[House Hearing, 114 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
DOE FOR THE 21ST CENTURY: SCIENCE, ENVIRONMENT, AND NATIONAL SECURITY
MISSIONS
=======================================================================
HEARING
BEFORE THE
SUBCOMMITTEE ON OVERSIGHT AND INVESTIGATIONS
OF THE
COMMITTEE ON ENERGY AND COMMERCE
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED FOURTEENTH CONGRESS
SECOND SESSION
----------
FEBRUARY 24, 2016
----------
Serial No. 114-119
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Printed for the use of the Committee on Energy and Commerce
energycommerce.house.gov
DOE FOR THE 21ST CENTURY: SCIENCE, ENVIRONMENT, AND NATIONAL SECURITY
MISSIONS
=======================================================================
HEARING
BEFORE THE
SUBCOMMITTEE ON OVERSIGHT AND INVESTIGATIONS
OF THE
COMMITTEE ON ENERGY AND COMMERCE
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED FOURTEENTH CONGRESS
SECOND SESSION
__________
FEBRUARY 24, 2016
__________
Serial No. 114-119
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Printed for the use of the Committee on Energy and Commerce
energycommerce.house.gov
______
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COMMITTEE ON ENERGY AND COMMERCE
FRED UPTON, Michigan
Chairman
JOE BARTON, Texas FRANK PALLONE, Jr., New Jersey
Chairman Emeritus Ranking Member
ED WHITFIELD, Kentucky BOBBY L. RUSH, Illinois
JOHN SHIMKUS, Illinois ANNA G. ESHOO, California
JOSEPH R. PITTS, Pennsylvania ELIOT L. ENGEL, New York
GREG WALDEN, Oregon GENE GREEN, Texas
TIM MURPHY, Pennsylvania DIANA DeGETTE, Colorado
MICHAEL C. BURGESS, Texas LOIS CAPPS, California
MARSHA BLACKBURN, Tennessee MICHAEL F. DOYLE, Pennsylvania
Vice Chairman JANICE D. SCHAKOWSKY, Illinois
STEVE SCALISE, Louisiana G.K. BUTTERFIELD, North Carolina
ROBERT E. LATTA, Ohio DORIS O. MATSUI, California
CATHY McMORRIS RODGERS, Washington KATHY CASTOR, Florida
GREGG HARPER, Mississippi JOHN P. SARBANES, Maryland
LEONARD LANCE, New Jersey JERRY McNERNEY, California
BRETT GUTHRIE, Kentucky PETER WELCH, Vermont
PETE OLSON, Texas BEN RAY LUJAN, New Mexico
DAVID B. McKINLEY, West Virginia PAUL TONKO, New York
MIKE POMPEO, Kansas JOHN A. YARMUTH, Kentucky
ADAM KINZINGER, Illinois YVETTE D. CLARKE, New York
H. MORGAN GRIFFITH, Virginia DAVID LOEBSACK, Iowa
GUS M. BILIRAKIS, Florida KURT SCHRADER, Oregon
BILL JOHNSON, Ohio JOSEPH P. KENNEDY, III,
BILLY LONG, Missouri Massachusetts
RENEE L. ELLMERS, North Carolina TONY CARDENAS, California
LARRY BUCSHON, Indiana
BILL FLORES, Texas
SUSAN W. BROOKS, Indiana
MARKWAYNE MULLIN, Oklahoma
RICHARD HUDSON, North Carolina
CHRIS COLLINS, New York
KEVIN CRAMER, North Dakota
Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations
TIM MURPHY, Pennsylvania
Chairman
DAVID B. McKINLEY, West Virginia DIANA DeGETTE, Colorado
Vice Chairman Ranking Member
MICHAEL C. BURGESS, Texas JANICE D. SCHAKOWSKY, Illinois
MARSHA BLACKBURN, Tennessee KATHY CASTOR, Florida
H. MORGAN GRIFFITH, Virginia PAUL TONKO, New York
LARRY BUCSHON, Indiana JOHN A. YARMUTH, Kentucky
BILL FLORES, Texas YVETTE D. CLARKE, New York
SUSAN W. BROOKS, Indiana JOSEPH P. KENNEDY, III,
MARKWAYNE MULLIN, Oklahoma Massachusetts
RICHARD HUDSON, North Carolina GENE GREEN, Texas
CHRIS COLLINS, New York PETER WELCH, Vermont
KEVIN CRAMER, North Dakota FRANK PALLONE, Jr., New Jersey (ex
JOE BARTON, Texas officio)
FRED UPTON, Michigan (ex officio)
C O N T E N T S
----------
Page
Hon. Tim Murphy, a Representative in Congress from the
Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, opening statement................ 1
Prepared statement........................................... 3
Hon. Fred Upton, a Representative in Congress from the state of
Michigan, prepared statement................................... 53
Hon. Frank Pallone, Jr., a Representative in Congress from the
State of New Jersey, prepared statement........................ 54
Witnesses
Norman Augustine, Co-Chairman, Congressional Advisory Panel on
the Governance of the Nuclear Security Enterprise.............. 8
Prepared statement........................................... 10
Answers to submitted questions............................... 312
