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House Approves Nuclear Weapons Appropriations By David Ruppe WASHINGTON ð– The U.S. House of Representatives overwhelmingly approved the $29.7 billion fiscal 2006 Energy and Water Development Appropriations bill yesterday evening. The bill, approved by a 416-13 vote, includes $1.5 billion for nuclear nonproliferation programs and $6.2 billion for U.S. nuclear weapons activities (see GSN, May 19). Funding for nonproliferation and to dispose of U.S. plutonium is more than the $1.3 billion Congress awarded for the current fiscal year, but is $136 million less than requested by the administration. Appropriations for nuclear weapons activities, from research to maintenance to dismantlement and disposal, were reduced in the bill from the administration’s request by $450 million. The bill forbids expenditures for creating a “Modern Pit Facility” that would enable mass production of plutonium cores for refurbishing nuclear weapons or building new ones. House appropriators last year cut funding for such a facility until the Congress reviewed the revised administration plan for the U.S. nuclear weapons stockpile. The bill provides $25 million for an initial study of a Reliable Replacement Warhead, an effort to design long-lasting nuclear warheads without the need to conduct explosive nuclear tests. The administration had requested $9.3 million. The Energy Department had requested $25 million to shorten the time needed to prepare for a test, but lawmakers approved only $15 million and said the preparation time should remain at 24 months and not move toward the administration’s goal of 18 months. The bill also denies a $4 million request for the Robust Nuclear Earth Penetrator. However, under a deal arranged between Representative David Hobson (R-Ohio) and Republicans and Democrats on the House Armed Services Committee, funding for the study would instead be provided to the Air Force, which could also examine conventionally armed penetrators. “In order to best explore all options for holding hard and deeply buried targets at risk, and to include options not previously considered as part of the Robust Nuclear Earth Penetrator study, the Strategic Forces Subcommittee transferred authorization for this study from the Department of Energy to the Department of Defense,” said Armed Services Committee spokesman Josh Holly. Congress approved no money for the program last year. Interim Civilian Nuclear Waste Storage ProposedNonbinding report language accompanying the bill includes a call for storing all U.S. spent nuclear fuel and radioactive waste at an interim site until a long-delayed storage facility is completed at Yucca Mountain, Nevada. The report suggests constructing such a site at one of the Energy Department’s complexes in Idaho, Hanford, Wash., or Savannah River, S.C. If those choices are not available, the report recommends considering using “federally owned sites, closed military bases, and non-federal fuel storage facilities.” It suggests beginning transfers the interim site by October 2006. According to Representative John Spratt (D-S.C.) in a statement released yesterday, current federal law forbids an interim storage facility until Yucca Mountain is licensed. In any case, he said, an interim site would be risky. It “puts nuclear waste at facilities not intended to hold them” he said, and, “Transport of this nuclear material to these interim sites could go through population centers, posing an additional security risk.” Arguing for the interim site recently, Hobson said that consolidating spent fuel at such a facility would help lower costs for U.S. electricity consumers and that the bill would not interfere with progress on Yucca Mountain.
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