OAK RIDGE Tenn. — http://www.therepublic.com/view/story/y12-anniversary/y12-anniversary
For
decades, the Y-12 nuclear weapons plant relished its nickname, the Fort
Knox of Uranium. The self-applied moniker helped define the type of work
that takes place in the government facility and underscored its
top-security image.
Overnight, however, Fort Knox became a laughingstock.
On
July 28, 2012, three intruders cut through fences, avoided detection
and managed to reach the plant's Protected Area, where nuclear warhead
parts are manufactured and where the nation's stockpile of bomb-grade
uranium is stored.
The intruders weren't terrorists or armed
adversaries. They were Bible-quoting pacifists who walked unimpeded into
the plant's inner sanctum.
That made the security failures seem all the worse.
A year later, Y-12 is still making amends and searching for its lost reputation.
Then-Secretary
of Energy Steven Chu called the breach "unacceptable." Congress held
hearings to demand an explanation. Inspector General Greg Friedman said
his team found "troubling displays of ineptitude" and much more. Within a
matter of weeks, the number of investigations reached double digits,
and yet there are still open questions about whether the security
problems have been fixed -- or even properly identified.
Within
the past month, DOE launched yet another review of security issues, not
just at Y-12 but at agency sites around the nation.
Sen. Bob Corker, R-Tenn., visited the plant immediately after the security breach and received a classified briefing.
According
to Laura Herzog, the senator's communications director, Corker was told
Y-12 officials understood the seriousness of the matter and were taking
appropriate corrective actions.
"Since then, another incident has
occurred, suggesting that the Department of Energy still does not have
proper security measures in place at our nuclear weapons facilities,"
she said.
Herzog was making reference to a June 6 security
breakdown in which a driver was waved into the plant at the main
entrance, even though she had no security credentials and no business at
the weapons plant. Two months before that, a bike rider was arrested on
a Y-12 patrol road -- not far from where the Plowshares protesters
initially broke into the plant -- after traversing most of the plant's
north side boundary.
And at the end of July, a year after the
initial break-in, two security police officers were wounded by the
accidental discharge of a firearm.
Despite these lapses, Y-12
supporters cite the many improvements made and claim the Oak Ridge plant
is perhaps more secure than it's ever been.
That statement isn't
convincing because security relies on bluster, as well as barricades,
and Y-12 appears to have lost its swagger.
"The aura of
impregnability is gone. Probably forever," Howard Hall, director of the
University of Tennessee's Institute for Nuclear Security, said. "This
might encourage others to think that similar acts of 'aggressive
dissent' might succeed, and so we may see more of these intrusions in
the future."
Sister Megan Rice, now 83, Greg Boertje-Obed, 58, and
Michael Walli, 64, are incarcerated in Georgia. The three await
sentencing hearings scheduled for Sept. 30.
The activists, known
collectively as the Transform Now Plowshares, were convicted in May on
two felony counts for breaking into Y-12 and damaging government
property. The most serious charge was attempting to injure or interfere
with the national defense. That conviction legally categorized them as
terrorists and made them ineligible for pre-sentencing release.
They face up to 30 years in prison, which could effectively become a life sentence.
It
seems surprising now, but in the months before the break-in, Y-12 was
developing plans to scale down its security force. The National Nuclear
Security Administration had ordered its security contractor to cut costs
to help address tight budgets. Layoffs were in the offing.
The
layoffs were scrapped, of course, after the activists infiltrated the
national security site, tossed blood against the walls of the uranium
storehouse, spray-painted messages and made a mockery of the plant's
protection.
The government acknowledged spending about $15 million
to repair damages and to shore up or replace the sensors, cameras and
other security equipment found to be faulty.
That dollar figure
doesn't come close to the total amount of money the government spent as a
result of the incident, including personnel costs, investigations and
training.
The government hasn't given an official price tag, but a
couple of observers with detailed knowledge of the situation said the
overall tab from the break-in will probably exceed $100 million.
Stephen
Young, a senior analyst with the Union of Concerned Scientists in
Washington, D.C., said there already is "exasperation" with the National
Nuclear Security Administration's governance and cost controls.