Richard Mies, Admiral, U.S. Navy (Retired), Co-Chairman,
Congressional Advisory Panel on the Governance of the Nuclear
Security Enterprise............................................ 15
Prepared statement........................................... 18
Answers to submitted questions \1\........................... 313
Jared Cohon, Co-Chairman, Commission to Review the Effectiveness
of the National Energy Laboratories............................ 31
Prepared statement........................................... 34
Answers to submitted questions............................... 323
TJ Glauthier, Co-Chairman, Commission to Review the Effectiveness
of the National Energy Laboratories............................ 31
Prepared statement........................................... 34
Answers to submitted questions \2\........................... 324
Submitted material
Document binder.................................................. 56
----------
\1\ Mr. Mies and Mr. Augustine submitted a joint response which
begins on page 314.
\2\ Mr. Glauthier and Mr. Cohon submitted a joint response which
begins on page 325.
DOE FOR THE 21ST CENTURY: SCIENCE, ENVIRONMENT, AND NATIONAL SECURITY
MISSIONS
----------
WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 24, 2016
House of Representatives,
Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations,
Committee on Energy and Commerce,
Washington, DC.
The subcommittee met, pursuant to call, at 11:30 a.m., in
room 2322 Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Tim Murphy
(chairman of the subcommittee) presiding.
Members present: Representatives Murphy, McKinley,
Griffith, Flores, Brooks, Mullin, Cramer, DeGette, Schakowsky,
Tonko, Kennedy, and Welch.
Staff present: Leighton Brown, Deputy Press Secretary;
Charles Ingebretson, Chief Counsel, Oversight and
Investigations; A.T. Johnston, Senior Policy Advisor; John
Ohly, Professional Staff, Oversight and Investigations; Chris
Santini, Policy Coordinator, Oversight and Investigations; Dan
Schneider, Press Secretary; Peter Spencer, Professional Staff
Member, Oversight; Gregory Watson, Legislative Clerk,
Communications and Technology; Andy Zach, Counsel, Environment
and the Economy; Ryan Gottschall, Minority GAO Detailee; Rick
Kessler, Minority Senior Advisor and Staff Director, Energy and
Environment; Chris Knauer, Minority Oversight Staff Director;
Una Lee, Minority Chief Oversight Counsel; and Elizabeth
Letter, Minority Professional Staff Member.
OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. TIM MURPHY, A REPRESENTATIVE IN
CONGRESS FROM THE COMMONWEALTH OF PENNSYLVANIA
Mr. Murphy. Good morning. Today we will begin to examine
how well the Department is prepared to meet its
responsibilities for the 21st century in this hearing of the
Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Oversight and
Investigations. This includes what is necessary to enhance the
performance of the department's national laboratory system,
which harbors the technological tools and know-how for
advancing our nuclear security as well as the nation's edge in
important science, energy, and environmental missions.
Indeed, a strong national laboratory system, well managed
and overseen, increases the prospects for a strong DOE mission
performance across the board. I know from my own experiences
with the National Energy Technology Laboratory, located in my
district, which has developed carbon capture storage technology
that has allowed the nation to achieve its lowest carbon
emission rates in over two decades, the essential role our
national laboratories can play to meet the nation's needs.
When it comes to the various missions for DOE, none surpass
in importance the Department's critical responsibility for
maintaining the nation's nuclear deterrent and technological
superiority on all aspects of nuclear security.
This morning we will hear why enhancing and sustaining U.S.
nuclear and technological leadership is vital for confronting
the complex challenges of the dangerous age we live in--with
potential adversaries modernizing their nuclear arsenals; with
threats of Iran, other nation-states; with emerging new nuclear
technologies and proliferation risks.
