Federal Law Violations, Anti-democratic Process in Preparing for New Plutonium Weapon Cores

By Los Alamos Study Group

At a February public hearing, the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) was harshly criticized by citizen watchdogs for its tardy environmental analysis of plans to produce new plutonium nuclear warhead cores (known as “pits”) at the Los Alamos National Lab (LANL) in New Mexico. The critics condemn the report’s inadequacy and the agency’s violations of the National Environmental Policy Act or NEPA.

LANL has decided to build extremely complex and dangerous plutonium fabrication systems on its highly-contaminated New Mexico site in order to fabricate new pits for future warheads. The production would violate long-standing policy, as well as presidential promises that the United States would not manufacture new nuclear weapons.

The Pentagon’s 2010 Nuclear Posture Review said, “It is U.S. nuclear policy that nuclear weapons Life Extension Programs…will not support new military missions or provide for new military capabilities.” The Los Alamos Study Group lambasted the NNSA and its “after decision” report and the group has collected 1,125 individual and 245 business, organizational, and religious community endorsements to the following statement:

“We call upon our elected officials to: Oppose plutonium warhead core (‘pit’) production at LANL first and foremost, but also elsewhere; Oppose the design, testing, and production of new and ‘upgraded’ nuclear weapons; Prioritize removal and disposal of legacy plutonium waste from LANL over production of additional nuclear waste from nuclear weapons; Choose human security, community resilience, and environmental protection over nuclear weapons production and our bloated military. We can no longer delay. We must use every opportunity, at every level of government, to prioritize human needs, invest in our communities, and build a more just and sustainable society.”

Study Group Director Greg Mello said at a hearing:

“These hearings and ‘comment opportunities’ are being staged to create a veneer of legitimacy for decisions taken prior to environmental analysis, in direct violation of NEPA, and to avoid proper NEPA analysis in the future. A completed Site-Wide Environmental Impact Statement (SWEIS) is — NNSA hopes — a NEPA ‘get out of jail free’ ticket.

“There has never been any valid environmental analysis of the choice to produce plutonium pits at LANL. The present process is NNSA’s attempt to cover its tracks.

“There has never even been a business-case analysis by NNSA endorsing production in LANL’s old plutonium building, an omission contrary to Dept. of Energy regulations. In 2017, NNSA said ‘don’t do it there’. It’s still a terrible idea and NNSA knows it.

“The SWEIS ‘alternatives’ aren’t alternatives at all. By merely including all these projects in the SWEIS, NNSA will have done, by its lights, sufficient NEPA analysis to go ahead with any or all of them. They do not have to agree with any comments or engage with commenters in good faith.

“These hearings are designed to take the democratic voice from civil society, not to provide it. NNSA is not here to listen and does not care what the public says.”

Study Group organizer Bex Hampton added, “New Mexicans were never given a choice regarding whether to host a plutonium pit factory in our state because if we had an option we would oppose it. We would not consent to becoming ‘ground zero’ for the new nuclear arms race with Russia and China, and we will continue to organize to halt the Los Alamos Plutonium Bomb factory in its tracks.”

— The Los Alamos Study group is a watchdog organization in Albuquerque.