipment will be purchased or 

upgraded within the agreed cost and schedule targets, as well as the 

project’s minimum capability to perform the desired function at 

completion, such as a research facility’s ability to accommodate people 

and equipment or a particle accelerator’s minimum energy level. 

Sometimes problems arise during a project’s implementation that prevent 

the project from achieving its original cost, schedule, or technical 

baselines. If so, the project generally must be “rebaselined” to reflect 

needed changes. In essence, a revised baseline allows a project that is 

running over budget or late, or requires a change in scope, to establish 

new performance targets. The performance baseline may be changed only 

with Science or DOE management review and approval. In rare instances, 

DOE may decide to terminate the project rather than approve a change, 

particularly if the project’s technical goals cannot be achieved without 

spending substantially more money. 

Page 10 GAO-08-641 DOE Office of Science Project Management 
Of the 42 projects we reviewed that were completed by Science or under

way from fiscal year 2003 through fiscal year 2007, around 70 percent 

adhered to their original cost and schedule targets (see fig. 2). Twentyseven of the projects we reviewed were completed during this period, and 

15 were still under way. Our analysis found that 24 (89 percent) of these 27 

projects met their original cost targets and 21 (78 percent) were completed 

on or ahead of schedule. Similarly, as of the end of February 2008, 9 

(60 percent) of the 15 projects that were still under way were on track to 

meet their original cost and schedule targets. For purposes of this analysis, 

in accordance with Office of Management and Budget guidance and DOE 

performance goals, we considered as within budget any Science project

that exceeded or will exceed its original cost baseline by less than 

10 percent. Although DOE performance goals do not address project 

schedule, the Office of Management and Budget’s guidance addresses both 

cost and schedule; we therefore also evaluated Science’s performance in 

meeting its schedule baseline, considering as on time the projects that 

exceeded or will exceed the original completion date by less than 

10 percent. 

Office of Science 

Managed Majority of 

Projects within 

Committed Cost and 

Schedule Targets 

Figure 2: Expected or Actual Performance of 42 Reviewed Office of Science 

Projects, Fiscal Year 2003 through Fiscal Year 2007 

Source: GAO analysis of Office of Science data.

Completed

projects

Ongoing

projects

Met cost target and completed on time

Met cost or schedule target but not both

Exceeded cost target and completed late

9 4 2 15

20 5 2 27

Among the completed projects, the 20 that successfully met their original 

cost targets and were on time ranged in nature from construction jobs 

costing a few million dollars to cutting-edge scientific facilities and 

equipment costing more than a billion dollars. While a few of these 

projects finished well below their original cost and schedule targets, most 

were at or near the targets, including the following: 

Page 11 GAO-08-641 DOE Office of Science Project Management 
• Run IIb CDF Detector, Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory, Illinois:

In July 2006, scientists and engineers successfully completed a 3.5-year 

effort5

 to upgrade a highly complex device used for detecting the presence

of subatomic particles at the laboratory’s main particle accelerator. The 

project was completed for around $10.9 million—64 percent less than the 

$30.4 million cost target—and 4 months ahead of schedule. The upgraded

device was capable of supplying critical evidence of certain particles 

thought to exist but undetectable by current particle detectors; 

confirmation of these particles could help resolve fundamental questions 

about the nature of energy and matter. A concurrent project to upgrade a 

similar detector at the Fermi Laboratory’s main accelerator, the Run IIb DZero Detector, was also completed well below (39 percent) its original 

$29 million target; it was also completed on schedule. 

• Nanoscale Science Research Centers at Argonne National Laboratory, 

Illinois; Brookhaven National Laboratory, New York; Lawrence Berkeley

National Laboratory, California; Oak Ridge National Laboratory, 

Tennessee; and Sandia and Los Alamos national laboratories, New 

Mexico: All five of the nanoscale science research center construction 

projects included in our review came in at or below their original cost and 

schedule targets or are on track to do so.6

 The Center for Nanoscale 

Materials at the Argonne National Laboratory, finished in September 2007, 

for example, took 47 months to complete. The project was completed on 

schedule and within its original committed cost target of $72 million.7

 The 

88,000-square-foot facility, used for researching and developing materials 

at the molecular or atomic level (such as those found within computer 

microchips), houses wet and dry laboratories and sterile “clean rooms” 

outfitted with $36 million of specialized research instruments and 

equipment, as well as a computing center, offices, meeting rooms, and 

other supporting infrastructure. 

 5

Unless otherwise noted, for ease of discussion in this report, project length has been

measured from DOE’s critical decision point 2, when the cost and schedule baselines are 

established for a project, to critical decision point 4, when DOE certifies that the project is

complete. 

6

Construction of the nanoscience research facility with components at the Sandia and Los 

Alamos national laboratories, New Mexico, was carried out as a single project. 

Additionally, the project to construct the facility at the Brookhaven National Laboratory, 

New York, was the only project of the five that was still under way as of the end of 

February 2008. 

7

The state of Illinois provided half of this project’s funding. 

Page 12 GAO-08-641 DOE Office of Science Project Management 
• Laboratory facilities HVAC upgrades, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, 

Tennessee: A project to upgrade heating, ventilation, and air-conditioning 

systems was finished in November 2003 (4 months ahead of schedule) for 

about $150,000 less than the project’s original target cost of $7.2 million. 

The project, which took 23 months to complete, involved upgrading and 

replacing deteriorated equipment and piping serving 13 buildings in the 

central research complex. 

In addition, 5 of the 27 completed projects (19 percent) met either their 

cost or schedule target but not both. Those that missed their schedule 

targets finished 3 to 15 months late. The projects in this group included

lower-cost infrastructure improvement projects and higher-cost projects 

to acquire advanced research equipment. The following projects met their 

cost targets but missed their schedule targets: 

• Electrical systems upgrade, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Tennessee:

This $5.9 million project was completed in April 2003 slightly under budget 

but took about 26 months to complete, 3 months longer than scheduled. 

The project included replacing damaged electrical poles and about 3 miles 

of feeder lines around the laboratory complex, installing a computer-based 

electrical metering system, and replacing or installing additional breakers

and substations throughout the laboratory complex. 

• Central supply facility, Argonne National Laboratory, Illinois: This 

$5.9 million project met its original cost target when it was completed in 

October 2002. Design began around June 1999,8

 and construction was 

completed in 40 months, about 15 months later than originally scheduled.

The focus of this project was to expand a storage facility and make other 

improvements to site infrastructure. 

Finally, only 2 of the 27 completed projects (7 percent) were both over 

cost and late. These 2 projects finished 18 percent and 23 percent over 

cost and over 1 year late. With costs ranging from $58 million to $168 

million, they were among the more costly of the projects we reviewed and 

generally had longer lead times, taking up to 6 years to complete after their 

original cost and schedule estimates were established. Both projects 

aimed to expand Science’s research capabilities, rather than to improve 

site infrastructure. The projects that were both over cost and late follow:

 8

Argonne National Laboratory could not document the date of critical decision point 2 

because this project’s cost and schedule targets were set before DOE’s project 

management order 413.3 was issued. 

Page 13 GAO-08-641 DOE Office of Science Project Management 
• Neutrinos at the Main Injector, Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory, 

Illinois: The neutrinos project included designing and constructing two 

particle detectors—one sited at Fermi Laboratory in Batavia, Illinois, and 

the other in Soudan, Minnesota—and a tunnel in which a proton beam 

instrument could be aimed through solid earth at the Soudan detector, 

more than 450 miles away. This $168 million project took 72 months and 

was completed 17 months late at more than 23 percent over its committed 

cost. 

• Stanford Positron-Electron Asymmetric Ring (SPEAR 3 Upgrade), 

Stanford Linear Accelerator Center, California: This project, to upgrade 

the scientific capability of the SPEAR 3 device, was completed in 2003 for 

$58 million—14 months late and nearly 18 percent over its original cost 

target of $49 million. The upgrade project, which lasted over 5 years, 

increased the device’s ability to produce x-rays useful for research in a 

variety of disciplines, including biology and medicine. Science partnered 

with the National Institutes of Health, which provided half of the project’s 

funding. 