Unfortunately, we will also hear that efforts to place
DOE's nuclear security operations on a sustainable track have
been coming up short for decades. Part of the problem has been
the complicated relationships through which DOE pursues its
various missions. Most of its work is performed by contractors
at the national laboratories and production sites.
The benefit of this contracting approach is that it
harnesses the best scientific, engineering, and management
expertise of industry and academia; the downside is that it
creates difficult oversight and accountability requirements--
from DOE headquarters to the site offices to the contractor
management to the operators in the field. In our hearing last
summer on a radiological incident that began at the Los Alamos
National Laboratory, we saw a vivid example of how oversight
and contractor accountability breakdowns led to a costly $500
million incident.
The most dramatic effect to address the management problems
in the nuclear weapons complex occurred in late 1999. Congress,
in reaction to serious security, project management and safety
issues, created the National Nuclear Security Administration,
or NNSA, as a semi-autonomous agency within DOE aimed at
focusing mission oversight to improve mission performance. Yet
the new agency did not improve oversight or accountability. In
some respects, the complexity increased, with more offices,
more audits, more lines of reporting--increasing costs,
obscuring communications, confusing decision-making
accountability.
Problems persisted--billion dollar cost overruns, delayed
and cancelled projects, deferred maintenance, serious safety
and security mishaps, and oversight failures at the Department,
site office, and contractor level--all documented in this
committee's oversight.
Three years ago, in the wake of across-the-board oversight
failures at NNSA's Y-12 site, Congress created the
Congressional Advisory Panel on the Governance of Nuclear
Security Enterprise. The independent, bipartisan panel examined
and made recommendations concerning the management of NNSA's
nuclear operations and alternative governance models.
Let me quote the panel's diagnosis, released just over a
year ago:
``One unmistakable conclusion is that NNSA governance
reform, at least as it has been implemented, has failed to
provide the effective, mission-focused enterprise that Congress
intended. The necessary fixes will not be simple or quick, and
they must address systemic problems in both management
practices and culture that exist across the nuclear
enterprise.''
That panel said the lack of sustained leadership focus on
the nuclear security mission contributes to virtually all the
observed problems. Other problems contributing to the failures
include overlapping DOE and NNSA headquarters staffs and
blurred ownership and accountability for the nuclear enterprise
missions, and dysfunctional relationships between mission-
support staffs and between the government and its contractors
operating the sites--all issues very familiar to this
committee.
Today's hearing will focus on the path to position DOE to
take on its critical nuclear security responsibilities. A key
element is to examine how to strengthen and sustain cabinet
secretary's ownership of the nuclear security mission and
reduce bureaucratic overlap.
We have four distinguished witnesses who can outline the
roadmap for reform: the co-chairmen of the Congressional
Advisory Panel who can explain what is necessary to cut a path
forward to clarify roles, responsibilities and accountability,
reduce duplicative offices, and improve the nuclear security
mission.
We will also hear from the co-chairmen of the
congressionally chartered Commission to Review the
Effectiveness of the National Energy Laboratories. This
Commission, which released its comprehensive report this past
October, identified challenges across DOE laboratory system
that relate to oversight, micro-management, and related
problems we see most visibly in the nuclear weapons programs.
In many respects, the thoughtful recommendations from these
panels complement each other and can serve this committee as a
guide for identifying what is necessary to address DOE
governance and management shortcomings going forward.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Murphy follows:]
Prepared statement of Hon. Tim Murphy
Today, we will begin to examine how well the Department is
prepared to meet its responsibilities for the 21st Century.
This includes what is necessary to enhance the performance of
the department's national laboratory system--which harbors the
technological tools and know-how for advancing our nuclear
security as well as the nation's edge in important science,
energy, and environmental missions.
Indeed, a strong national laboratory system, well managed
and overseen, increases the prospects for strong DOE mission
performance across the board. I know from my own experience
with the National Energy Technology Laboratory, located in my
district, which has developed carbon capture storage technology
that has allowed the nation to achieve its lowest carbon
emissions rates in over two decades, the essential role our
national laboratories can play to meet the nation's needs.
When it comes to the various missions for DOE none surpass
in importance the department's critical responsibility for
maintaining the nation's nuclear deterrent and technological
superiority on all aspects of nuclear security.