"Depending
on how the deck plays out, change is in the cards for the NNSA, and the
break-in plays a substantial role in how likely and how significant
that change will be," Young said. "It may be the break-in was the straw
that broke the camel's back."
(Contact Frank Munger of The Knoxville News Sentinel in Tennessee at MungerF(at)knoxnews.com.)Y-12 nuke plant guards wounded in accident on anniversary of Oak Ridge security breach
On the anniversary of the
worst security breach in the plant's history, there was yet another
security incident at the Y-12 nuclear weapons plant in Oak Ridge, Tenn. —
A federal spokesman confirmed that two Y-12 security police officers
were wounded on Sunday by the accidental discharge of a firearm.
The
guards received first-aid at Y-12 shortly after the 12:15 a.m. incident
and then were taken to the Oak Ridge Methodist Medical Center, where
they were treated and released, Steven Wyatt of the National Nuclear
Security Administration said via email.
Their injuries were described as minor.
The gun incident is under investigation, and the federal agency refused to release details.
Wyatt would not say what type of weapon was involved.
According
to information contained last year in a contract procurement document,
these are the weapons used by Y-12 guards: M249 squad automatic weapon
5.56 mm; Bushmaster M4 5.56 mm with EOTech holographic sight; M240B
medium machine gun 7.62 mm; M134D Dillon Aero minigun 7.62 mm; M67
fragmentation grenade; Remington 870 12-gauge breaching shotgun; M-4
w/M203; and Sig Sauer P226 9 mm.
The news of the latest security
incident came on the anniversary of the July 28, 2102, break-in at Y-12
by three Plowshares protesters, including an 82-year-old Catholic nun.
The
protesters -- Sister Megan Rice, Michael Walli and Greg Boertje-Obed --
were convicted in May of two felony charges associated with damaging
the government property and injuring the national defense activities at
the site, and they are jailed in Georgia while awaiting Sept. 30
sentencing hearings. They face up to 30 years in prison for breaking
into Y-12 and defacing structures, including spray-painted messages on
the walls of the Highly Enriched Uranium Materials Facility.
(Contact
reporter Frank Munger of The Knoxville News Sentinel in Tennessee at
MungerF@knoxnews.com. Distributed by Scripps Howard News Service, http://www.shns.com.)
Frank Munger: Uranium Processing Facility team's growth leads to leased space
A rendering of the Uranium Processing
Facility, the multibillion-dollar production facility to be constructed
at the Y-12 nuclear weapons plant in Oak Ridge.
The UPF, which would
replace several old production facilities at Y-12, has a phase-one
completion date of 2025. For now, the UPF team has had to lease office
space to alleviate staff overcrowding including up to four people
sharing the same cubicle.
The last time the Uranium Processing Facility got too big for its
britches, the problem cost the government about $500 million. I’m
referring, of course, to the design failure that forced the big
project’s design team to redo things — raising the roof by 13 feet and
modifying other features — to make sure that the UPF, once constructed,
could accommodate all of the needed equipment and operations.
This time around the space problem isn’t so complex or nearly so costly. The UPF team grew significantly over the past year, and simply ran out of room (four people, in some instances, shared the same cubicle) and so they had to look for more leased space.
Part of the Uranium Processing Facility team, including top management, has moved into a new facility on Union Valley Road not far from the Y-12 nuclear weapons plant — where the new production facility is to be built between now and 2025 at a cost that’s currently estimated somewhere between $4.2 billion and $6.5 billion.
According to spokeswoman Bridget Correll Waller, the total number of UPF employees grew from 620 in June 2012 to 770 in June 2013. Most of those are contractors and subcontractors who work under the umbrella of B&W Y-12, the government’s managing contractor at Y-12. It also includes the federal staff — notably Federal Project Director John Eschenberg — of the National Nuclear Security Administration.
More hiring is expected, Waller said, especially as site preparation gets underway in earnest on the west side of the Y-12 installation.
“The federal project director is hiring 10 new employees and is continuing to hire industry and subject-matter experts to supplement the project teams’ technical and project management capabilities,” Waller said.