For Science’s 15 projects still under way as of the end of February 2008, 

Science or laboratory officials reported that they expected to complete 9 

(60 percent) within their cost and schedule targets. In contrast, managers 

of 4 of the 15 projects (27 percent) told us that as of the end of February 

2008, they expected to meet their cost targets but not their target 

completion dates. And 2 (13 percent) of these projects—specifically, the

National Compact Stellarator Experiment at the Princeton Plasma Physics 

Laboratory, New Jersey, and the Linac Coherent Light Source project at 

the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center—are expected to miss both their 

cost and schedule targets. 

That Science has been able to deliver most projects within their 

committed cost and scheduled targets is due in part to practicing sound 

management principles: leadership commitment to achieving these targets,

ensuring that each project has the necessary management and technical 

expertise, and approaching project management with discipline and rigor 

so that processes focus on results. Science’s practice of trimming selected 

technical or other components from some projects helped in achieving 

cost and schedule commitments, although this practice has sometimes 

raised concerns. 

Several Factors 

Contributed to 

Science’s Cost and 

Schedule 

Performance 

Page 14 GAO-08-641 DOE Office of Science Project Management 
In our prior work reviewing practices that promote effective project 

management, we identified committed leadership as an important 

contributing factor.9

 An organization’s leaders play a pivotal role because 

they serve as the primary proponents of the organization’s values and 

culture, including commitment to consistently achieving project cost and

schedule targets. When the top tier of an organization embraces a 

particular performance goal, the rest of the organization is more likely to 

follow suit. Shortly after assuming office in 2002, the Under Secretary of 

Science issued a memorandum to Science staff articulating his 

commitment to achieving project cost and schedule targets, stating that 

“the Office of Science expectation is that all projects be completed on 

schedule and within budget” and that senior-level managers and project 

staff would be held accountable for doing so. Most recently, in a March 

2007 testimony before Congress, the Under Secretary emphasized 

Science’s continued commitment to “a careful process” of preparing 

project cost and schedule targets to ensure that they are realistic.10 Science 

leadership’s consistent emphasis on achieving cost and schedule goals 

appears to have been adopted by Science and contractor laboratory 

management and staff, many of whom told us they believed that requesting 

more money or more time to complete a project was typically not an 

option, as the following examples illustrate: 

Leadership Commitment 

to Achieving Cost and 

Schedule Targets Played a 

Key Role 

• National Compact Stellarator Experiment, Princeton Plasma Physics 

Laboratory, New Jersey: This experiment to develop an alternative 

method for harnessing fusion energy is facing design problems that are 

likely to increase the cost by 91 percent and delay completion by 4.5 years. 

In an August 2007 letter to the Fusion Energy Sciences Advisory 

Committee, which advises the Office of Science on fusion energy research, 

the Under Secretary requested that the committee evaluate the feasibility 

of continuing the project. “These overruns are large enough to add new 

burdens on the limited resources of the U.S. fusion energy sciences 

program, as well as undermine confidence of the Administration and 

Congress in the ability of the Office of Fusion Energy Sciences and the 

Office of Science to manage large and technically challenging construction 

 9

GAO, Department of Energy: Consistent Application of Requirements Needed to Improve 

Project Management, GAO-07-518 (Washington, D.C.: May 11, 2007), and GAO, Framework 

for Assessing the Acquisition Function at Federal Agencies, GAO-05-218G (Washington,

D.C.: Sept. 1, 2005). 

10House Committee on Appropriations, Subcommittee on Energy and Water Development, 

Hearing on the Fiscal Year 2008 Budget for the Department of Energy’s Office of Science,

March 14, 2007. 

Page 15 GAO-08-641 DOE Office of Science Project Management 
projects. Given the magnitude of the increases projected for the NCSX 

(National Compact Stellarator Experiment), all options, including 

termination of the project, must be considered,” the Under Secretary 

wrote. As of November 2007, the project team had requested to increase 

the cost target and extend the completion schedule, but the Under 

Secretary had not approved the request. 

• Center for Nanoscale Materials, Argonne National Laboratory, Illinois:

The Argonne National Laboratory project staff managing the construction 

of this $72 million office and laboratory facility said that the Director of 

Basic Energy Sciences, who was responsible for project oversight, 

repeatedly made it clear that the team could not exceed its cost target. 

According to the laboratory project manager for construction, basic 

energy sciences officials were “breathing down our necks” to ensure that 

the project would be completed on time and within cost; it was. 

• Neutrinos at the Main Injector, Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory, 

Illinois: The federal project director said that the project team felt 

pressured to maintain a fixed budget target even before a firm baseline 

was established. The project included designing and constructing two 

particle detectors and a tunnel. He pointed out that an early Fermi 

Laboratory plan to construct three modules for the Neutrinos at the Main

Injector project was trimmed back to two modules to save on costs, even 

though the project had not yet committed to a cost target. According to the 

federal project director, suggesting that the project’s budget expand for 

the modules was not an option. 

Another factor important to effective project management is having people

in the right numbers with the right skills to accomplish an agency’s goals.

Science and laboratory officials said that finding experienced staff to 

manage and carry out projects can be challenging, but they have generally

succeeded by supporting and implementing recruitment and retention 

incentives, collaborating with other Science laboratories to secure 

expertise and management skills lacking on the project team, and training 

skilled scientists in effective project management techniques. For 

example: 

Management and Technical 

Expertise Was Generally 

Available to Lead and 

Carry Out Projects 

• Spallation Neutron Source, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Tennessee:

Oak Ridge Laboratory officials said problems assigning people with the 

right skills to support construction of the Spallation Neutron Source, the 

world’s most powerful neutron-scattering device, were significant. Not 

only did the project face problems hiring a project manager, but it also 

faced problems securing other needed staff. When initial work on the 

Page 16 GAO-08-641 DOE Office of Science Project Management 
spallation project did not progress adequately, threatening cost and 

schedule targets, the project manager was replaced. The laboratory, which 

had developed a “human resources tool kit” to assist in recruiting and 

retaining staff, was eventually able to secure needed personnel. According 

to officials, they offered key personnel pay incentives, including recruiting

bonuses and employment service credit for employees transferring from 

other DOE laboratories. 

• U.S. components of the Large Hadron Collider, Fermi National 

Accelerator Laboratory, Illinois: Science officials said that many 

laboratories have been able to secure scientific expertise they lacked by 

partnering with other Science laboratories, so that experienced staff could 

lend their knowledge and expertise to a project without having to relocate 

themselves and their families. The hadron collider project is a 

collaboration among the member states of the European Organization for 

Nuclear Research,11 the United States, and others to construct a new highenergy physics facility outside Geneva, Switzerland. The United States is 

contributing components to an accelerator and two very large generalpurpose detectors. Because the project’s complexity and size required a 

wide range of technical expertise not readily available at the Fermi site 

alone, the laboratory collaborated with two additional laboratories, 

Lawrence Berkeley and Brookhaven national laboratories. Fermi 

Laboratory, with experience constructing and operating particle detectors, 

was given responsibility for overseeing U.S. contributions to one of the 

two detectors and the accelerator; Brookhaven took responsibility for the 

other detector. 

• Center for Nanoscale Materials, Argonne National Laboratory, Illinois:

Science officials said that laboratories generally assign a project leader 

with science background and a project manager with project management 

background to manage projects jointly. In one instance, they assigned a 

scientist as project manager. For the nanoscience research facility at 

Argonne Laboratory, the project manager was a trained physicist. He said

that although his interest and expertise lay in scientific research, the 

laboratory assigned him to spearhead construction of the nanoscience 

facility. To successfully do so, he said, he received sufficient training in 

project management skills to be certified by the Project Management 

Institute, a national organization that sets professional project

management standards. Similarly, according to Oak Ridge officials, 12

federal and laboratory staff completed project management training and 

 11The organization is known by its acronym, CERN. 

Page 17 GAO-08-641 DOE Office of Science Project Management 
were professionally certified by the Project Management Institute during

construction of the Spallation Neutron Source. 

