NATIONAL NUCLEAR 

SECURITY 

ADMINISTRATION

Observations on NNSA’s 

Management and Oversight 

of the Nuclear Security 

Enterprise 

Statement of Gene Aloise, Director 

Natural Resources and Environment

Testimony 

Before the Subcommittee on Strategic 

Forces, Committee on Armed Services, 

House of Representatives

For Release on Delivery 

Expected at 11:00 a.m. EST

Thursday, February 16, 2012

GAO-12-473T

United States Government Accountability Office

GAO
United States Government Accountability Office

Highlights of GAO-12-473T, a testimony 

before the Subcommittee on Strategic Forces, 

Committee on Armed Services, House of 

Representatives

February 16, 2012

NATIONAL NUCLEAR SECURITY 

ADMINISTRATION 

Observations on NNSA’s Management and Oversight 

of the Nuclear Security Enterprise

Why GAO Did This Study

The National Nuclear Security 

Administration (NNSA), a separately 

organized agency within the 

Department of Energy (DOE), is 

responsible for managing its 

contractors’ nuclear weapon- and 

nonproliferation-related national 

security activities in laboratories and 

other facilities, collectively known as 

the nuclear security enterprise. GAO 

designated DOE’s management of its 

contracts as an area at high risk of 

fraud, waste, and abuse. Progress has 

been made, but GAO continues to 

identify problems across the nuclear 

security enterprise, from projects’ cost 

and schedule overruns to inadequate 

oversight of safety and security at 

NNSA’s sites. Laboratory and other 

officials have raised concerns that 

federal oversight of the laboratories’ 

activities has been excessive. With 

NNSA proposing to spend tens of 

billions of dollars to modernize the 

nuclear security enterprise, it is 

important to ensure scarce resources

are spent in an effective and efficient 

manner.

This testimony addresses (1) NNSA’s 

ability to produce budget and cost data 

necessary to make informed 

management decisions, (2) improving 

NNSA’s project and contract 

management, and (3) DOE’s and 

NNSA’s safety and security oversight. 

It is based on prior GAO reports issued 

from August 2000 to January 2012. 

DOE and NNSA continue to act on the 

numerous recommendations GAO has 

made in improving budget and cost 

data, project and contract 

management, and safety and security 

oversight. GAO will continue to monitor 

DOE’s and NNSA’s implementation of 

these recommendations. 

What GAO Found

NNSA has successfully ensured that the nuclear weapons stockpile remains safe 

and reliable in the absence of underground nuclear testing, accomplishing this 

complicated task by using state-of-the-art facilities as well as the skills of top 

scientists. Nevertheless, NNSA does not have reliable enterprise-wide 

management information on program budgets and costs, which potentially 

increases risk to NNSA’s programs. For example, in June 2010, GAO reported 

that NNSA could not identify the total costs to operate and maintain essential 

weapons activities facilities and infrastructure. In addition, in February 2011, 

GAO reported that NNSA lacks complete data on, among other things, the 

condition and value of its existing infrastructure, cost estimates and completion 

dates for planned capital improvement projects, and critical human capital skills 

in its contractor workforce that are needed for its programs. As a result, NNSA 

does not have a sound basis for making decisions on how to most effectively 

manage its portfolio of projects and other programs and lacks information that 

could help justify future budget requests or target cost savings opportunities.

NNSA recognizes that its ability to make informed decisions is hampered and is 

taking steps to improve its budget and cost data.

For more than a decade and in numerous reports, GAO found that NNSA has 

continued to experience significant cost and schedule overruns on its major 

projects. For example, in 2000 and 2009, respectively, GAO reported that

NNSA’s efforts to extend the operational lives of nuclear weapons in the stockpile 

have experienced cost increases and schedule delays, such as a $300 million 

cost increase and 2-year delay in the refurbishment of one warhead and a nearly 

$70 million increase and 1-year delay in the refurbishment of another warhead. 

NNSA’s construction projects have also experienced cost overruns. For example, 

GAO reported that the cost to construct a modern Uranium Processing Facility at 

NNSA’s Y-12 National Security Complex experienced a nearly seven-fold cost 

increase from between $600 million and $1.1 billion in 2004 to between $4.2 

billion and $6.5 billion in 2011. Given NNSA’s record of weak management of 

major projects, GAO believes careful federal oversight of NNSA’s modernization 

of the nuclear security enterprise will be critical to ensure that resources are 

spent in as an effective and efficient manner as possible.