The UPF, which will provide modernized processing and manufacturing capabilities at Y-12, is being billed as the largest construction project in Tennessee history. It is to be constructed adjacent to the Highly Enriched Uranium Materials Facility, which is the hardened storehouse for the nation’s inventory of bomb-grade uranium.
The UPF team had been spread out at multiple facilities, and that will continue to be the case. The employees now located at the Union Valley Road facility were previously split between offices at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Scientific and Technical Information on the east side of Oak Ridge and another facility in Commerce Park. The new site will consolidate the project’s federal staff and project managers, as well as folks working on environmental and safety issues, security and project controls, Waller said.
“It also provides the space needed for the growth of the project,” she said.
“The UPF engineering team has been consolidated into 1099 Commerce Park and Cherahala (an office complex off Hardin Valley Road in Knox County), and the construction team is on site at Y-12 as we proceed with site readiness work and in preparation for construction,” Waller said.
Additional people will be moved to Union Valley Road in the near future to help ease the overcrowding at the other sites, she said.
Total cost of the leased sites, covering 145,000 square feet, is about $2.2 million per year.
This time around the space problem isn’t so complex or nearly so costly. The UPF team grew significantly over the past year, and simply ran out of room (four people, in some instances, shared the same cubicle) and so they had to look for more leased space.
Part of the Uranium Processing Facility team, including top management, has moved into a new facility on Union Valley Road not far from the Y-12 nuclear weapons plant — where the new production facility is to be built between now and 2025 at a cost that’s currently estimated somewhere between $4.2 billion and $6.5 billion.
According to spokeswoman Bridget Correll Waller, the total number of UPF employees grew from 620 in June 2012 to 770 in June 2013. Most of those are contractors and subcontractors who work under the umbrella of B&W Y-12, the government’s managing contractor at Y-12. It also includes the federal staff — notably Federal Project Director John Eschenberg — of the National Nuclear Security Administration.
More hiring is expected, Waller said, especially as site preparation gets underway in earnest on the west side of the Y-12 installation.
“The federal project director is hiring 10 new employees and is continuing to hire industry and subject-matter experts to supplement the project teams’ technical and project management capabilities,” Waller said.
The UPF, which will provide modernized processing and manufacturing capabilities at Y-12, is being billed as the largest construction project in Tennessee history. It is to be constructed adjacent to the Highly Enriched Uranium Materials Facility, which is the hardened storehouse for the nation’s inventory of bomb-grade uranium.
The UPF team had been spread out at multiple facilities, and that will continue to be the case. The employees now located at the Union Valley Road facility were previously split between offices at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Scientific and Technical Information on the east side of Oak Ridge and another facility in Commerce Park. The new site will consolidate the project’s federal staff and project managers, as well as folks working on environmental and safety issues, security and project controls, Waller said.
“It also provides the space needed for the growth of the project,” she said.
“The UPF engineering team has been consolidated into 1099 Commerce Park and Cherahala (an office complex off Hardin Valley Road in Knox County), and the construction team is on site at Y-12 as we proceed with site readiness work and in preparation for construction,” Waller said.
Additional people will be moved to Union Valley Road in the near future to help ease the overcrowding at the other sites, she said.
Total cost of the leased sites, covering 145,000 square feet, is about $2.2 million per year.
© 2013, Knoxville News Sentinel Co.Editorial: NNSA must take control of UPF project at Y-12
Seemingly inevitable cost increases, design flaws and extended
completion dates have combined to undermine confidence in the National
Nuclear Security Administration’s management of the Uranium Processing
Facility project at the Y-12 nuclear weapons plant.
The Oak Ridge project is a vital part of the nation’s effort to
upgrade its nuclear weapons production infrastructure. The UPF would
replace a complex of buildings — some of them dating to the Manhattan
Project — that are inefficient, deteriorating and pose safety risks for
workers.
The NNSA has done the cause no favors by fumbling through the design phase of a project that was green-lighted nine years ago.
The UPF is to be built next to the Highly Enriched Uranium Materials
Facility — the nation’s storehouse for enriched uranium and the building
defaced last year by peace protesters who infiltrated the highly secure
section of the plant. The two facilities are to be joined together.