Another factor fundamental to effective project management is the quality 

of project monitoring and oversight. Office of Science project monitoring 

and oversight practices are more frequent, focused, and rigorous than 

those required under DOE project management guidance.12

DOE requires that, at selected stages, projects receive independent peer 

reviews, called independent project reviews, directed by each responsible 

program office.13 Generally, DOE guidance states that independent peer 

reviews are to be done by individuals with no vested interest in a project’s 

outcome. Depending on the total project scope, cost and schedule 

estimates, and other factors, such internal reviews may be required to 

validate the mission need for the project (at critical decision point 0), the 

project’s costs and schedule estimates (at critical decision point 2), and 

the project’s readiness to be executed or begin construction (at critical 

decision point 3). For projects involving high-risk or high-hazard nuclear 

facilities, a technical review at critical decision point 1 may also be 

required to validate the safety of the project’s design. Guidance regarding

independent peer review suggests only when and why reviews should 

occur; it does not provide specific requirements for how the reviews 

should be conducted or how each project should be evaluated.

Science not only follows this overall guidance but has developed more 

explicit guidelines, laid out in its Independent Review Handbook. For each

Science project, a review panel is convened, consisting of up to 30 

technical and management experts from Science field sites and contractor

laboratories other than the project site; more-complex projects have larger 

review panels, and less-complex projects have smaller panels. The 

handbook lays out the documentation each project team should provide 

reviewers, expected areas of reviewer expertise and their respective

responsibilities, and follow-up procedures for addressing any problems 

Rigorous Project Oversight 

Policies and Processes 

Helped Identify Potential 

Problems 

 12DOE Order 413.3 and Order 413.3A. 

13Other reviews are also required, including those conducted by organizations within and 

outside of Science, such as external independent reviews by DOE’s Office of Engineering 

and Construction Management, peer reviews of project designs, “earned-value management 

systems” reviews, and quarterly project reviews. These reviews were outside the scope of 

our report. 

Page 18 GAO-08-641 DOE Office of Science Project Management 
identified during review. For example, the handbook calls for assessing, 

among other things: 

• how a project conforms to Science’s mission needs; 

• cost estimates, including the estimates’ basis and level of detail, associated 

risks, and contingency planning in the event of unexpected events, such as 

changes to labor market rates; 

• planned schedules and how schedules could affect cost estimates; 

• the proposed strategy for procuring goods and services to support the 

project; 

• the project’s business management, including organization, project 

controls, staffing, risk mitigation, quality issues, and environmental and

safety compliance issues; and 

• how problems or recommendations identified in previous reviews were or 

are being addressed. 

For most of the Science projects we reviewed, DOE guidance required 

only one or two independent peer reviews. Nevertheless, Science reviewed 

many of these projects more than the requisite once or twice and issued

review reports that appeared to be comprehensive. Many officials we 

spoke with, including DOE Construction Management officials, federal 

project directors, and laboratory officials, said that Science’s peer reviews 

are thorough; often improve cost and schedule estimates; and lead to 

corrective measures that address procurement, design, and other 

problems. In fact, a number of these officials pointed to these reviews as 

key to Science’s strong performance relative to that of other DOE offices. 

DOE and laboratory officials told us that the technical expertise provided 

by Science’s internal review panels was key to providing effective review 

and oversight, particularly since the Office of Engineering and 

Construction Management, which develops guidance on project 

management policy and processes, depends on internal reviews to 

evaluate technical issues that lie beyond its own capabilities. DOE 

Construction Management and other officials explained that Science’s 

internal reviews are valuable because the panel members’ experience and 

expertise help to identify and resolve potential difficulties before they 

become problems affecting cost, schedule, or technical goals. The 

following examples illustrate the effectiveness of internal reviews: 

• The Center for Nanophase Materials Sciences, Oak Ridge National 

Laboratory, Tennessee: Under DOE guidance, this $65 million project to 

construct a four-story office and laboratory complex to study materials on 

the nanoscale should have received two independent internal reviews, one 

Page 19 GAO-08-641 DOE Office of Science Project Management 
at the stage in which cost and schedule targets and work scope were 

validated and another when the project was nearly ready to begin 

construction. Science, however, conducted four reviews—on average, one

each year. Among the concerns identified during these internal reviews 

were questions about whether a planned “clean room” would adequately 

limit the number and size of airborne environmental pollutants, such as 

dust, microbes, and vapors, and whether the costs of achieving industry 

standards for a sterile laboratory environment had been accurately 

projected. The review panel for this project suggested hiring a private 

consultant to evaluate the laboratory’s construction plans, and numerous 

changes were ultimately implemented. In addition, the review panel 

validated cost estimates that had been revised on the basis of an earlier 

review. Ultimately, this project averted cost overruns and was completed 

1 month early. 

• U.S. contributions to the Large Hadron Collider, Fermi National 

Accelerator Laboratory, Illinois: Under DOE guidance, the three projects 

(components of two particle detectors and an accelerator)14 comprising 

the $531 million U.S. contribution to the international Large Hadron 

Collider would have required only one internal review each to validate 

readiness for construction at critical decision point 3. Instead, Science 

conducted 17 reviews of each component. According to project managers 

for the detector components, the first internal independent review found

that the estimated cost allowance to cover unexpected occurrences was 

deficient, given the project’s complexity. The review panel directed the 

project teams to develop a higher cost estimate to better account for 

unexpected problems. Ultimately, each of these projects was or will be 

completed within 2 percent of its committed cost (the two detector 

projects are still under way), although our analysis suggests that all three 

were or will be completed late, in part because of installation delays 

resulting from problems with tunnel construction, which was a 

responsibility of the European consortium. 

 14U.S. funding for the Large Hadron Collider project was provided by both the National 

Science Foundation and DOE. U.S. funding supported three primary components: two

particle detectors and an accelerator. Funding for the accelerator included $90 million paid

to CERN to purchase U.S. manufactured parts for that instrument. The total combined

DOE and National Science Foundation commitment to the project was $531 million. DOE 

regards the U.S. contributions to the collider as one project. For purposes of analysis, we 

have characterized these contributions in this report as three separate projects because 

they had separate budgets and schedules and were tracked separately under DOE’s Project 

Assessment Reporting System. 

Page 20 GAO-08-641 DOE Office of Science Project Management 
Some of the projects we reviewed were able to achieve original cost or 

schedule targets, in part because they trimmed away selected components 

from the project’s scope. DOE’s project management order 413.3 and

associated guidance allow revisions in project scope to control costs and 

stay on schedule, as long as the project will still meet its technical goals 

and the proper laboratory or DOE officials approve the changes. DOE 

guidance defines technical goals to include the minimum level of 

performance that a project must attain—the essential capabilities, design 

features, functions, and other characteristics present at the project’s 

completion—to fulfill the mission need motivating DOE to pursue the 

project.15

The scope of several projects we reviewed was revised to help meet cost 

or schedule targets, without apparent adverse effect on technical goals, 

including:16

Science Modified Project 

Scope to Meet Cost and 

Schedule Targets, but This 

Practice Sometimes Raised 

Concerns

• Argonne National Laboratory trimmed scope from a project to expand its

central supply facility when it decided not to remove aboveground pipes 

from the laboratory grounds. The funds saved by this decision offset the 

unexpected additional costs resulting from higher-than-expected 

construction bids. Removing the pipes was considered the project’s lowest 

priority. 

• Similarly, Oak Ridge National Laboratory eliminated a planned upgrade of 

the electrical connections between two laboratory buildings, in part 

because electricity use had declined and the upgrade was no longer 

essential. Eliminating this work helped offset increased costs associated 

with other components of the project.17

• At the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center, a plan to construct an 

administrative office building was deleted from the Linac Coherent Light 

Source project and replaced by a plan to renovate existing space to help

offset costs associated with high construction bids resulting from labor 

market pressures in the San Francisco Bay Area.

 15Although technical goals may exist for a project’s various components and

subcomponents, we are referring here to the technical goals of a project as a whole, as

defined in the project baseline.

16Each of the changes in scope we report here was approved by the appropriate DOE or

laboratory officials. 

17Although this project met its original committed cost target, it was completed 3 months

late for reasons unrelated to the described change in scope. 

Page 21 GAO-08-641 DOE Office of Science Project Management 
DOE policies and guidance, as well as other organizations’ guidance 

related to effective project management, emphasize the importance of 

clearly defining a project’s performance or technical goals. Specifically, 

DOE guidance requires that minimum performance goals clearly define

what new facilities or functions a project will consist of. These goals are 

then used as a measure for evaluating project performance. Our own cost 

assessment guide and studies of DOE’s project management by the 

National Research Council also discuss the importance of defining a 

project’s technical goals appropriately to enable adequate oversight.18 The 

underlying rationale is that if technical goals are too broad or vaguely 

stated, it can be difficult to assess whether or to what extent trimming 

certain aspects of project scope undermines the project’s ability to 

accomplish its mission. 

