Oak Ridge, Tennessee uranium processing facility project on track and budget, Sen. Alexander says

U.S. Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-TN) said the Uranium Processing Facility project in Oak Ridge, Tennessee
is on time and on budget in a recent hearing on President Trump’s proposed budget for the National
Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA)

The project’s leaders have been working on implementing the recommendations of a Red Team review conducted in 2014.

“We have said the project needs to be completed by 2025 at a cost of no more than $6.5 billion, and the design of the nuclear facilities needs to be 90% complete before construction of those buildings begins,” Alexander said. “I recently visited Y-12 with Secretary Perry, and saw the work being done to build the new Uranium Processing Facility. I understand the designs for the two nuclear buildings will be more than 90% completed by the end of the year, and ready to start construction next year.”

Alexander also discussed the MOX Fuel Fabrication Facility in South Carolina and the Plutonium Facility in New Mexico, which the NNSA is also responsible for.

A Red Team review found that an alternative to the MOX project, known as the Dilute and Disposal Alternative, would cost about half as much and also get plutonium out of South Carolina faster.

“The MOX Fuel Fabrication Facility, a major construction project in South Carolina, has also raised several concerns because of growing costs,” Alexander said. “Senator Feinstein and I asked for a Red Team review of the MOX project in 2015 to get the project back on track.”