Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD)

Statement of Rose Gottemoeller

Deputy Administrator for Defense Nuclear Nonproliferation (Acting)

U.S. Department of Energy

INTRODUCTION

Mr. Chairman and members of this Committee, thank you for the opportunity to appear before you today to present this statement for the record on the new National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) and, in particular, the Office of Defense Nuclear Nonproliferation.  I very much appreciate having this opportunity to discuss the functions of this new Office with you, Chairman Thornberry, and with the rest of the members of the Special Oversight Panel on Department of Energy Reorganization.

 

NNSA IMPLEMENTATION

 

As you know, Mr. Chairman, on March 1, 2000, the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Nonproliferation and National Security, which I led, became the Office of Defense Nuclear Nonproliferation.  On March 1, I was designated by Secretary Richardson to serve as the Office=s Acting Deputy Administrator.  This new Office also incorporates the Office of Fissile Materials Disposition.  Laura Holgate, the Assistant Deputy Administrator for Fissile Materials Disposition, will also serve as the Special Secretarial Negotiator for Plutonium Disposition, recognizing the continuing high-level visibility of this important nonproliferation mission.

 

The new Office of Defense Nuclear Nonproliferation will have 141 employees, incorporating 32 employees from the Office of Fissile Materials Disposition.  The FY 2000 appropriation for the new Office is $749 million, of which $547 million is for the former Office of Nonproliferation and National Security and $121 million is for the Office of Fissile Materials Disposition.  The combined budget request for FY 2001 is $906 million, of which $223 million is for fissile materials disposition activities.

 

Implementation of the new NNSA has gone very smoothly.  I commend Secretary Richardson for his leadership in making this transition, and also for his recommendation that the President select General Gordon to lead the new NNSA.  Having known and worked with General Gordon over the past decade, I fully concur with the Secretary=s view that there is no better-qualified candidate for this position.  I look forward to working with General Gordon and the rest of the NNSA team as we continue to promote some of the nation=s most urgent national security priorities.

 

PROGRAMS IN SUPPORT OF NNSA=S MISSION

 

According to Section 3215 of the National Defense Authorization Act of FY 2000, the functions of the new Office of Defense Nuclear Nonproliferation include:

(1) preventing the spread of materials, technology, and expertise relating to weapons of mass destruction;

(2) eliminating inventories of surplus fissile materials usable for nuclear weapons;

(3) providing for international nuclear safety; and

(4) detecting the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction worldwide.

 

These are extremely important goals.  I would like to use this opportunity to share with the members of this panel the many programs my Office administers to advance nonproliferation and national security.  Before doing so, however, I would like to describe an important new initiative, developed by Secretary Richardson, which I believe will greatly boost our cooperative work with Russia to stem the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction.

 

LONG-TERM NONPROLIFERATION PROGRAM WITH RUSSIA

 

The President=s FY 2001 budget request includes a proposed $100 million program to improve our ability to respond to the most serious dangers presented by Russian nuclear facilities and weapons-usable materials, bringing our cooperation with Russia to an entirely new level.  The proposed program has two core elements: the first attempts to plug gaps in our efforts to manage fissile material from the civil side of the nuclear fuel cycle; the second part addresses proliferation vulnerabilities in Russia=s nuclear infrastructure.

 

Under the first part of this new initiative, we propose to work with Russia to prevent the further accumulation of separated civil plutonium.  To facilitate a moratorium on the separation of plutonium from spent power reactor fuel in Russia, we have offered to assist in the construction of a new facility for the dry storage of spent fuel.  This initiative is important; once implemented, it would cap Russia=s stockpile of civil plutonium, which is currently more than 30 metric tons and growing at a rate of 2 additional tons per year.

 

We would also propose to conduct collaborative research into modern nuclear reactor technologies and fuels, with the aim of devising more proliferation-resistant systems.  No major investments in this area would be carried out until our concerns about Russian nuclear cooperation with Iran are met.  Finally, we would explore permanent disposition options for spent nuclear fuel and high level waste.

 

The second part of the initiative expands our excellent cooperative work addressing problems of the nuclear weapons infrastructure -- for example working with the Russian Navy to help secure their stocks of nuclear fuel for the submarine fleet and ice breakers.  We will also accelerate programs with Russia to consolidate and convert fissile materials to non-weapon-usable forms and to facilitate the closure of nuclear warhead assembly and disassembly lines at Avangard and Penza-19.

 

Let me now turn to a number of our existing, core nonproliferation activities.

