Report says DOE bungles big jobs

A new report criticizes the Department of Energy for major performance and management problems, citing the Yucca Mountain Project, the proposed repository for high-level nuclear waste, as one of the worst examples.

The General Accounting Office, the congressional watchdog agency, released its critique of DOE last week. It was one of 21 critiques it is doing of all high-level executive agencies.

The report cites the $6.5 billion spent on determining the suitability of Yucca Mountain to become a repository for high-level waste as an example of the DOE's inability to complete large projects.

"For example, DOE spent $6.5 billion over 15 years for a permanent disposal site for highly radioactive waste at Yucca Mountain, Nevada," the GAO report said.

"This project is currently 12 years behind schedule, and DOE has not yet determined whether the site is suitable for a repository."

The fifth Green Scissors Report, released by environmental groups last week, also pointed to Yucca Mountain as one of 53 wasteful federal projects.

Last week Lake Barrett, DOE's acting director for radioactive waste management, said that Yucca Mountain could be built, operated and closed for $18.7 billion. He noted that $2.7 billion had been spent directly at the mountain so far. The rest has gone toward such expenses as laboratory research, waste containers and oversight.

Reviewing DOE's progress from 1980 to 1996, the GAO pointed out that DOE handles many big-ticket projects: More than $10 billion was spent on 15 out of 80 critical projects. But it doesn't necessarily handle them well. Of the 80, 31 were canceled.

As a result of DOE's inability to complete the Yucca Mountain project, the GAO report said, utilities that operate nuclear power plants have had to deal with mounting waste.

The DOE has been sued for $8.5 billion by 10 utilities for failing to take irradiated fuel rods away. If the utilities win the lawsuit, the DOE may have to shift funds for its studies at Yucca Mountain to help the utilities store the high-level nuclear waste near the reactors or ship the commercial wastes to a temporary facility. A bill has been introduced in the House of Representatives to create a temporary facility at the Nevada Test Site.

While all federal agencies, including the DOE, have downsized during the 1990s, the Energy Department's task is daunting, the GAO report conceded.

In 1998 alone, the DOE spent almost $18 billion to maintain the nation's nuclear stockpile, manage the largest environmental cleanup in history, support research and development at 23 national laboratories -- including the Nevada Test Site -- and employed more than 11,000 federal workers.

In addition, the DOE is the largest civilian contracting agency in the federal government, the GAO said. It keeps 108,000 contract employees at more than 50 major installations in 35 states.

The DOE recognizes its weaknesses, the report said. The problem is that there are major risks in changing the culture of the department.

And while the DOE has taken steps to become more competitive in its contract reforms, it still considers the process a high-risk issue, the GAO said.

Those concessions did not spare DOE from harsh criticism on other fronts.

The GAO criticized the DOE for funding projects in a piecemeal fashion that delays accomplishments and increases costs.

For example, the DOE is requesting $355 million for fiscal 2000, which begins Oct. 1, to expand studies at Yucca Mountain, Barrett said. That is $3 million less than Congress gave the DOE for Yucca Mountain this year. If Congress cuts that level, delays in some scientific probes will be inevitable, he said.

The GAO also chided the DOE for failing to undergo independent safety inspections. For national security reasons, the DOE has relied on its own staff to ensure health and safety.

"The department's own advisory committee concluded that 'widespread environmental contamination at DOE facilities and the immense costs associated with their cleanup provide clear evidence that self-regulation has failed,' " the GAO report stated, noting that environmental liabilities reported by the DOE in 1997 could total $181 billion.

Just this year the DOE start to bore six wells south and west of Pahute Mesa to monitor whether radioactivity has leaked into the ground water from underground nuclear experiments exploded at the Test Site from 1951 to 1992.

The DOE wells are costing $1 million each. Nye County officials are doing their own ground-water testing for a third of the cost.

Earlier this decade, the DOE took steps toward bringing in outsiders to regulate health and safety but, the GAO report noted, "the DOE has backed off from its initial plans." Instead, pilot programs are under way at a few DOE facilities to see whether independent inspections are warranted.

"Although DOE maintains that its current plan reflects appropriate caution, we believe that the department is wavering in its commitment to external regulation," the GAO said, adding that it had warned the DOE to set up an external review of nuclear and worker safety in May.

As an example of DOE failure on safety matters, GAO pointed to a discovery in 1997 that tritium, a radioactive element, had leaked into ground water from a research reactor at the Brookhaven National Laboratory on Long Island for years because of DOE's weak lines of authority to its contractor. The DOE did not hold the laboratory accountable.

The DOE's own oversight offices reported similar weaknesses before the Brookhaven incident.

archive