In fact, concerns have been raised within DOE that projects’ goals may not 

always be adequately defined. An April 2008 DOE report—which cited the

findings of a recent workshop to identify systemic challenges in planning 

and managing DOE projects—found that DOE often fails to plan 

thoroughly before committing to project costs, schedules, scope, and 

technical goals. This shortcoming was identified as the primary root cause

for long-standing project management problems.19 Project management 

oversight officials at DOE’s Office of Engineering and Construction 

Management said that projects, including Science’s, sometimes include 

overly broad technical goals, making it difficult to determine the effects of

a change in project scope. According to DOE, descriptions of project 

scope do not always articulate technical goals in terms of required 

facilities, whose costs generally make up a significant share of overall 

expenditures. Facility requirements, as well as technical goals, must be 

well defined in project scope to establish reliable cost and schedule 

targets. Officials added that they believe that DOE guidance could be 

clarified to help ensure that project technical goals are sufficiently 

detailed to permit effective oversight. 

 18GAO, Cost Assessment Guide: Best Practices for Estimating and Managing Program

Costs, GAO-07-1134SP (Washington, D.C.: July 2, 2007), and National Research Council,

Progress in Improving Project Management in the Department of Energy: 2003 

Assessment (Washington, D.C.: National Academies Press, 2004). 

19Department of Energy, Root-Cause Analysis: Contract and Project Management 

(Washington, D.C., April 2008). 

Page 22 GAO-08-641 DOE Office of Science Project Management 
DOE’s Inspector General has also raised concerns about project scope.

Specifically, changes in the scope of the Spallation Neutron Source project 

led the Inspector General to conclude that Science had compromised the 

project’s scientific mission and technical goals to achieve cost and 

schedule commitments and avoid requesting more funding from Congress. 

In its November 2001 report, the Inspector General found that, among 

other scope reductions, Science had trimmed both the range of 

capabilities and the number of planned scientific instruments it had 

committed to in the original baseline.20 Science countered that it had never 

committed to procuring the 10 instruments described in the project’s 

performance goals and was clear in its intention to delay selecting 

instruments until later in the project. Science officials explained that the 

5 instruments ultimately selected were chosen on scientific, rather than 

budgetary, grounds and were technically superior to the 10 “proxy” 

instruments in the original performance goals. Science and the Inspector

General disagreed over the effect these changes may have had on the 

project’s technical goals, in part because those goals were so broadly 

defined that it was unclear how acquiring the 5 instruments, rather than 

the original 10, may have affected the facility’s performance. 

We did not find such concerns in the other projects we reviewed, although

we did find differences in the level of detail spelled out in technical goals,

such as the goals listed for five similar nanoscience research centers in 

five states. For example, the center in Illinois defined “completion” as a 

completed laboratory building approved for occupancy, with all scientific 

instruments delivered, installed, verified, and tested. The technical goals 

for the centers in California and New York went so far as to specify the 

number of users their facilities would accommodate. All of these facilities 

were or are on track to successful completion, but if any of them found it 

necessary to reduce scope to stay on track, it might be difficult to discern 

the effect of any reductions on the overarching technical goals unless 

those goals were explicitly detailed. The effect of a midproject reduction 

in how many researchers and staff a facility could accommodate, for 

example, might only be apparent for the centers whose technical goals 

spelled out how many users were originally envisioned for the facility. An 

Office of Engineering and Construction Management official explained 

that a scope description clearly laying out a building’s expected 

functionality, not just its square footage, can make it easier for interested 

 20Department of Energy, Office of the Inspector General, Progress of the Spallation 

Neutron Source Project, DOE-IG/0532 (Washington, D.C., November 2001). 

Page 23 GAO-08-641 DOE Office of Science Project Management 
parties to understand key project goals and the effects of any 

modifications in scope. Engineering and Construction Management 

officials we spoke with are concerned enough about this vulnerability 

departmentwide that they are considering developing and issuing 

additional guidance on defining projects’ technical goals, perhaps by 2009. 

Science is likely to face two primary challenges to maintaining its project 

performance in the future: heightened funding and market uncertainties,

and a shrinking pool of qualified people to manage projects. Interruptions 

in expected funding that in the past have increased project costs or caused 

schedule delays will doubtless continue, given the ongoing decline in

federal funding available for discretionary projects, including Science’s 

programs. Meanwhile, as the nation’s population ages and both federal and 

laboratory staff retire in increasing numbers, the pool of experienced 

scientists and project managers available to carry out Science’s program of 

work is likely to shrink, and difficulties replacing them are likely to 

continue. 

Achieving cost and schedule targets could become more difficult for 

Science in the future, as growing federal budgetary constraints potentially

exacerbate interruptions in anticipated flows of funding to projects 

already under way and volatile market conditions in some areas of the 

country unexpectedly drive up the costs of the labor and commodities 

needed to complete those projects. When projects do not receive funding

as anticipated, officials said, projects take longer to complete. Labor 

expenses accumulate over the longer period, and prices for commodities 

may increase, driving total project costs upward. The experiences of the 

following projects at the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center in California 

help illustrate how these forces have affected Science’s ability to meet 

cost and schedule targets: 

Maintaining 

Successful Project 

Performance in the 

Future Will Require 

Continued Attention 

to Challenges 

Affecting Funding and 

Human Resources 

Heightened Funding and 

Market Uncertainties 

Could Make Cost and 

Schedule Targets More 

Difficult to Achieve in the 

Future 

• Stanford Positron-Electron Asymmetric Ring (SPEAR 3 Upgrade): This 

project experienced a slowdown in the expected stream of funding during 

the years when a large share of the project’s costs were to be allocated for 

major aspects of the work, such as fabricating components. As a result, 

Science had to extend its schedule and revise its cost estimates to ensure 

sufficient funding and staff to carry out the remaining work. Total project 

costs increased 9 percent—from $53 million to $58 million—and instead of

4 years, the project took over 5 years to complete. This followed an earlier

Page 24 GAO-08-641 DOE Office of Science Project Management 
but unrelated cost increase from the project’s original $49 million target 

cost, resulting from a decision by Science and the National Institutes of 

Health, which funded half of the project’s costs, to further boost the 

scientific capability of the upgraded device beyond the level planned in the 

baseline. 

• Large Area Telescope: This telescope is the primary scientific instrument 

to be flown on the Gamma-Ray Large Area Space Telescope (GLAST), 

which is due to launch in May 2008. The telescope, DOE’s contribution to 

GLAST and a joint effort of the National Aeronautics and Space 

Administration and a host of other U.S. and foreign institutions, was 

completed in March 2006.21 Once in orbit, the telescope will be used to 

explore the dynamics of extreme environments in space and could lead to

major discoveries about the universe. When the cost and schedule targets 

were first established, this project included an in-kind contribution by the 

French space agency to design and fabricate the telescope’s calorimeter—

a device for measuring the energy picked up by the telescope’s sensors. 

When the French government withdrew its participation, the project 

managers at the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center had to procure the 

component elsewhere and pay for it out of the project’s budget. That 

procurement contributed to the overall increase in costs from $121 million 

to $188 million, and DOE’s direct financial contribution to the project 

increased from $37 million to $45 million. 

• Safety and operational reliability improvements: This $15.7 million 

project will upgrade utilities and improve the aging Stanford laboratory’s 

ability to withstand earthquakes. When construction prices in the San 

Francisco Bay Area rose dramatically and unexpectedly between approval 

of the project’s cost baseline and DOE’s authorization to begin 

construction, Stanford postponed some planned improvements until other, 

higher-priority work was completed. If sufficient funding is unavailable to

complete those improvements, they will be cut from the project. Officials 

told us they do not plan to request additional funding. If, near the end of

construction, residual project funding is available, Stanford will then 

contract for the postponed work, adding at least 3 months to this 3.5-year 

project. 

Although the future cannot be predicted with certainty, it seems that 

current federal fiscal constraints on discretionary funding will likely make

 21Although Science managed the large-area telescope project, DOE’s direct financial 

contribution totaled $45 million of the $188 million project cost. 