According to a U.S. Government Accountability Office report released
July 12, the initial cost estimates were based on the construction
costs for the materials storage facility. The UPF, however, is to house
manufacturing, machining and disassembly operations. That accounts for
the rise in the upper cost range estimate from $1.1 billion in 2004 to
the current estimate of $6.5 billion.
That number is all but certain to rise even higher. Last year NNSA
announced that the UPF would have to be redesigned because the building
could not contain all the equipment necessary to its operations. The
roof would have to be raised 13 feet and other design elements revised
accordingly.
David Wilfert, a retired U.S. Department of Energy official who
helped guide the construction of the $1.4 billion Spallation Neutron
Source at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, told the News Sentinel’s Frank
Munger that the UPF management team was “out of control.”
“I cannot imagine how any set of engineers beyond kindergarten could
have gotten that far without discovering that mistake,” Wilfert said.
The GAO blamed the plant’s managing contractor, B&W Y-12, for
inadequately coordinating its work with four subcontractors. The
additional design work will add about $540 million to the cost of the
project. The GAO concluded that “it is not clear if the ($4.2 billion to
$6.5 billion) cost estimate range remains valid.”
NNSA spokesman Steven Wyatt said the redesign is responsible for
extending the construction time line. Originally slated to begin
operations in 2020, the UPF now is expected to begin operations in 2025,
but it will not be fully equipped until 2038. A revised, official cost
estimate should be released next year when the design is expected to be
90 percent complete.
The UPF is necessary to maintain America’s nuclear arsenal, dismantle
warheads and provide fuel for the U.S. Navy’s nuclear vessels. The
current complex of shops continues to deteriorate, resulting in workflow
interruptions and increased safety risks.
The NNSA must gain control of this important national security project and set it on a course for completion.
© 2013, Knoxville News Sentinel Co.Want to use this article? Click here for options!
DOE To Rebuild Y-12 Nuclear Weapons Plant at Oak Ridge, Tennessee
by Paloma Galindo
by Paloma Galindo
http://yeoldeconsciousnessshoppe.com/art47.html
The Department of Energy (DOE) plans to spend $4 billion
to rebuild the Y-12 nuclear weapons plant in Oak Ridge, Tennessee. This
will enable Y-12 to create 10 times as much nuclear weapons work with a
60 percent broader range than current levels.
The bogus draft Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) which
has just been commented upon, would recreate Y-12 with the ability to
not only continue the work of upgrading the US nuclear stockpile, but
also to be able to manufacture parts for new bombs. DOE documents
indicate the national labs are already chomping at the bit to develop a
new generation of "mini-nukes." The DOE calculates that a mini-nuke
would be less offensive than a multi-megaton bomb to the world
community, despite the fact that a mini-nuke would still spread death
and contamination over broad areas, subjecting the world to radiation
poisoning.
Y-12 is the last remaining full-scale nuclear weapons
production plant in the United States. Starting with the Little Boy bomb
that destroyed Hiroshima and continuing today, Y-12 has manufactured
parts for every nuclear weapon in the US arsenal. Y-12 is responsible
for the actual thermonuclear bomb that fits into the carrier vehicle
(missile). Y-12 also contains the world's largest storage of highly
enriched uranium.
The Y-12 Nuclear Weapons Component Plant spreads over 811
acres with an additional 4,800 acres used as a fenced security buffer.
The lush and fertile valley that was confiscated during the Manhattan
Project is home to many species that travel across the fence-line.
For years, hunters given permits on the nuclear
reservation have been required to bring all deer killed to an assay
station, where inspections regularly reveal contaminated body parts
requiring confiscation. In a 1990 environmental survey, grass growing at
the Y-12 plant was discovered to contain radiation.
In 1983, DOE admitted that more than two-million pounds of mercury had previously been "lost to the environment."
Efforts to determine where the mercury went, led the DOE
to estimate that 440,000 pounds of mercury were lost to land, 51,000
pounds to air, 1.3 million pounds are unaccounted for and 240,000 pounds
traveled off site through East Fork Poplar Creek.