NNSA’s oversight of safety and security in the nuclear security enterprise has 

also been questioned. As work carried out at NNSA’s sites involves dangerous 

nuclear materials such as plutonium and highly enriched uranium, stringent 

safety procedures and security requirements must be observed. GAO reported in 

2008 on numerous safety and security problems across NNSA’s sites, 

contributing, among other things, to the temporary shutdown of facilities at both 

Los Alamos and Lawrence Livermore National Laboratories in 2004 and 2005, 

respectively. Ineffective NNSA oversight of its contractors’ activities contributed 

to many of these incidents as well as relatively lax laboratory attitudes toward 

safety procedures. In many cases, NNSA has made improvements to resolve 

these safety and security concerns, but better oversight is needed to ensure that 

improvements are fully implemented and sustained. GAO agrees that excessive 

oversight and micromanagement of contractors’ activities are not an efficient use 

of scarce federal resources, but that NNSA’s problems are not caused by 

excessive oversight but instead result from ineffective departmental oversight. 

View GAO-12-473T. For more information, 

contact Gene Aloise at (202) 512-3841 or 

aloisee@gao.gov. 
 

Page 1 GAO-12-473T Oversight of the Nuclear Security Enterprise

Chairman Turner, Ranking Member Sanchez, and Members of the 

Subcommittee:

Thank you for the opportunity to discuss our work on the governance, 

oversight, and management of the nation’s nuclear security enterprise. As 

you know, the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA), a 

separately organized agency within the Department of Energy (DOE), is 

responsible for managing its contractors’ nuclear weapon- and 

nonproliferation-related national security activities in research and 

development laboratories, production plants, and other facilities known 

collectively as the nuclear security enterprise.1

Ensuring that the nuclear weapons stockpile remains safe and reliable in 

the absence of underground nuclear testing is extraordinarily complicated 

and requires state-of-the-art experimental and computing facilities as well 

as the skills of top scientists in the field. To its credit, NNSA consistently 

accomplishes this task, as evidenced by the successful assessment of 

the safety, reliability, and performance of each weapon type in the nuclear 

stockpile since such assessments were first conducted in 1995. NNSA’s 

three nuclear weapon design laboratories are heavily involved in this 

assessment process and, over the past decade, the United States has 

invested billions of dollars in sustaining the Cold War-era stockpile and 

upgrading the laboratories.

With the moratorium on 

underground nuclear testing that began in 1992 and the subsequent 

creation of the Stockpile Stewardship Program, the mission of the nuclear 

security enterprise changed from designing, building, and testing 

successive generations of weapons to extending the life of the existing 

nuclear weapons stockpile through scientific study, computer simulation, 

and refurbishment.

Nevertheless, DOE’s and NNSA’s management of the nuclear security 

enterprise has been the subject of much criticism. The department’s 

problems are long-standing. For example, we have designated DOE’s 

management of its contracts as an area at high risk of fraud, waste, 

 

1 Specifically, NNSA manages three national nuclear weapon design laboratories—

Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California, Los Alamos National Laboratory in 

New Mexico, and Sandia National Laboratories in New Mexico and California. It also 

manages four nuclear weapons production plants—the Pantex Plant in Texas, the Y-12 

National Security Complex in Tennessee, the Kansas City Plant in Missouri, and the 

Tritium Extraction Facility at DOE’s Savannah River Site in South Carolina. NNSA also 

manages the Nevada National Security Site, formerly known as the Nevada Test Site.

 
 

Page 2 GAO-12-473T Oversight of the Nuclear Security Enterprise

abuse, and mismanagement because of the department’s record of 

inadequate management and oversight of its contractors. In January 

1995, we reported that DOE’s laboratories did not have clearly defined 

missions that focus their considerable resources on accomplishing the 

department’s changing objectives and national priorities.2 Noting that the 

laboratories have made vital contributions to the nation’s defense and 

civilian science and technology efforts, we reported that DOE had not 

coordinated these laboratories’ efforts to solve national problems but had 

instead managed each laboratory on a program-by-program basis. The 

establishment of NNSA as a semi-autonomous agency within DOE in 

2000 was intended to correct these long-standing and widely recognized 

DOE management problems, which had been underscored by significant 

cost overruns on major projects and security problems at the national 

laboratories.3

NNSA’s creation, however, has not yet had the desired effect of fully 

resolving these management problems. Progress has been made, but 

NNSA and DOE’s Office of Environmental Management remain on our 

high-risk list.4

My testimony today discusses NNSA’s management of the nuclear 

security enterprise. It focuses on our reports issued from August 2000 to 

January 2012 on (1) NNSA’s ability to produce adequate budget and cost 

Furthermore, we continue to identify problems across the 

nuclear security enterprise, ranging from significant cost and schedule 

overruns on major projects to ineffective federal oversight of safety and 

security at NNSA’s sites. Concerns have also been raised by national 

laboratory and other officials that DOE’s and NNSA’s oversight of the 

laboratories’ activities has been excessive and that the safety and 

security requirements the laboratories’ are subject to are overly 

prescriptive and burdensome, which has resulted in a negative effect on 

the quality of science performed at these laboratories.

 

2 GAO, Department of Energy: National Laboratories Need Clearer Missions and Better 

Management, GAO/RCED-95-10 (Washington, D.C.: Jan. 27, 1995).