Page 25 GAO-08-641 DOE Office of Science Project Management 
Science’s ability to meet its future cost and schedule targets increasingly 

more challenging. Lower-than-expected appropriations for fiscal year 2008 

are already forcing Science to end or slow progress on several projects 

and curtail operation or use of a number of scientific facilities and items of 

equipment obtained earlier. According to Science’s assessment, for 

example, shortfalls in funding for one of the ongoing projects in our 

review—a $33 million effort to construct additional space at the Lawrence 

Berkeley National Laboratory, California, to accommodate the growing 

number of researchers using the Advanced Light Source facility—could 

delay this 3.5-year project by more than 1 year beyond the original 

committed schedule. For the U.S. contribution to the International 

Thermonuclear Energy Reactor—an internationally led fusion energy 

demonstration project currently in planning and design and the subject of

our prior work22—$10.7 million in funding for fiscal year 2008 was 

provided, rather than the $160 million requested. 

Over the long term, fiscal constraints on discretionary funding are also 

likely to affect Science’s 20-year plan to acquire new research equipment 

and facilities. In our work assessing the nation’s long-term fiscal outlook,

we have reported that continued budget deficits—exacerbated by the 

aging of the American population and rising related Social Security and 

health care costs—could soon lead to a protracted decline in the 

availability of federal funding for discretionary programs, including 

scientific research.23 The Director of Science’s Office of Project 

Assessment said that interruptions in project funding arising from federal 

fiscal constraints represent the primary challenge Science faces in meeting 

cost and schedule targets in the future. In a February 2008 presentation to

the High Energy Physics Advisory Panel, the Under Secretary for Science

echoed this concern. He said he expected that recent flat and declining

budgets for the agency would continue unless Science and its advocates 

successfully convinced Congress of the need for long-term high-energy 

physics research. 

 22GAO, Fusion Energy: Definitive Cost Estimates for U.S. Contributions to an

International Experimental Reactor and Better Coordinated DOE Research Are Needed, 

GAO-08-30 (Washington, D.C.: Oct. 26, 2007). 

23GAO, A Call for Stewardship: Enhancing the Federal Government’s Ability to Address 

Key Fiscal and Other 21st-Century Challenges, GAO-08-93SP (Washington, D.C.: Dec. 17, 

2007), and GAO, The Nation’s Long-Term Fiscal Outlook: January 2008 Update, 

GAO-08-591R (Washington, D.C.: Mar. 21, 2008). 

Page 26 GAO-08-641 DOE Office of Science Project Management 
Finally, recent sustained increases in the prices for crude oil, steel, and

other commodities and a weakening dollar could have inflationary effects 

on the nation, leading to higher prices for many things—from 

manufactured goods to facility construction.24 Unexpected increases in 

prices add continued uncertainty to the cost of Science’s planned longterm research and facility construction programs, raising questions about 

Science’s ability to meet cost and schedule targets in the future. 

Large-scale retirements as the nation’s workforce ages are likely to 

continue challenging Science’s ability to staff future projects effectively 

and, ultimately, achieve cost and schedule goals. Two of the 12 projects 

we reviewed in depth have faced difficulties securing adequately 

experienced project managers, although only 1 breached its cost and 

schedule baseline as a result. This 72-month project, Neutrinos at the Main

Injector, was completed 17 months late and 23 percent over its committed 

cost, in large part because expertise in two areas was not available in a 

timely manner. First, the management team overseeing the project had

little experience in tunneling, which was needed to house an underground 

proton-beam device. Staff qualified to oversee tunneling work were not 

brought on board the project until after the contractor encountered 

technical and safety problems. Second, the project’s cost target had been 

established before engineering was completed, and the design did not fully 

account for the underground environment. Other factors, including higherthan-expected construction prices, also contributed to the cost increase 

and delay. 

Such problems securing adequate management and technical expertise 

will doubtless continue, given expected retirements within Science and its 

contractor laboratories and growing competition for scientific expertise, 

as these examples demonstrate: 

Forthcoming Retirements 

Could Deplete Scientific, 

Technical, and 

Management Expertise 

Available for Future

Projects 

• Office of Science: According to the most recent analysis from the Office of 

Science, about 21 percent of the agency’s workforce was eligible for 

retirement in 2005, and that number is expected to increase to 43 percent

by 2011. Technical occupations are expected to be most seriously affected, 

although Science also is facing the imminent departure of much of its 

senior executive staff. Science has reported that almost all of its nuclear,

 24Congressional Research Service, Weak Dollar, Strong Dollar: Causes and Consequences

(Washington, D.C., Oct. 18, 2007). 

Page 27 GAO-08-641 DOE Office of Science Project Management 
chemical, and mechanical engineers will be eligible for retirement by 2011, 

as well as one-third or more of its technical specialists, such as physical 

scientists, health physicists, and chemists. In addition, more than half of 

Science’s senior management staff is already eligible to retire. These 

people include senior project management officials, as well as Science’s 

most senior leadership in basic energy sciences, fusion energy sciences, 

high-energy physics, and nuclear physics. Looming retirements are of 

substantial concern to DOE’s Inspector General, which has identified 

human capital as a “significant management challenge” requiring priority 

long-term attention.25 The Inspector General reported in 2007 that recent 

reductions in overall staffing at the department—staffing levels at Science 

have declined by almost 15 percent since 1999—combined with an aging 

workforce approaching retirement will create difficulties ensuring that the 

department has sufficient skills and knowledge in place to carry out its 

future responsibilities. 

• Contractor laboratories: Officials at three of the four laboratories we 

visited—Fermi, Oak Ridge, and Argonne—said that, like the federal 

government, they also anticipate large-scale retirements in the near future, 

although budget reductions have already caused layoffs of many staff with 

management and technical expertise.26 The vast majority of staff working 

on Science projects (about 23,000 people) are employed by DOE’s 10 

contractor laboratories and facilities across the country. In anticipation of 

future retirements, workforce-planning officials at the laboratories we 

visited said they had recently begun succession planning. None, however, 

had yet estimated the resulting shortfall in project management and 

scientific expertise because they have not completed comprehensive 

analyses comparing their expected capabilities with their future workforce 

needs. 

Nevertheless, laboratory officials said that replacing retiring staff will 

present a challenge because the labor market demand for expertise in key 

science and engineering fields currently exceeds the supply. Colleges and

universities are not generating enough graduates to replace staff who are 

retiring. An Argonne National Laboratory preliminary analysis of its 

 25Department of Energy, Office of Inspector General, Special Report: Management 

Challenges at the Department of Energy, DOE/IG-0782 (Washington, D.C., December 

2007). 

26The Stanford Linear Accelerator Center is undergoing a change in mission that has caused

it to encourage early retirements and voluntary separations. The center’s director of human

resources said he anticipates that retirements will not present a near-term challenge. 

Page 28 GAO-08-641 DOE Office of Science Project Management 
workforce needs, for example, recently identified a shortage of expertise

in the computational sciences, superconducting technology, nanoscience, 

nuclear engineering, and health physics. Argonne’s experience 

underscores the findings of a 2008 National Science Foundation report, 

which revealed that science and engineering occupations grew at an 

average annual rate of 3.6 percent between 1990 and 2000—more than 

triple the growth rate of other occupations.27 According to the foundation, 

growth in the science and engineering labor force in the past has been 

supported by an influx of foreign-born graduates. But global competition 

for such expertise is rising, and fewer immigrants can be expected to fill 

those skill gaps in the future. The director of Fermi Laboratory’s human 

resources organization said that the laboratory has already faced problems 

retaining its foreign-born scientists, many of whom have returned to their 

home countries for higher pay and better professional opportunities. In 

addition, laboratory officials said they often face stiff competition for new 

graduates with for-profit private sector firms, where salaries can be 

substantially higher and hiring incentives, such as relocation packages, are

often better. The combined effects of retirements and a labor market in 

which demand for experienced and knowledgeable scientists and 

technicians far outstrips the supply will be a formidable challenge for 

Science in the future as it seeks not only to implement its future plan of 

work, but also to do so within budget and on time. 