East Fork Poplar Creek was long used as an industrial
drainage ditch by Y12. It originates inside the complex and travels
off-site and through the city of Oak Ridge. It flows into the Clinch
River then into the Watts Bar Reservoir followed by the Tennessee River,
Ohio River, the Mississippi and finally into the gulf. When talking to a
Y-12 employee, individuals were told that mercury was the least of the
problems. To this day, mercury continues to leach into the creek.
Y-12 reported the release of 20.9 kilograms of uranium,
including 1.2 kilograms of enriched uranium into the air, this is just
what was reported.
The predominately African-American Scarboro community sits
less than one-half mile from the Y-12 plant. (It is the closest
residential area to a nuclear facility in the country.) The Scarboro
community's soil, tested in 1998 (after the plant was on stand down for
four years) showed elevated levels of highly enriched uranium in the
surface of people's yards! This showed that Y-12 was illegally burning
radioactive materials in the incinerator, and the volitized materials
were released into the air.
Although Y-12 sits on an aquifer and studies have shown
that yes, indeed, waste does filter through limestone and soil into the
water, the DOE is still unable to tell how far the contamination has
spread. Folks who drink the groundwater are not warned, and in fact, one
woman in Scarboro had her spring tested by the DOE and was told the
water was "pure."
The EIS notes that groundwater to the west has been
contaminated by hazardous chemicals and radionuclides, and the aquifers
below Y-12 are contaminated with nitrates, solvents (tricholoroethene
and others), radionuclides (uranium and technetium99) and heavy metals
(uranium, cadmium, strontium). Wells to the east of Y-12 contain
volatile organics like benzene and toluene and a murderer's row of
metals: boron, beryllium, cobalt, copper, chromium, lead, lithium,
mercury, manganese, nickel and uranium.
One member of the Scarboro community counted over 500
cancer related deaths within the community since 1945. Yet the DOE
claims that there are no environmental justice issues. If Y-12 is
allowed to rebuild and increase production, the Earth and neighboring
communities will suffer that much more contaminated waste that will
never be able to be dealt with.
The DOE says it needs a new bomb plant because it needs to
maintain a stockpile of 6,000 nuclear weapons for the US arsenal. This
is said during a time in which Russia has ratified the START2 Treaty
committing them to reduce their stockpile and President Vladimir Putin
has called for deep arsenal reductions.
The US military has petitioned Congress for authority to
reduce its nuclear stockpile, estimating that we can save $9 billion a
year if we retire unusable and unneeded missiles.
Meanwhile, the United States continues its search for a
boogie-man to justify larger budgets and increased production while the
window of opportunity for disarmament closes. We need your help.
You are invited to the April 7-8 action at the gates of
Y-12. Saturday will include nonviolence training for those committing to
an act of civil conscience (arrest scenario) and Sunday is the march,
rally and action, with plenty of non-arrest and equally important
activities. If you can't make it, send us a postcard and let the DOE
know why it shouldn't rebuild. We will put them on the 50-foot
inflatable missile that will be at the rally and then give them to the
media and Y-12. The cards will help illustrate that people from all over
the world don't want Y-12 to be rebuilt! Please help spread the word,
tell folks about Y-12 and come to the gates.
We are in a pivotal time. A time that will either be
remembered as the turning point when we stood for peace or a time
recorded by some future species hypothesizing about the cause of our
disappearance.
I remember a phrase, "love is not an abstract emotion, but
a call to action." This is our choice: to give in or to rise to the
occasion, seize the moment and build the world we want to live in.
For more information, contact Oak Ridge Environmental Peace Alliance, POB 5743, Oak Ridge, TN 37831; (865) 483-8202; palomagal@earthlink.net.
© Earth First! Journal, March-April 2001
Oak Ridge Y-12 Map
Y-12 nuclear weapons plant in Oak Ridge, Tenn
Oak Ridge Y-12 National Security Complex
Y-12 National Security Complex http://www.nukeworker.com/pictures/thumbnails-60.html
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History of the Atomic Bomb & The Manhattan Project
My God, what have we done?" - Robert Lewis co-pilot of the Enola Gay
Atomic Bomb Explosion
Courtesy Outlawlab
By Mary Bellis, About.com Guide
On August 2, 1939, just before the beginning of World War II, Albert Einstein
wrote to then President Franklin D. Roosevelt. Einstein and several
other scientists told Roosevelt of efforts in Nazi Germany to purify
uranium-235, which could be used to build an atomic bomb. It was shortly
thereafter that the United States Government began the serious
undertaking known then only as "The Manhattan Project." Simply put, the
Manhattan Project was committed to expediting research that would
produce a viable atomic bomb.