3 GAO, Department of Energy: Views on the Progress of the National Nuclear Security 

Administration in Implementing Title 32, GAO-01-602T (Washington, D.C.: Apr. 4, 2001); 

GAO, NNSA Management: Progress in the Implementation of Title 32, GAO-02-93R

(Washington, D.C.: Dec. 12, 2001); and GAO, Department of Energy: NNSA Restructuring 

and Progress in Implementing Title 32, GAO-02-451T (Washington, D.C.: Feb. 26, 2002).

4 GAO, High-Risk Series: An Update, GAO-11-278 (Washington, D.C.: February 2011).
 

Page 3 GAO-12-473T Oversight of the Nuclear Security Enterprise

data necessary to make informed management decisions; (2) NNSA’s 

project and contract management; and (3) NNSA’s oversight of safety 

and security performance in the nuclear security enterprise. Detailed 

information about scope and methodology can be found in our issued 

reports. We conducted the performance audit work that supports this 

statement in accordance with generally accepted government auditing 

standards. Those standards require that we plan and perform audits 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.

DOE is responsible for a diverse set of missions, including nuclear 

security, energy research, and environmental cleanup. These missions 

are managed by various organizations within DOE and largely carried out 

by management and operating (M&O) contractors at DOE sites. 

According to federal budget data, NNSA is one of the largest 

organizations in DOE, overseeing nuclear weapons and nonproliferationrelated missions at its sites. With a $10.5 billion budget in fiscal year 

2011—nearly 40 percent of DOE’s total budget—NNSA is responsible for 

providing the United States with safe, secure, and reliable nuclear 

weapons in the absence of underground nuclear testing and maintaining 

core competencies in nuclear weapons science, technology, and 

engineering.

Under DOE’s long-standing model of having unique M&O contractors at 

each site, management of its sites has historically been decentralized 

and, thus, fragmented. Since the Manhattan Project produced the first 

atomic bomb during World War II, NNSA, DOE, and predecessor 

agencies have depended on the expertise of private firms, universities, 

and others to carry out research and development work and efficiently 

operate the facilities necessary for the nation’s nuclear defense. DOE’s 

relationship with these entities has been formalized over the years 

through its M&O contracts—agreements that give DOE’s contractors 

Background 
 

Page 4 GAO-12-473T Oversight of the Nuclear Security Enterprise

unique responsibility to carry out major portions of DOE’s missions and 

apply their scientific, technical, and management expertise.5

Currently, DOE spends 90 percent of its annual budget on M&O 

contracts, making it the largest non-Department of Defense contracting 

agency in the government. The contractors at DOE’s NNSA sites have 

operated under DOE’s direction and oversight but largely independently 

of one another. Various headquarters and field-based organizations 

within DOE and NNSA develop policies and NNSA site offices, collocated 

with NNSA’s sites, conduct day-to-day oversight of the M&O contractors, 

and evaluate the contractors’ performance in carrying out the sites’ 

missions. 

As we have reported since 1999, NNSA has not had reliable enterprisewide budget and cost data, which potentially increases risk to NNSA’s 

programs. Specifically:

• In July 2003 and January 2007, we reported that NNSA lacked a 

planning and budgeting process that adequately validated contractorprepared cost estimates used in developing annual budget requests.6

Establishing this process was required by the statute that created 

NNSA—Title 32 of the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal 

Year 2000.7

 

5 M&O contracts are agreements under which the government contracts for the operation, 

maintenance, or support, on its behalf, of a government-owned or -controlled research, 

development, special production, or testing establishment wholly or principally devoted to 

one or more of the major programs of the contracting federal agency. Federal Acquisition 

Regulation, 48 C.F.R. § 17.601.

In particular, NNSA had not established an independent 

analysis unit to review program budget proposals, confirm cost 

estimates, and analyze budget alternatives. At the request of the 

Subcommittee on Energy and Water Development, Senate 

Committee on Appropriations, we are currently reviewing NNSA’s 

planning and budgeting process, the extent to which NNSA has 

6 GAO, Nuclear Weapons: Opportunities Exist to Improve the Budgeting, Cost Accounting,

and Management Associated with the Stockpile Life Extension Program, GAO-03-583. 

(Washington, D.C.: July 28, 2003), and GAO, National Nuclear Security Administration: 

Additional Actions Needed to Improve Management of the Nation’s Nuclear Programs,

GAO-07-36. (Washington, D.C.: Jan. 19, 2007).

7 50 U.S.C. § 2452.

NNSA Does Not Have 

Reliable EnterpriseWide Management 

Information on 

Program Budgets and 

Costs 
 

Page 5 GAO-12-473T Oversight of the Nuclear Security Enterprise

established criteria for evaluating resource trade-offs, and challenges 

NNSA has faced in validating its budget submissions. We expect to 

issue a report on this work later this year.