 

PREVENTING THE SPREAD OF MATERIALS, TECHNOLOGY, AND EXPERTISE RELATING TO WEAPONS OF MASS DESTRUCTION

 

A.  Securing Weapons Expertise 

Our flagship Abrain drain@ prevention programs -- the Initiatives for Proliferation Prevention (IPP) and the Nuclear Cities Initiative -- are keeping former weapons scientists at home as they turn their talents to peaceful pursuits.  Since the inception of IPP program in 1994, more than 6,000 weapons scientists in Russia and the Newly Independent States have been supported through 400 non-military projects.  The program partners Russian and NIS scientists with specialists at the Department=s national laboratories, and concentrates aggressively on the commercialization of projects that are cost-shared with U.S. industry.  Major corporations -- such as United Technologies, DuPont, and American Home Products -- are participating in this program.

 

The Nuclear Cities Initiative, established in late 1998 by Secretary Richardson and Minister for Atomic Energy Adamov, is a new type of Abrain drain@ program in that it is focused on nuclear workers slated to leave the nuclear weapons complex as facilities, and their jobs, are eliminated.  Our initial focus has been on three cities -- Sarov, Snezhinsk, and Zheleznogorsk.  Since April 1999, when my Office was first authorized to spend funds, we have commissioned an Open Computing Center in Sarov and an International Business Development Center in Zheleznogorsk (with similar centers to open soon in Snezhinsk and Sarov), upgraded telecommunications systems in all three cities, and signed an agreement at the end of December 1999 with the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development to open small business loan centers in the three cities, providing access to millions of dollars in potential financing.  We are also developing strategic plans to establish goals, costs, and timelines for workforce reduction and facility closures in each of the three cities.

 

B. Securing Weapon-Usable Materials

Another core activity is our Materials Protection, Control and Accounting (MPC&A) program, an essential bulwark against the nuclear weapons aspirations of terrorists or countries of proliferation concern. Through the MPC&A program, we have built a legacy of trust, solid working relationships and cooperation with Russian agencies, institutes and scientists, facilitating our efforts to improve the security for fissile materials at highest risk throughout the Russian nuclear complex.

Our MPC&A efforts are progressing well.  We have improved the security of hundreds of tons of fissile material at more than 30 sites in Russia.  Last October, Secretary Richardson and Russian Minister for Atomic Energy Adamov signed a government-to-government agreement that will ensure the job is finished at the remaining sites.  We are also nearing completion of a separate implementing agreement with the Russian Ministry of Defense that will advance our MPC&A work at a number of very sensitive Russian Navy sites.  I have been very impressed with the unprecedented degree of cooperation and access shown by the Russian Navy to Department of Energy employees.  Two additional areas of emphasis for the coming year are (1) material consolidation and conversion, and (2) sustainability.  We will accelerate efforts to secure at-risk materials by consolidating highly enriched uranium into fewer buildings and sites and converting it into a form not directly usable in nuclear weapons.  On the Asustainability@ front, we must  ensure that computers for nuclear materials accounting and control remain operational and that the protective locks we help to install do not rust and break away.

Our MPC&A work complements our related cooperative efforts with Russia to prevent unauthorized nuclear trade at nine key border crossing points and transportation centers, and to improve the security for fissile material in the Newly Independent States.  In Kazakhstan, we are nearing completion of a project to can and secure 3,000 spent fuel rods at a reactor site in the eastern part of the country.  We are also close to finishing a similar plutonium security effort in North Korea.

ELIMINATING INVENTORIES OF SURPLUS FISSILE MATERIALS

USABLE FOR NUCLEAR WEAPONS 

A. Fissile Materials Disposition

The transfer of the Office of Fissile Materials Disposition to the new Office of Defense Nuclear Nonproliferation is now complete and has gone extremely well.  There is a strong synergy between fissile materials disposition and my Office=s broader mission to demilitarize large stocks of U.S. and Russian fissile materials surplus to national security requirements and to develop verification systems to assure transparent and irreversible reductions of nuclear weapons.

On the domestic front, we made significant progress this past year, transferring substantial quantities of surplus U.S. highly enriched uranium to the U.S. Enrichment Corporation for down-blending and peaceful use as commercial fuel.  We also entered into contracts for the design of key plutonium disposition facilities.  Internationally, we are now very close to completing negotiations with Russia on a bilateral plutonium disposition agreement.  Implementation of this agreement is needed to trigger the start of actual disposition in both countries.

B. Highly Enriched Uranium Transparency