Making Enriched Uranium
The most complicated issue to be addressed in making of an atomic bomb
was the production of ample amounts of "enriched" uranium to sustain a
chain reaction. At the time, uranium-235 was very hard to extract. In
fact, the ratio of conversion from uranium ore to uranium metal is
500:1. Compounding this, the one part of uranium that is finally refined
from the ore is over 99% uranium-238, which is practically useless for
an atomic bomb. To make the task even more difficult, the useful U-235
and nearly useless U-238 are isotopes, nearly identical in their
chemical makeup. No ordinary chemical extraction method could separate
them; only mechanical methods could work.
A massive enrichment laboratory/plant was constructed at Oak Ridge,
Tennessee. Harold Urey and his colleagues at Columbia University devised
an extraction system that worked on the principle of gaseous diffusion,
and Ernest Lawrence
(inventor of the Cyclotron) at the University of California in Berkeley
implemented a process involving magnetic separation of the two
isotopes.
Next, a gas centrifuge was used to further separate the lighter U-235
from the heavier, non-fissionable U-238. Once all of these procedures
had been completed, all that needed to be done was to put to the test
the entire concept behind atomic fission ("splitting the atom," in
layman's terms).
Robert Oppenheimer - Manhattan Project
Over the course of six years, from 1939 to 1945, more than $2 billion
was spent during the history of the Manhattan Project. The formulas for
refining uranium and putting together a working atomic bomb were created
and seen to their logical ends by some of the greatest minds of our
time. Chief among the people who unleashed the power of the atom was Robert Oppenheimer, who oversaw the project from conception to completion.
Testing The Gadget aka Atomic Bomb
Finally, the day came when all at Los Alamos would find out if "The
Gadget" (code-named as such during its development) was going to be the
colossal dud of the century or perhaps an end to the war. It all came
down to a fateful morning in midsummer, 1945.
At 5:29:45 (Mountain War Time) on July 16, 1945, in a white blaze that
stretched from the basin of the Jemez Mountains in northern New Mexico
to the still-dark skies, "The Gadget" ushered in the Atomic Age. The light of the explosion
then turned orange as the atomic fireball began shooting upwards at 360
feet per second, reddening and pulsing as it cooled. The characteristic
mushroom cloud of radioactive vapor materialized at 30,000 feet.
Beneath the cloud, all that remained of the soil at the blast site were
fragments of jade green radioactive glass created by the heat of the
reaction.
The brilliant light from the detonation pierced the early morning skies
with such intensity that residents from a faraway neighboring community
would swear that the sun came up twice that day. Even more astonishing
is that a blind girl saw the flash 120 miles away.
Upon witnessing the explosion, its creators had mixed reactions. Isidor
Rabi felt that the equilibrium in nature had been upset as if humankind
had become a threat to the world it inhabited. Robert Oppenheimer,
though ecstatic about the success of the project, quoted a remembered
fragment from the Bhagavad Gita. "I am become Death," he said, "the
destroyer of worlds." Ken Bainbridge, the test director, told
Oppenheimer, "Now we're all sons of bitches."
After viewing the results several participants signed petitions against
loosing the monster they had created, but their protests fell on deaf
ears. The Jornada del Muerto of New Mexico would not be the last site on
planet Earth to experience an atomic explosion.
Key Staff - Manhattan Project
Scientists Who Invented the Atomic Bomb under the Manhattan Project: Robert Oppenheimer, David Bohm, Leo Szilard, Eugene Wigner, Otto Frisch, Rudolf Peierls, Felix Bloch, Niels Bohr, Emilio Segre, James Franck, Enrico Fermi, Klaus Fuchs and Edward Teller. View a copy of the letter Einstein wrote Roosevelt that prompted the Manhattan Project.
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