• In June 2010, we reported that NNSA could not identify the total costs 

to operate and maintain essential weapons activities’ facilities and 

infrastructure.8

• We reported in February 2011 that NNSA lacked complete data on (1) 

the condition and value of its existing infrastructure, (2) cost estimates 

and completion dates for planned capital improvement projects, (3) 

shared-use facilities within the nuclear security enterprise, and (4) 

critical human capital skills in its M&O contractor workforce that are 

needed to maintain the Stockpile Stewardship Program.

Furthermore, we found that contractor-reported costs 

to execute the scope of work associated with operating and 

maintaining these facilities and infrastructure likely significantly 

exceeded the budget for this program that NNSA justified to 

Congress.

9

• In September 2011, we reported that, because of different accounting 

practices, NNSA could not accurately estimate planned cost savings 

that might result from a consolidated management contract for two of 

its production sites.

As a result, 

NNSA does not have a sound basis for making decisions on how to 

most effectively manage its portfolio of projects and other programs 

and will lack information that could help justify future budget requests 

or target cost savings opportunities.

10

 

8 GAO, Nuclear Weapons: Actions Needed to Identify Total Costs of Weapons Complex 

Infrastructure and Research and Production Capabilities,

Similarly, in January 2012, we reported on 

efforts NNSA sites have taken to streamline support functions and 

generate cost savings in a time of growing federal deficits and 

GAO-10-582. (Washington, 

D.C.: June 21, 2010).

9 GAO, Nuclear Weapons: NNSA Needs More Comprehensive Infrastructure and 

Workforce Data to Improve Enterprise Decision-making, GAO-11-188 (Washington, D.C.: 

Feb. 14, 2011).

10 GAO, Modernizing the Nuclear Security Enterprise: The National Nuclear Security 

Administration’s Proposed Acquisition Strategy Needs Further Clarification and 

Assessment, GAO-11-848. (Washington, D.C.: Sept. 20, 2011).
 

Page 6 GAO-12-473T Oversight of the Nuclear Security Enterprise

uncertainty over future federal budgets.11

The administration plans to request $88 billion from Congress over the 

next decade to modernize the nuclear security enterprise and ensure that 

base scientific, technical, and engineering capabilities are sufficiently 

supported and the nuclear deterrent can continue to be safe, secure, and 

reliable. To adequately justify future presidential budget requests, NNSA 

must accurately identify these base capabilities and determine their costs. 

Without this information, NNSA risks being unable to identify return on its 

investment or opportunities for cost savings or to make fully informed 

decisions on trade-offs in a resource-constrained environment.

We found that it was difficult 

to compare or quantify total savings across sites because guidance 

for estimating savings is unclear and the methods used to estimate 

savings vary between sites.

NNSA, recognizing that its ability to make informed enterprise-wide 

decisions is hampered by the lack of comprehensive data and analytical 

tools, is considering the use of computer models—quantitative tools that 

couple data from each site with the functions of the enterprise—to 

integrate and analyze data to create an interconnected view of the 

enterprise, which may help to address some of the critical shortcomings 

we identified. In July 2009, NNSA tasked its M&O contractors to form an 

enterprise modeling consortium. NNSA stated that the consortium is 

responsible for leading efforts to acquire and maintain enterprise data, 

enhance stakeholder confidence, integrate modeling capabilities, and fill 

in any gaps that are identified. The consortium has identified areas in 

which enterprise modeling projects could provide NNSA with reliable data 

and modeling capabilities, including capabilities on infrastructure and 

critical skills needs. In addition, we recently observed progress on 

NNSA’s development of an Enterprise Program Analysis Tool that should 

give NNSA greater insight into its sites’ cost reporting. The Tool also 

includes a mechanism to identify when resource trade-off decisions must 

be made, for example, when contractor-developed estimates for program 

requirements exceed the budget targets provided by NNSA for those 

programs. A tool such as this one could help NNSA obtain the basic data 

 

11 GAO, Department of Energy: Additional Opportunities Exist to Streamline Support 

Functions at NNSA and Office of Science Sites, GAO-12-255. (Washington, D.C.: Jan. 31, 

2012).
 

Page 7 GAO-12-473T Oversight of the Nuclear Security Enterprise

it needs to make informed management decisions, determine return on 

investment, and identify opportunities for cost saving.

A basic tenet of effective management is the ability to complete projects 

on time and within budget. However, for more than a decade and in 

numerous reports, we have found that NNSA has continued to experience 

significant cost and schedule overruns on its major projects, principally 

because of ineffective oversight and poor contractor management. 

