GAO makes recommendations to Energy Department for nuclear site cleanup strategy

The U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) is recommending that the Department of Energy develop a program-wide strategy to clean up waste from Cold War nuclear weapons production.

The DOE is tasked with cleaning up waste from Cold War nuclear weapons production, much of which is hazardous or radioactive. The DOE’s Office of Environmental Management has estimated that the cleanup work could cost $377 billion, which is about $109 billion more than last year’s estimate.

The GAO said the plan should balance risks and costs across the various cleanup sites. Further, the DOE should submit an annual cleanup report and disclose the funding needed to comply. DOE agreed with all three recommendations.

The estimated $377 billion cleanup cost largely reflects estimates of future costs to clean up legacy radioactive tank waste and contaminated facilities and soil. The Office of Environmental Management’s (EM) environmental liability grew by about $214 billion from 2011 to 2018, outpacing its cleanup spending of about $45 billion for that period.

EM relies primarily on individual sites to negotiate cleanup activities and establish priorities. EM sites generally do not consider other sites’ risks and priorities when making cleanup decisions, and this is not consistent with recommendations by GAO to develop national priorities to balance risks and costs across and within its sites. However, EM has not developed such a program-wide strategy. Instead, it continues to fund cleanup activities by individual site. Without a national strategy, EM is likely not making the most cost-effective cleanup decisions across its sites.