The ability of DOE’s Office of Science to deliver a majority of its projects 

since 2003 within their original committed cost targets and on time stands 

in clear contrast to the struggle of other DOE program offices, in 

particular, the Office of Environmental Management. Science has 

encountered challenges common to many large federal projects, including

unexpected interruptions in funding and difficulties in securing 

appropriately qualified staff. Yet the office has addressed such challenges, 

in large part by instilling a strong organizational commitment to meeting 

cost and schedule targets, implementing a rigorous approach to project 

oversight, and appropriately addressing staffing problems it has 

encountered. Some of Science’s practices—in particular, the frequency 

and focus of its independent reviews—may offer practical lessons for 

DOE’s Office of Engineering and Construction Management, which this 

office could consider implementing in other DOE program offices. The 

Conclusions 

 27National Science Foundation, Science and Engineering Indicators 2008 (Arlington, Va.,

January 2008). 

Page 29 GAO-08-641 DOE Office of Science Project Management 
wide range of expertise that internal review panels are able to supply—

from pointing out design flaws and potential procurement obstacles to 

professional skepticism of overly optimistic cost and schedule estimates—

appears to be especially effective in helping projects stay on track to meet

their performance targets. Still, Science will need to remain diligent to 

ensure future success despite continuing, and potentially intensifying, 

challenges in funding and the impending retirement of large numbers of 

experienced technical and project management staff. These growing 

pressures might lead Science to more often consider trimming selected 

components from a project’s planned scope of work to achieve cost and

schedule targets—a practice that has the potential, without due diligence, 

of eventually weakening some of a project’s technical goals. In our view, 

concerns about scope reduction expressed by DOE’s Inspector General, 

differences we found in the level of detail describing technical goals for 

similar projects, and DOE’s own concerns about inadequate project 

definition could, when taken together, indicate potential vulnerabilities 

associated with trimming project scope. To help ensure that vulnerabilities 

do not materialize as problems, Science and other DOE offices could 

benefit from DOE project management guidance to ensure that a project’s 

scientific mission and technical goals are clearly defined, so that before 

reducing scope, organizations have fully weighed the scientific and 

technical effects of the reductions and have ensured that scope-altering 

trade-offs are clear to key interested parties, including Congress. 

To help improve the potential for projects throughout DOE to achieve 

their cost and schedule targets, we recommend that the Secretary of 

Energy direct the Director of the Office of Engineering and Construction 

Management, which develops DOE’s project management policy and

facilitates project management oversight, to consider whether other DOE

program offices would benefit from adopting selected practices from 

Science’s independent project reviews, such as the frequency and focus of 

reviews for technically complex projects. 

In addition, to lessen the possibility that changes in work scope could 

undermine some projects’ ability to meet their mission need, we 

recommend that the Secretary of Energy direct the Office of Engineering 

and Construction Management to review DOE’s project management 

guidance and consider whether it could be strengthened to help ensure 

that each project’s technical goals, including the project’s expected 

scientific performance and corresponding facility requirements, are clearly 

and sufficiently defined. 

Recommendations for 

Executive Action 

Page 30 GAO-08-641 DOE Office of Science Project Management 
We provided copies of our draft report to DOE for comment. The department 

generally concurred with our findings and stated that it would consider

incorporating our recommendations into its Root Cause Analysis: Corrective 

Action Plan. DOE also wished to clarify the utility of trimming project scope,

stating that our report appeared to imply that trimming project scope was an

inappropriate practice. On the contrary, we believe that trimming scope can 

be a useful tool to help keep projects on schedule and within cost targets 

when internal or external events affect a project’s cost or progress. We

described several projects in the report where scope was trimmed without

apparent adverse effect on the projects’ overall technical goals. Officials 

within DOE, however, have raised concerns that projects’ goals may not 

always be adequately defined, which can make it more difficult to assess the 

effects of a change in project scope. In addition, officials within the Office of

Engineering and Construction Management said they believed that DOE

guidance could be clarified to help ensure that project technical goals are 

sufficiently detailed to facilitate effective oversight. We agree, and we believe 

that if and when difficult choices must be made, the effect of those choices 

should be clear to all interested parties, including Congress. The department

also provided numerous technical clarifications, which we incorporated as 

appropriate. Appendix III contains DOE’s comment letter. 

As agreed with your offices, unless you publicly release the contents of the 

report earlier, we plan no further distribution until 30 days from the report 

date. At that time, we will send copies of this report to the appropriate 

congressional committees, the Secretary of Energy, and the Director of the 

Office of Management and Budget. We will also make copies available to 

others upon request. In addition, this report will be available at no charge 

on the GAO Web site at http://www.gao.gov. 

If you or your staff have any questions about this report, 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 report. GAO staff who made major contributions to this report are 

listed in appendix IV. 

Gene Aloise 

Director, Natural Resources and Environment 

Agency Comments 

and Our Evaluation 

Page 31 GAO-08-641 DOE Office of Science Project Management 
Appendix I: Scope and Methodology 

Page 32 GAO-08-641 DOE Office of Science Project Management 

Appendix I: Scope and Methodology 

To determine the extent to which the Department of Energy’s (DOE) 

Office of Science (Science) manages its projects within cost and schedule 

commitments, we obtained performance information on the 42 Science 

projects at 10 national laboratories that, from fiscal year 2003 through 

fiscal year 2007, were either completed (27 projects) or still under way at 

the time of our study and for which Science had committed to cost and 

schedule targets (15 projects). The 42 projects excluded information 

technology acquisitions and projects that met our selection criteria but 

were suspended at the time we selected projects for review in October 

2007. Because we did not consider DOE’s Project Assessment Reporting 

System a fully reliable source for performance information on individual 

projects, we obtained project cost and schedule data and other 

information directly from the responsible laboratories.1

For the 42 Science projects, we reviewed selected documents providing

information about the projects’ scope and purpose, estimated and actual

costs, and proposed and actual time frames. We compared the cost or 

schedule commitments in the original project baselines with the actual

performance of the 27 completed projects and the expected performance—as 

of February 29, 2008—for the 15 projects still under way. For most of the 27 

completed projects, we compared the cost targets in the documents

establishing the project baseline (at critical decision point 2, or CD-2) with the 

actual costs, as provided in the documents certifying project completion (at

critical decision point 4, or CD-4). We then compared the proposed time

frames in the CD-2 documents with the CD-4 document approval dates.2

 In a

few cases, these documents were not available, and alternative documents 

were used instead. For the 15 projects still under way, we compared the cost

and schedule targets in the CD-2 documents with project performance reports 

as of February 29, 2008, provided by the responsible laboratories. In

recognition of Office of Management and Budget guidance and DOE’s recent 

project performance goals, we characterized projects that met or exceeded 

(or are expected to meet or exceed) their original cost or schedule goals by

less than 10 percent as completed within budget or on time, whereas we

considered projects that exceeded (or will exceed) their goals by 10 percent

 1

GAO, Department of Energy: Consistent Application of Requirements Needed to Improve 

Project Management, GAO-07-518 (Washington, D.C.: May 11, 2007), and GAO, Department

of Energy: Further Actions are Needed to Strengthen Project Management for Major 

Projects, GAO-05-123 (Washington, D.C.: Mar. 18, 2005). 

2

For some projects baselined before the implementation of DOE’s project management 

directive, DOE Order 413.3, approved in October 2000, the committed cost and schedule 

targets were established early in project development, typically, at conceptual design. 
Appendix I: Scope and Methodology 

or more to be over cost or late.

3

 The Office of Management and Budget

requires that federal agencies monitor the performance of capital acquisitions

and that agency heads review major acquisitions that exceed their cost, 

schedule, and performance goals by 10 percent or more.4

 In coordination with

the Office of Management and Budget, DOE in 2008 adopted a goal of 

completing individual projects within 10 percent of the original cost baseline,

with certain exceptions that were beyond the scope of this report.5

 DOE did 

not adopt a performance goal for projects’ schedule baselines. 