Specifically:

• In August 2000, we found that poor management and oversight of the 

National Ignition Facility construction project at Lawrence Livermore 

National Laboratory had increased the facility’s cost by $1 billion and 

delayed its scheduled completion date by 6 years.12 Among the many 

causes for the cost overruns or schedule delays, DOE and Livermore 

officials responsible for managing or overseeing the facility’s 

construction did not plan for the technically complex assembly and 

installation of the facility’s 192 laser beams. They also did not use 

independent review committees effectively to help identify and correct 

issues before they turned into costly problems. Similarly, in April 2010, 

we reported that weak management by DOE and NNSA had allowed 

the cost, schedule, and scope of ignition-related activities at the 

National Ignition Facility to increase substantially.13,

14

 

12 GAO, National Ignition Facility: Management and Oversight Failures Caused Major 

Cost Overruns and Schedule Delays, 

Since 2005, 

ignition-related costs have increased by around 25 percent—from 

$1.6 billion to over $2 billion—and the planned completion date for 

these activities has slipped from the end of fiscal year 2011 to the end 

of fiscal year 2012 or beyond.

GAO/RCED-00-271 (Washington, D.C.: Aug. 8, 

2000).

13 Ignition-related activities consist of the efforts separate from the facility’s construction 

that have been undertaken to prepare for the first attempt at ignition—the extremely 

intense pressures and temperatures that simulate on a small scale the thermonuclear 

conditions created in nuclear explosions.

14 GAO, Nuclear Weapons: Actions Needed to Address Scientific and Technical 

Challenges and Management Weaknesses at the National Ignition Facility, GAO-10-488

(Washington, D.C.: Apr. 8, 2010).

NNSA Needs to Make 

Further 

Improvements to Its 

Management of Major 

Projects and 

Contracts 
 

Page 8 GAO-12-473T Oversight of the Nuclear Security Enterprise

• We have issued several reports on the technical issues, cost 

increases, and schedule delays associated with NNSA’s efforts to 

extend, through refurbishment, the operational lives of nuclear 

weapons in the stockpile. For example, in December 2000, we 

reported that refurbishment of the W87 strategic warhead had 

experienced significant design and production problems that 

increased its refurbishment costs by over $300 million and caused 

schedule delays of about 2 years.15 Similarly, in March 2009 we 

reported that NNSA and the Department of Defense had not 

effectively managed cost, schedule, and technical risks for the B61 

nuclear bomb and the W76 nuclear warhead refurbishments.16

• In October 2009, we reported on shortcomings in NNSA’s oversight of 

the planned relocation of its Kansas City Plant to a new, more modern 

facility.

For the 

B61 life extension program, NNSA was only able to stay on schedule 

by significantly reducing the number of weapons undergoing 

refurbishment and abandoning some refurbishment objectives. In the 

case of the W76 nuclear warhead, NNSA experienced a 1-year delay 

and an unexpected cost increase of nearly $70 million as a result of 

its ineffective management of one the highest risks of the program—

the manufacture of a key material known as Fogbank, which NNSA 

did not have the knowledge, expertise, or facilities to manufacture.

17

 

15 GAO, Nuclear Weapons: Improved Management Needed to Implement Stockpile 

Stewardship Program Effectively, 

Rather than construct a new facility itself, NNSA chose to 

have a private developer build it. NNSA would then lease the building 

through the General Services Administration for a period of 20 years. 

However, when choosing to lease rather than construct a new facility 

itself, NNSA allowed the Kansas City Plant to limit its cost analysis to 

a 20-year life cycle that has no relationship with known requirements 

of the nuclear weapons stockpile or the useful life of a production 

facility that is properly maintained. As a result, NNSA’s financing 

decisions were not as fully informed and transparent as they could 

have been. If the Kansas City Plant had quantified potential cost 

savings to be realized over the longer useful life of the facility, NNSA 

GAO-01-48 (Washington, D.C.: Dec. 14, 2000).

16 GAO, Nuclear Weapons: NNSA and DOD Need to More Effectively Manage the 

Stockpile Life Extension Program, GAO-09-385 (Washington, D.C.: Mar. 2, 2009).

17 GAO, Nuclear Weapons: National Nuclear Security Administration Needs to Better 

Manage Risks Associated with Modernization of Its Kansas City Plant, GAO-10-115

(Washington, D.C.: Oct. 23, 2009).
 

Page 9 GAO-12-473T Oversight of the Nuclear Security Enterprise

may have made a different decision as to whether to lease or 

construct a new facility itself.

• We reported in March 2010 that NNSA’s plutonium disposition 

program was behind schedule in establishing a capability to produce 

the plutonium feedstock necessary to operate its Mixed-oxide Fuel 

Fabrication facility currently being constructed at DOE’s Savannah 

River Site in South Carolina.18

• In November 2010, we reported that NNSA’s plans to construct a 

modern Uranium Processing Facility at its Y-12 National Security 

Complex in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, had experienced significant cost 

increases.

