Proposed Energy Department Budget Would
Boost Funds for Nuclear Weapons
by Karen Yourish and Matthew Johnson, March 2004

The Bush administration is seeking to boost spending on U.S. nuclear weapons programs in fiscal year 2005 to $6.6 billion, up 5 percent from the $6.2 billion appropriated by Congress for fiscal year 2004. That constitutes the bulk of the administration’s $9 billion budget request for the Department of Energy’s National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA), unveiled Feb. 2. In addition to proposing increases for controversial research on a potential new generation of nuclear weapons, the NNSA request includes funds to maintain the weapons stockpile, prevent the spread of weapons to terrorists and rogue states, safeguard Energy Department facilities, and modernize the infrastructure of the weapons complex.

The president’s proposals promise another year of bickering between the House and the Senate and between Democrats and Republicans over how much money, if any, should be spent on programs that could result in the development of new nuclear weapons. Last November, after months of back and forth, House and Senate appropriators finally agreed to increase spending on nuclear weapons programs in fiscal year 2004 by $273 million from the previous year—about $150 million less than the administration requested but not quite as much as the Senate was willing to provide.

Already, some congressional appropriators have begun to question the Bush administration’s proposals. “With all the proliferation threats we now face with countries like Iran, Pakistan, and North Korea, are we really sending the right signal to those countries and the rest of the world when we embark on nuclear weapons initiatives?” Rep. David Hobson (R-Ohio), chairman of the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Energy and Water, asked Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld at a Feb. 12 hearing of the Defense Appropriations Subcommittee.

Nuclear Earth Penetrators

For fiscal year 2005, Bush has requested $27.6 million for the third and final year of an Air Force-led study on enhancing the capabilities of two existing, high-yield nuclear warhead types—the B-61 and B-83—to penetrate more deeply underground to destroy deeply buried and hardened targets. The request for the potential new weapon, known as the Robust Nuclear Earth Penetrator (RNEP), is a 271 percent increase from Congress’ fiscal year 2004 appropriation of $7.5 million, which was half of what the administration had requested.

Although administration officials have repeatedly argued they simply wish to conduct research, the budget request lays out a five-year research and development schedule for RNEP. According to the plan, NNSA would conclude research at the end of fiscal year 2005 and in fiscal year 2006 would begin a three-year development phase, after which the NNSA would be ready to produce and induct the warhead into the arsenal. Legislation passed in the Fiscal Year 2004 Defense Authorization Act would require congressional authorization for work beyond the research phase. The NNSA budget document estimates that the RNEP research and development program would cost $484.7 million through fiscal year 2009.

Research on New Warheads

The Bush administration is also hoping to increase funding for the Advanced Concepts Initiative in fiscal year 2005 to $9 million to study new nuclear weapons concepts, including lower-yield weapons designed to strike chemical or biological weapons targets.

Last year, at the administration’s urging, Congress repealed the decade-long ban on research leading to the development of low-yield nuclear warheads, which are defined as those with an explosive yield of five kilotons or less TNT equivalent. By comparison, the bomb dropped on Hiroshima was a 13-kiloton nuclear device.

Congress granted the administration’s $6 million request for the program in fiscal year 2004, but fenced off $4 million until the administration delivers its revised nuclear weapons stockpile plan in light of the reductions of deployed warheads outlined under the Strategic Offensive Reductions Treaty.

At the Feb. 12 House Defense Appropriations Subcommittee hearing, Rumsfeld said the Energy and Defense Departments are due to release the stockpile plan to Congress later this spring. “You’ll get your money then,” Hobson said, referring to the $4 million withheld last year.

Enhanced Test Site Readiness

The Energy Department is asking for $5 million more than was appropriated last year to continue preparing the Nevada Test Site to be able to conduct a nuclear test within 18 months of a presidential order. Under the administration’s request, the agency’s test readiness budget would jump 20 percent to $30 million for work to transition from the current testing readiness window of 24-36 months.

Modern Pit Facility

The fiscal year 2005 budget request also includes $29.8 million—a 176 percent increase from the 2004 appropriation—to construct a Modern Pit Facility to restart full-scale production of the plutonium pits for use in new or refurbished warheads at a rate of 150-450 pits per year. Large-scale pit production for nuclear bombs ended at the Rocky Flats Plant in 1989 due to severe health and safety violations.

Congressional critics of the pit facility contend that plutonium pits are readily available from existing nuclear warheads that are not operationally deployed and that it is premature to design and site a facility until the makeup of the future stockpile is more clearly defined. Some argue that, with a smaller nuclear stockpile, a more modest existing facility at Los Alamos National Laboratory could support future stockpile requirements. The Energy Department maintains that, regardless of the stockpile size, the United States will ultimately require a new pit manufacturing capability for new and refurbished plutonium pits.

In response to congressional concerns, NNSA at the end of January delayed the final environmental impact statement (EIS) for the Modern Pit Facility, scheduled for publication in April. The decision to push back publication of the EIS also delays selection of a preferred site for constructing the facility. “Restoring our capability to manufacture plutonium pits is an essential element of America’s nuclear defense policy,” Brooks said in a statement Jan. 28. “While there is widespread support in Congress for this project, I believe we need to pause to respond to concerns that some committees have raised about its scope and timing.”

National Nuclear Security Administration Budget

Key Weapons Programs

Figures are in millions

*Congress withheld $4 million pending delivery of nuclear weapons stockpile report to Congress.

*This article was originally published by Arms Control Today