nuclear-news

US nuclear agency isn’t consistent in tracking costs for some construction projects, report says

Daily Mail, 26 Jan 24, PHOENIX (AP) – The U.S. agency in charge of maintaining the nation´s nuclear arsenal is not consistent when it comes to tracking the progress of small construction projects, making it difficult to prevent delays and cost overruns, congressional investigators said in a report released Thursday.

The Government Accountability Office warned in the report that even fewer projects will go under the microscope if officials raise the dollar limit for what qualifies as a small project. Congress has raised that threshold numerous times, reaching $30 million during the last fiscal year after having started at $5 million in 2003.

Without collecting and tracking information on minor projects in a consistent manner, National Nuclear Security Administration officials may not have the information they need to manage and assess project performance, the investigators said…………………………………………………

Greg Mello with the Los Alamos Study Group said large projects often are split into two or more smaller ones as a way to avoid federal and congressional oversight and accountability. He said better reporting after the fact won’t necessarily help NNSA do a better job of managing projects going forward.

“There are too many contractors and subcontractors in the value chain, too many profit opportunities and too few penalties for poor performance to expect high-quality results,” he said.

Mello pointed to the contracts to run Los Alamos and other sites that are part of the complex, saying they are worth tens of billions of dollars and are among the largest contracts in the federal government………………………..

Between 2019 and 2023, the congressional investigators documented 414 minor construction projects worth more than $3 billion at NNSA sites across several states. Most of that spending was done at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California and at Sandia and Los Alamos labs in New Mexico.https://www.dailymail.co.uk/wires/ap/article-13008399/US-nuclear-agency-isnt-consistent-tracking-costs-construction-projects-report-says.html

January 27, 2024 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | business and costs, politics