In addition, NNSA had not sufficiently 

assessed alternatives to producing plutonium feedstock and had only 

identified one potential customer for the mixed-oxide fuel the facility 

would produce. In its fiscal year 2012 budget justification to Congress, 

NNSA reported that it did not have a construction cost baseline for the 

facility needed to produce the plutonium feedstock for the mixed-oxide 

fuel, although Congress had already appropriated over $270 million 

through fiscal year 2009 and additional appropriation requests totaling 

almost $2 billion were planned through fiscal year 2016. NNSA stated 

in its budget justification that it is currently considering options for 

producing necessary plutonium feedstock without constructing a new 

facility.

19

 

18 GAO, Nuclear Nonproliferation: DOE Needs to Address Uncertainties with and 

Strengthen Independent Safety Oversight of Its Plutonium Disposition Program, 

Originally estimated in 2004 to cost from $600 million to 

$1.1 billion, estimated construction costs had more than doubled from 

$1.4 billion to $3.5 billion. Costs have continued to rise since we 

issued our report. As of September 2011, NNSA estimated that the 

facility would cost from $4.2 billion to $6.5 billion to construct—a 

nearly seven-fold cost increase. We are currently reviewing the cost 

and schedule estimates for another multi-billion dollar NNSA 

construction project—the Chemistry and Metallurgy Research 

Replacement nuclear facility at Los Alamos National Laboratory—at 

the request of the Subcommittee on Energy and Water Development, 

GAO-10-

378 (Washington, D.C.: Mar. 26, 2010). Mixed-oxide fuel contains plutonium blended with 

natural uranium, reprocessed uranium, or depleted uranium.

19 GAO, Nuclear Weapons: National Nuclear Security Administration’s Plans for Its 

Uranium Processing Facility Should Better Reflect Funding Estimates and Technology 

Readiness, GAO-11-103 (Washington, D.C.: Nov. 19, 2010).
 

Page 10 GAO-12-473T Oversight of the Nuclear Security Enterprise

Senate Committee on Appropriations. We plan to issue our report 

next month.

As discussed above, NNSA remains on our high-risk list and remains 

vulnerable to fraud, waste, abuse, and mismanagement. DOE has 

recently taken a number of actions to improve management of major 

projects, including those overseen by NNSA. For example, DOE has 

updated program and project management policies and guidance in an 

effort to improve the reliability of project cost estimates, better assess 

project risks, and better ensure project reviews that are timely, useful and 

identify problems early. However, DOE needs to ensure that NNSA has 

the capacity—that is, the people and other resources—to resolve its 

project management difficulties and that it has a program to monitor and 

independently validate the effectiveness and sustainability of its corrective 

measures. This is particularly important as NNSA embarks on its longterm, multibillion dollar effort to modernize the nuclear security enterprise.

Another underlying reason for the creation of NNSA was a series of 

security issues at the national laboratories. Work carried out at NNSA’s 

sites may involve plutonium and highly enriched uranium, which are 

extremely hazardous. For example, exposure to small quantities of 

plutonium is dangerous to human health, so that even inhaling a few 

micrograms creates a long-term risk of lung, liver, and bone cancer and 

inhaling larger doses can cause immediate lung injuries and death. Also, 

if not safely contained and managed, plutonium can be unstable and 

spontaneously ignite under certain conditions. NNSA’s sites also conduct 

a wide range of other activities, including construction and routine 

maintenance and operation of equipment and facilities that also run the 

risk of accidents, such as those involving heavy machinery or electrical 

mishaps. The consequences of such accidents could be less severe than 

those involving nuclear materials, but they could also lead to long-term 

illnesses, injuries, or even deaths among workers or the public. Plutonium 

and highly enriched uranium must also be stored under extremely high 

security to protect it from theft or terrorist attack.

In numerous reports, we have expressed concerns about NNSA’s 

oversight of safety and security across the nuclear security enterprise. 

With regard to nuclear and worker safety:

• In October 2007, we reported that there had been nearly 60 serious 

accidents or near misses at NNSA’s national laboratories since 

NNSA’s Oversight of 

Safety and Security in 

the Nuclear Security 

Enterprise Has Been 

Questioned 
 

Page 11 GAO-12-473T Oversight of the Nuclear Security Enterprise

2000.20 These incidents included worker exposure to radiation, 

inhalation of toxic vapors, and electrical shocks. Although no one was 

killed, many of the accidents caused serious harm to workers or 

damage to facilities. For example, at Los Alamos in July 2004, an 

undergraduate student who was not wearing required eye protection 

was partially blinded in a laser accident. Accidents and nuclear safety 

violations also contributed to the temporary shutdown of facilities at 

both Los Alamos and Livermore in 2004 and 2005. In the case of Los 

Alamos, laboratory employees disregarded established procedures 

and then attempted to cover up the incident, according to Los Alamos 

officials.21

• We reported in January 2008 on a number of long-standing nuclear 

and worker safety concerns at Los Alamos.