To evaluate the key factors affecting Science’s project management 

performance, we selected a nongeneralizable sample of 12 out of the 42 

projects overseen by four laboratories with diverse scientific missions—

Argonne National Laboratory and Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory 

in Illinois, Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee, and the Stanford

Linear Accelerator Center in California—for more detailed review. The 

projects were the Center for Nanoscale Materials; Neutrinos at the Main 

Injector; U.S. ATLAS; U.S. Compact Muon Solenoid; U.S. Large Hadron 

Collider Accelerator; Center for Nanophase Material Sciences; SNS 

Instruments: Next Generation; Spallation Neutron Source; Large Area 

Telescope; Linac Coherent Light Source; safety and operational reliability 

improvements at the Stanford Linear Accelerator; and Stanford PositronElectron Asymmetric Ring (SPEAR 3) upgrade. Results from 

nongeneralizable samples, including our sample of 12 projects, cannot be 

used to make inferences about Science’s overall project performance. Our 

interest was in gathering information on the selected Science projects to 

identify material factors that may not exist across all projects but could 

help us understand Science’s organizational strengths and potential future 

challenges. We selected these 12 projects to ensure that our sample 

included completed and ongoing projects, scientific projects and 

infrastructure improvement projects, and a wide range of project costs. 

Together, the 12 projects represented about $2.9 billion, or 75 percent, of 

the total value of the 42 projects. 

 3

In a prior GAO report, Department of Energy: Major Construction Projects Need a

Consistent Approach for Assessing Technology Readiness to Help Avoid Cost Increases 

and Delays, GAO-07-336 (Washington, D.C.: Mar. 27, 2007), the Spallation Neutron Source 

was characterized as exceeding its original baseline. At the time of our 2007 report, the

project was 2 percent over its original cost target. 

4

Office of Management and Budget, Planning, Budgeting, Acquisition, and Management 

of Capital Assets, circular A-11, part 7 (Washington, D.C., July 2007). 

5

Department of Energy, Root-Cause Analysis: Contract and Project Management 

(Washington, D.C., April 2008). 

Page 33 GAO-08-641 DOE Office of Science Project Management 
Appendix I: Scope and Methodology 

For these 12 projects, we visited the responsible laboratory and reviewed

selected documents providing information about the project’s scope and 

purpose, estimated and actual costs, and proposed and actual time frames. 

We also examined reviews of the 12 projects conducted by Science’s 

Office of Project Assessment, which provides guidance and oversight for 

Science’s projects.6

 We interviewed federal project directors, laboratory 

project managers, and other knowledgeable staff to gather their 

perspectives on their projects’ performance and reasons for it. We also 

discussed key factors affecting Science’s project management 

performance with headquarters officials at DOE’s Office of Engineering 

and Construction Management, which provides project management 

policy and oversight departmentwide; at Science’s Office of Project 

Assessment; and Science’s principal subprogram offices. In addition, to 

evaluate projects’ technical goals, we reviewed the project execution plans 

for projects within and outside our nongeneralizable sample. 

To determine the main challenges that could affect Science’s ability to 

maintain project management performance in the future, we interviewed 

federal and laboratory officials at the four laboratories we visited, as well 

as officials at DOE’s Office of Engineering and Construction Management 

and Science’s Office of Project Assessment. We interviewed workforceplanning officials at the four laboratories, Science’s headquarters, and 

regional administrative offices in Illinois and Tennessee. We also reviewed 

relevant studies by GAO, DOE’s Inspector General, and the National 

Science Foundation about fiscal challenges facing the United States and 

challenges to maintaining a skilled federal workforce and to securing 

technical expertise across a variety of scientific fields. 

We conducted this performance audit from June 2007 through May 2008, 

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 objectives. We believe that 

the evidence obtained provides a reasonable basis for our findings and 

conclusions based on our audit objectives. 

 6

Although many different types of reviews of Science’s projects were conducted by

organizations within or outside of DOE, we limited our assessment to Science’s

independent project reviews and, to a lesser extent, external independent reviews 

conducted by DOE’s Office of Engineering and Construction Management. 

Page 34 GAO-08-641 DOE Office of Science Project Management 
Appendix II: Summary of Office of Science 

Projects Reviewed 

Page 35 GAO-08-641 DOE Office of Science Project Management 

We obtained and reviewed performance information on 42 Science 

projects at 10 national laboratories, summarized in table 1. 

Table 1: Projects Under Way or Completed from Fiscal Year 2003 through Fiscal Year 2007 

Site and project Project type Status

Original 

target 

completion 

datea

Actual 

completion 

dateb

Percentage

over (under) 

completion 

datec

Original 

target 

cost 

(dollars in 

millions)a

Final cost

(dollars in 

millions)b

Percentage

over (under) 

target costc

ARGONNE NATIONAL LABORATORY

Center for Nanoscale 

Materialsd

Scientific Completed 9/1/2007 9/1/2007 0% $72.00 $72.00 0%

Central supply facility Infrastructure Completed 7/1/2001 10/1/2002 60.00 5.90 5.90 0

Fire safety 

improvements 

Infrastructure Completed 6/1/2003 11/1/2003 16.13 8.43 8.38 (0.59)

Mechanical and control 

systems upgrade

Infrastructure Completed 6/1/2005 6/1/2005 0 9.00 8.96 (0.44)

BROOKHAVEN NATIONAL LABORATORY

Center for Functional 

Nanomaterials 

Scientific Under way 4/1/2008 3/1/2008 (2.08) 81.00 81.00 0

Electrical system

modifications: phase II 

Infrastructure Completed 9/1/2003 11/1/2003 7.41 6.77 6.73 (0.59)

Electron Beam Ion 

Source 

Scientific Under way 3/1/2010 9/1/2010 14.29 14.80 14.80 0

Ground and surface 

water protection 

upgrade 

Infrastructure Completed 12/1/2003 11/1/2003 (3.33) 6.05 6.03 (0.33)

Research support 

building 

Infrastructure Completed 3/1/2007 2/1/2007 (2.94) 18.27 18.27 0

STAR Electromagnetic 

Calorimeter 

Scientific Completed 9/1/2003 9/1/2003 0 8.60 8.60 0

FERMI NATIONAL ACCELERATOR LABORATORY

MINERvA Scientific Under way 4/1/2010 9/1/2010 13.51 16.80 16.80 0

Neutrinos at the Main 

Injectord

Scientific Completed 9/1/2003 2/1/2005 30.91 136.10 167.97 23.42

Appendix II: Summary of Office of Science 

Projects Reviewed 
Appendix II: Summary of Office of Science 

Projects Reviewed 

Site and project Project type Status

Original 

target 

completion 

datea

Actual 

completion 

dateb

Percentage

over (under) 

completion 

datec

Original 

target 

cost 

(dollars in 

millions)a

Final cost

(dollars in 

millions)b

Percentage

over (under) 

target costc

Run IIb CDF Detector Scientific Completed 11/1/2006 7/1/2006 (8.89) 30.40 10.90 (64.14)

Run IIb D-Zero Detector Scientific Completed 11/1/2006 11/1/2006 0 28.60 17.40 (39.16)

U.S. ATLASdScientific Under way 9/1/2005 9/1/2008e40.45 163.75 163.75 0

U.S. Compact Muon 

Solenoidd

Scientific Under way 9/1/2005 9/1/2008e40.91 167.25 167.25 0

U.S. Large Hadron 

Collider Acceleratord

Scientific Completed 9/1/2005 7/1/2006 12.05 200.00f200.00 0

LAWRENCE BERKELEY NATIONAL LABORATORY

Advanced Light Source 

molecular

environmental science 

facility

Scientific Completed 10/1/2002 12/1/2002 5.26 6.75 6 (11.11)

Advanced Light 

Source user support 

building 

Infrastructure Under way 5/1/2010 5/1/2010 0 32.80 32.80 0

Building 77 

rehabilitation: phase II 

Infrastructure Under way 11/1/2009 11/1/2009 0 13.61 13.61 0

Gamma-Ray EnergyTracking Array Scientific Under way 3/1/2011 3/1/2011 0 18.80 18.80 0

The Molecular Foundry Scientific Completed 12/1/2006 12/1/2006 0 85.00 84.90 (0.12)

Transmission Electron 

Aberration-Corrected 

Microscope

Scientific Under way 9/1/2009 9/1/2009 0 27.09 27.09 0

Sitewide water 

distribution upgrade: 

phase I 

Infrastructure Completed 12/1/2003 12/1/2003 0 8.26 8.26 0

OAK RIDGE NATIONAL LABORATORY

Center for Nanophase 

Materials Sciencesd

Scientific Completed 9/1/2006 8/1/2006 (2.08) 65.00 64.74 (0.40)

