Report: U.S. Learns to Start Worrying and Love Nuclear Oversight

By DANA LIEBELSON

Dr. Strangelove fans had an exciting news cycle last week, with the release of two new reports that focus on the bomb (and tangentially, one on nuclear energy oversight.) First, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) concluded the U.S. has no reliable way to track uranium and plutonium shipped to more than two dozen countries. Then Bloomberg reported that the U.S. Air Force is overstating the number of nuclear arsenals in service. Finally, the Nuclear Regulatory Committee (NRC) released a report asking for immediate reevaluation of the risks posed by earthquakes and floods to reactors. So put on your cowboy hat, here’s a closer look at these reports.

The U.S. has shipped 17,500 kilograms of highly enriched uranium and separated plutonium—material
that could potentially be used for weapons—to 27 countries with which it has peaceful nuclear cooperation agreements. According to the GAO report, the U.S. can only verify the location of about 1,160 kilograms of this material. Call me crazy, but it seems like a bad idea to track nuclear weapons material like Halloween candy.

The GAO report also reveals that the agencies (NRC, Department of State and the Department of Energy) responsible for visiting countries holding the highest proliferation risk quantities of U.S. nuclear material have not done so. In fact, of the 55 visits made between 1994 and 2010, countries only met international security guidelines about half the time.

“This could be a major violation of America’s international treaty obligations” wrote Adam Weinstein, Mother Jones’ national security reporter.

Bloomberg reported on Thursday that the Air Force claims that it has 555 ‘Minuteman IIIs,’ which are land-based intercontinental nuclear missiles. However, according to congressional investigators and Air Force documents, 105 of these missiles are disassembled. Several officials pointed to this discrepancy as evidence of a lack of accountability.

Senator Tom Carper (D-Delaware) told Bloomberg, “If the Air Force accounting and inventory systems can't accurately count the number of intercontinental ballistic missiles in its possession, it's fair to question whether the Air Force and other military services can count other, more common and more numerous assets.”

The NRC also released a report last week requesting immediate reviews of seismic and flooding risks at 104 nuclear reactors throughout the country. This report comes about in response to the catastrophic Japan earthquake—and also last month’s East coast quake, which knocked over a couple chairs.

According to the report, knowledge of seismic hazards in the U.S. has evolved to the point where it’s time to reevaluate the designs of existing nuclear power reactors to ensure safety standards are met. Additionally, some plants still rely on “temporary flood mitigation measures”—like sandbagging.

The NRC recommends that their recommendations for regulatory actions be initiated “without delay.” Whether this will actually happen remains to be seen: as POGO’s executive director, Danielle Brian wrote recently: “regulators have been knowingly giving a pass to nuclear operators on 'seismic qualification' - i.e. earthquake preparedness - for years.”

Perhaps these kinds of reports would fly with Dr. Strangelove after all—he did say, “the whole point of the Doomsday Machine is lost if you keep it a secret.” Hopefully he was also referring to nuclear transparency—in war and energy.

Dana Liebelson is POGO's Beth Daley Impact Fellow.