Our review of nearly 100 reports issued since 2000 found 

that the contributing factors to these safety problems generally fell into 

three key categories: (1) relatively lax laboratory attitudes toward 

safety procedures; (2) laboratory inadequacies in identifying and 

addressing safety problems with appropriate corrective actions; and 

(3) inadequate oversight by NNSA.

22

• In October 2008, we reported that DOE’s Office of Health, Safety, and 

Security—which, among other things, develops, oversees, and helps 

enforce nuclear safety policies at DOE and NNSA sites—fell short of 

fully meeting our elements of effective independent oversight of 

These concerns 

included, among other things, the laboratory’s lack of compliance with 

safety documentation requirements, inadequate safety systems, 

radiological exposures, and enforcement actions for significant 

violations of nuclear safety requirements that resulted in civil penalties 

totaling nearly $2.5 million.

 

20 GAO, Nuclear and Worker Safety: Actions Needed to Determine the Effectiveness of 

Safety Improvement Efforts at NNSA’s Weapons Laboratories, GAO-08-73 (Washington, 

D.C.: Oct. 31, 2007).

21 For additional information on the 2004 temporary shutdown of facilities at Los Alamos, 

see GAO, Stand-Down of Los Alamos National Laboratory: Total Costs Uncertain; Almost 

All Mission-Critical Programs Were Affected but Have Recovered, GAO-06-83

(Washington, D.C.: Nov. 18, 2005).

22 GAO, Los Alamos National Laboratory: Information on Security of Classified Data, 

Nuclear Material Controls, Nuclear and Worker Safety, and Project Management 

Weaknesses, GAO-08-173R (Washington, D.C.: Jan. 10, 2008).
 

Page 12 GAO-12-473T Oversight of the Nuclear Security Enterprise

nuclear safety.23

With regard to security:

For example, the office’s ability to function 

independently was limited because it had no role in reviewing 

technical analyses that help ensure safe design and operation of 

nuclear facilities, and the office had no personnel at DOE sites to 

provide independent safety observations.

• In June 2008, we reported that significant security problems at Los 

Alamos had received insufficient attention.24 The laboratory had over 

two dozen initiatives under way that were principally aimed at 

reducing, consolidating, and better protecting classified resources but 

had not implemented complete security solutions to address either 

classified parts storage in unapproved storage containers or 

weaknesses in its process for ensuring that actions taken to correct 

security deficiencies were completed. Furthermore, Los Alamos had 

implemented initiatives that addressed a number of previously 

identified security concerns but had not developed the long-term 

strategic framework necessary to ensure that its fixes would be 

sustained over time. Similarly, in October 2009, we reported that Los 

Alamos had implemented measures to enhance its information 

security controls, but significant weaknesses remained in protecting 

the information stored on and transmitted over its classified computer 

network.25

• In March 2009, we reported about numerous and wide-ranging 

security deficiencies at Livermore, particularly in the ability of 

A key reason for this was that the laboratory had not fully 

implemented an information security program to ensure that controls 

were effectively established and maintained.

 

23 GAO, Nuclear Safety: Department of Energy Needs to Strengthen Its Independent 

Oversight of Nuclear Facilities and Operations, GAO-09-61 (Washington, D.C.: Oct. 23, 

2008). GAO first developed its elements of effective independent oversight of nuclear 

safety in 1987 when Congress was considering legislation to establish the Defense 

Nuclear Facilities Safety Board. Key elements include, among other things, independence, 

technical expertise, and enforcement authority. 

24 GAO, Los Alamos National Laboratory: Long-Term Strategies Needed to Improve 

Security and Management Oversight, GAO-08-694 (Washington, D.C.: June 13, 2008).

25 GAO, Information Security: Actions Needed to Better Manage, Protect, and Sustain 

Improvements to Los Alamos National Laboratory’s Classified Computer Network, GAO10-28 (Washington, D.C.: Oct. 14, 2009).
 

Page 13 GAO-12-473T Oversight of the Nuclear Security Enterprise

Livermore’s protective force to assure the protection of special nuclear 

material and the laboratory’s protection and control of classified 

matter.26

• We reported in December 2010 that NNSA needed to improve its 

contingency planning for its classified supercomputing operations.

Livermore’s physical security systems, such as alarms and 

sensors, and its security program planning and assurance activities 

were also identified as areas needing improvement. Weaknesses in 

Livermore’s contractor self-assessment program and the NNSA 

Livermore Site Office’s oversight of the contractor contributed to these 

security deficiencies at the laboratory. According to one DOE official, 

both programs were “broken” and missed even the “low-hanging fruit.” 

The laboratory took corrective action to address these deficiencies, 

but we noted that better oversight was needed to ensure that security 

improvements were fully implemented and sustained.