Electrical system

upgrade 

Infrastructure Completed 1/1/2003 4/1/2003 13.04 5.99 5.90 (1.50)

Page 36 GAO-08-641 DOE Office of Science Project Management 
Appendix II: Summary of Office of Science 

Projects Reviewed 

Site and project Project type Status

Original 

target 

completion 

datea

Actual 

completion 

dateb

Percentage

over (under) 

completion 

datec

Original 

target 

cost 

(dollars in 

millions)a

Final cost

(dollars in 

millions)b

Percentage

over (under) 

target costc

Facilities heating,

ventilation, and airconditioning upgrade 

Infrastructure Completed 3/1/2004 11/1/2003 (14.81) 7.20 7.05 (2.08)

Fire protection system 

upgrade 

Infrastructure Completed 9/1/2004 5/1/2004g(12.50) 6.02 5.89 (2.16)

Fundamental neutron 

physics beamline 

Scientific Under way 6/1/2010 4/1/2010 (2.56) 9.20 9.20 0

Laboratory for 

Comparative and

Functional Genomics 

Scientific Completed 9/1/2003 10/1/2003 4 13.90 13.86 (0.29)

Research support 

center

Infrastructure Completed 8/1/2004 10/1/2004 9.52 16.26 16.04 (1.35)

SNS instruments: next 

generation (SING I)d

Scientific Under way 9/1/2011 8/1/2010 (15.66) 68.50 68.50 0

Spallation Neturon 

Sourced

Scientific Completed 9/1/2005 5/1/2006 8.60 1332.80 1405.00 5.92

PACIFIC NORTHWEST NATIONAL LABORATORY

Physical sciences

facility

Infrastructure Under way 2/1/2011 2/1/2011 0 224.00 224.00 0

PRINCETON PLASMA PHYSICS LABORATORY

Alcator C-Mod lower 

drive upgrade 

Scientific Completed 3/1/2003 4/1/2003 5.26 5.20 5.14 (1.15)

National Compact 

Stellarator Experiment 

Scientific Under way 5/1/2008 12/1/2012 107.84 86.30 165.00 91.19

SANDIA AND LOS ALAMOS NATIONAL LABORATORIES

Center for Integrated 

Nanotechnologies 

Scientific Completed 5/1/2007 5/1/2007 0 75.80 75.75 (0.07)

STANFORD LINEAR ACCELERATOR CENTER

Large Area TelescopedScientific Completed 3/1/2006 2/1/2006 (2.5) 121.20 188.06h55.17

Linac Coherent Light 

Sourced

Scientific Under way 3/1/2009 7/1/2010 34.04 379.00 420.00 10.82

Page 37 GAO-08-641 DOE Office of Science Project Management 
Appendix II: Summary of Office of Science 

Projects Reviewed 

Site and project Project type Status

Original 

target 

completion 

datea

Actual 

completion 

dateb

Percentage

over (under) 

completion 

datec

Original 

target 

cost 

(dollars in 

millions)a

Final cost

(dollars in 

millions)b

Percentage

over (under) 

target costc

Safety and operational 

reliability improvementsd

Infrastructure Under way 9/1/2009 12/1/2009 7.32 15.72 15.72 0

SPEAR 3 upgradedScientific Completed 9/1/2002 11/1/2003 29.17 49.20 58.00 9.23

THOMAS JEFFERSON NATIONAL ACCELERATOR LABORATORY

CEBAF center 

addition: phase I

Scientific Completed 6/1/2006 4/1/2006 (6.25) 10.94 10.94 0

Source: GAO analysis of Office of Science data. 

Note: DOE data typically expressed target completion dates as month and year; for consistency, we 

recorded and calculated target and actual completion dates from the first of the month. 

a

Original completion date and cost targets were committed to at critical decision point 2, when cost 

and schedule targets are set. For projects baselined before DOE’s project management order 413.3 

was fully implemented, we used an equivalent project milestone or, if such a milestone was not 

available, we instead used estimates at conceptual design. Estimates made at conceptual design lack 

the precision possible when design has progressed further. 

b

For projects under way, the actual completion date and final cost reflect Science’s projections as of 

February 29, 2008. 

c

To determine the extent to which each project finished before or exceeded its original target 

completion date, we computed percentage change from the planned project length (the period 

between DOE’s approval of critical decision point 2, which is not shown in the table, and the original 

target completion date) to the actual project length (the period between critical decision point 2 

approval and critical decision point 4, when DOE certifies that a project is complete). To determine 

the extent to which each project finished under or exceeded its original target cost, we computed the

percentage change from the original target cost to the final cost. 

d

Part of our nongeneralizable sample of 12 projects selected for in-depth review. 

e

DOE completed 97 percent of this project on time. The remaining 3 percent will not be completed 

until September 2008 because of tunneling problems at the European Organization for Nuclear 

Research (CERN) site in Switzerland. 

f

DOE funding included $90 million paid to CERN to purchase parts made in the United States. 

g

Date corresponds to date of project’s critical decision point 4 memorandum, our criterion for project 

completion. Documentation for this project, however, indicates that the upgrades were completed in 

March 2004, 2 months earlier. 

h

DOE’s direct financial contribution to this project amounted to $45 million. 

Page 38 GAO-08-641 DOE Office of Science Project Management 
Appendix III: Comments from the Department 

of Energy 

Page 39 GAO-08-641 DOE Office of Science Project Management 

Appendix III: Comments from the 

Department of Energy 
Appendix III: Comments from the Department 

of Energy 

Page 40 GAO-08-641 DOE Office of Science Project Management 
Appendix IV: 

A

GAO Contact and Staff 

cknowledgments 

Page 41 GAO-08-641 DOE Office of Science Project Management 

Appendix IV: GAO Contact and Staff 

Acknowledgments 

Gene Aloise, (202) 512-3841 or aloisee@gao.gov

In addition to the individual named above, Janet Frisch, Assistant Director; 

Ellen W. Chu; Elizabeth Deyo; Kevin Jackson; Omari Norman; Jeff 

Rueckhaus; and Ginny Vanderlinde made key contributions to this report. 

GAO Contact 

Staff 

Acknowledgments 

(360844) 
GAO’s Mission The Government Accountability Office, the audit, evaluation, and 

investigative arm of Congress, exists to support Congress in meeting its 

constitutional responsibilities and to help improve the performance and 

accountability of the federal government for the American people. GAO 

examines the use of public funds; evaluates federal programs and policies; 

and provides analyses, recommendations, and other assistance to help

Congress make informed oversight, policy, and funding decisions. GAO’s 

commitment to good government is reflected in its core values of 

accountability, integrity, and reliability. 

The fastest and easiest way to obtain copies of GAO documents at no cost

is through GAO’s Web site (www.gao.gov). Each weekday, GAO posts 

newly released reports, testimony, and correspondence on its Web site. To

have GAO e-mail you a list of newly posted products every afternoon, go 

to www.gao.gov and select “E-mail Updates.” 

The first copy of each printed report is free. Additional copies are $2 each. 

A check or money order should be made out to the Superintendent of 

Documents. GAO also accepts VISA and Mastercard. Orders for 100 or 

more copies mailed to a single address are discounted 25 percent. Orders 

should be sent to: 

U.S. Government Accountability Office 

441 G Street NW, Room LM 

Washington, DC 20548 

To order by Phone: Voice: (202) 512-6000 

TDD: (202) 512-2537 

Fax: (202) 512-6061 

Contact: 

Web site: www.gao.gov/fraudnet/fraudnet.htm

E-mail: fraudnet@gao.gov

Automated answering system: (800) 424-5454 or (202) 512-7470 

Ralph Dawn, Managing Director, dawnr@gao.gov, (202) 512-4400 

U.S. Government Accountability Office, 441 G Street NW, Room 7125 

Washington, DC 20548 

Chuck Young, Managing Director, youngc1@gao.gov, (202) 512-4800 

U.S. Government Accountability Office, 441 G Street NW, Room 7149 

Washington, DC 20548 

Obtaining Copies of 

GAO Reports and 

Testimony

Order by Mail or Phone 

To Report Fraud,

Waste, and Abuse in 

Federal Programs 

Congressional 

Relations 

Public Affairs 

PRINTED ON RECYCLED PAPER