27

In March 2010, the Deputy Secretary of Energy announced a new effort—

the 2010 Safety and Security Reform effort—to revise DOE’s safety and 

security directives and reform its oversight approach to “provide 

contractors with the flexibility to tailor and implement safety and security 

programs without excessive federal oversight or overly prescriptive 

departmental requirements.” We are currently reviewing the reform of 

DOE’s safety directives and the benefits DOE hopes to achieve from this 

effort for, among others, the House Committee on Energy and 

Commerce. We expect to issue our report next month. Nevertheless, our 

All three NNSA laboratories had implemented some components of a 

contingency planning and disaster recovery program, but NNSA had 

not provided effective oversight to ensure that the laboratories’ 

contingency and disaster recovery planning and testing were 

comprehensive and effective. In particular, NNSA’s component 

organizations, including the Office of the Chief Information Officer, 

were unclear about their roles and responsibilities for providing 

oversight in the laboratories’ implementation of contingency and 

disaster recovery planning.

 

26 GAO, Nuclear Security: Better Oversight Needed to Ensure That Security 

Improvements at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory Are Fully Implemented and 

Sustained, GAO-09-321 (Washington, D.C.: Mar. 16, 2009).

27 GAO, Information Security: National Nuclear Security Administration Needs to Improve 

Contingency Planning for Its Classified Supercomputing Operations, GAO-11-67

(Washington, D.C.: Dec. 9, 2010).
 

Page 14 GAO-12-473T Oversight of the Nuclear Security Enterprise

prior work has shown that ineffective NNSA oversight of its contractors 

has contributed to many of the safety and security problems across the 

nuclear security enterprise and that NNSA faces challenges in sustaining 

improvements to safety and security performance.

NNSA faces a complex task in planning, budgeting, and ensuring the 

execution of interconnected activities across the nuclear security 

enterprise. Among other things, maintaining government-owned facilities 

that were constructed more than 50 years ago and ensuring M&O 

contractors are sustaining critical human capital skills that are highly 

technical in nature and limited in supply are difficult undertakings. Over 

the past decade, we have made numerous recommendations to DOE and 

NNSA to improve their management and oversight practices. DOE and 

NNSA have acted on many of these recommendations, and we will 

continue to monitor progress being made in these areas. In the current 

era of tight budgets, Congress and the American taxpayer have the right 

to know whether investments made in the nuclear security enterprise are 

worth the cost. However, NNSA currently lacks the basic financial 

information on the total costs to operate and maintain its essential 

facilities and infrastructure, leaving it unable to identify return on 

investment or opportunities for cost savings. NNSA is now proposing to 

spend decades and tens of billions of dollars to modernize the nuclear 

security enterprise, largely by replacing or refurbishing aging and 

decaying facilities at its sites across the United States. Given NNSA’s 

record of weak management of its major projects, we believe that careful 

federal oversight will be critical to ensure this time and money are spent 

in as an effective and efficient manner as possible.

With regard to the concerns that DOE’s and NNSA’s oversight of the 

laboratories’ activities have been excessive and that safety and security 

requirements are overly prescriptive and burdensome, we agree that 

excessive oversight and micromanagement of contractors’ activities is not 

an efficient use of scarce federal resources. Nevertheless, in our view, 

the problems we continue to identify in the nuclear security enterprise are 

not caused by excessive oversight, but instead result from ineffective 

oversight. Given the critical nature of the work the nuclear security 

enterprise performs and the high-hazard operations it conducts—often 

involving extremely hazardous materials, such as plutonium and highly 

enriched uranium, that must be stored under high security to protect them 

from theft—careful oversight and stringent safety and security 

requirements will always be required at these sites

Concluding 

Observations 
 

Page 15 GAO-12-473T Oversight of the Nuclear Security Enterprise

It is also important in an era of scarce resources that DOE and NNSA 

ensure that the work conducted by the nuclear security enterprise is 

primarily focused on its principal mission—ensuring the safety and 

reliability of the nuclear weapons stockpile. DOE has other national 

laboratories capable of conducting valuable scientific research on issues 

as wide-ranging as climate change or high-energy physics, but there is no 

substitute for the sophisticated capabilities and highly-skilled human 

capital present in the nuclear security enterprise for ensuring the 

credibility of the U.S. nuclear deterrent.

Chairman Turner, Ranking Member Sanchez, and Members of the 

Subcommittee, this completes my prepared statement. I would be 

pleased to respond to any questions you may have at this time.

If you or your staff have any questions about this testimony, please 

contact me at (202) 512-3841 or aloisee@gao.gov. Contact points for our 

Offices of Congressional Relations and Public Affairs may be found on 

the last page of this statement. GAO staff who made key contributions to 

this testimony are Allison Bawden, Ryan T. Coles, and Jonathan Gill, 

Assistant Directors, and Patrick Bernard, Senior Analyst. 

GAO Contact and 

Staff 

Acknowledgments 

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