This morning, we will hear why enhancing and sustaining
U.S. nuclear and technological leadership is vital for
confronting the complex challenges of the dangerous age we live
in- with potential adversaries modernizing their nuclear
arsenals; with threats of Iran, other nation-states; with
emerging new nuclear technologies and proliferation risks.
Unfortunately, we will also hear that efforts to place
DOE's nuclear security operations on a sustainable track have
been coming up short for decades. Part of the problem has been
the complicated relationships through which DOE pursues its
various missions: most of its work is performed by contractors
at the national laboratories and production sites.
The benefit of this contracting approach is that it
harnesses the best scientific, engineering, and management
expertise of industry and academia; the downside is that it
creates difficult oversight and accountability requirements-
from DOE headquarters to the site offices, to the contractor
management, to the operators in the field. In our hearing last
summer on a radiological incident that began at the Los Alamos
National Laboratory, we saw a vivid example of how oversight
and contractor accountability breakdowns lead to a costly, 500
million dollar incident.
The most dramatic effort to address the management problems
in the nuclear weapons complex occurred in late 1999. Congress,
in reaction to serious security, project management and safety
issues, created the National Nuclear Security Administration
(NNSA) as a semi-autonomous agency within DOE aimed at focusing
on mission oversight to improve mission performance. Yet the
new agency did not improve oversight or accountability. In some
respects, the complexity increased, with more offices, more
audits, more lines of reporting--increasing costs, obscuring
communications, confusing decision-making accountability.
Problems persisted-billion dollar cost overruns; delayed
and cancelled projects; deferred maintenance; serious safety
and security mishaps; and oversight failures at the Department,
site office, and contractor level-all documented in this
committee's oversight.
Three years ago, in the wake of across-the-board oversight
failures at NNSA's Y-12 site, Congress created the
Congressional Advisory Panel on the Governance of the Nuclear
Security Enterprise. The independent, bi-partisan panel
examined and made recommendations concerning the management of
NNSA's nuclear operations and alternative governance models.
Let me quote the panel's diagnosis, released just over a
year ago:
``One unmistakable conclusion is that NNSA governance
reform, at least as it has been implemented, has failed to
provide the effective, mission-focused enterprise that Congress
intended. The necessary fixes will not be simple or quick, and
they must address systemic problems in both management
practices and culture that exist across the nuclear
enterprise.''
That panel said the lack of sustained leadership focus on
the nuclear security mission contributes to virtually all the
observed problems. Other problems contributing to the failures
included: Overlapping DOE and NNSA headquarters staffs and
blurred ownership and accountability for the nuclear enterprise
missions; and dysfunctional relationships between line managers
and mission-support staffs and between the government and its
contractors, operating the sites-all issues familiar to this
committee.
Today's hearing will focus on the path to position DOE to
take on its critical nuclear security responsibilities. A key
element is to examine how to strengthen-and sustain- Cabinet
secretary's ownership of the nuclear security mission and
reduce bureaucratic overlap.
We have four distinguished witnesses who can outline the
roadmap for reform: the co-chairmen of the Congressional
Advisory Panel, who can explain what is necessary to cut a path
forward to clarify roles, responsibilities and accountability,
reduce duplicative offices, and improve the nuclear security
mission.
We will also hear from the co-chairman of the
congressionally chartered Commission to Review the
Effectiveness of the National Energy Laboratories. This
Commission, which released its comprehensive report this past
October, identifies challenges across DOE's laboratory system
that related to oversight, micro-management, and related
problems we see most visibly in the nuclear weapons programs.
In many respects, the thoughtful recommendations from these
panels complement each other, and can serve this committee as a
guide for identifying what is necessary to address DOE
governance and management shortcomings going forward.
Mr. Murphy. So I thank all the witnesses for attending, and
I now recognize the ranking member from Colorado, Ms. DeGette,
for 5 minutes.
Ms. DeGette. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. As you have heard me
say before, I have been on this subcommittee now for, I am in
my 20th year on this subcommittee, and unfortunately, the long
view doesn't improve the situation regarding the NNSA. This
agency was created more than a decade ago as a semi-autonomous
agency within the Department of Energy because of the systemic
and complex problems that were facing the labs and a belief
that by somehow creating this agency it would solve the
problems.
At the time, my mentor and the former chairman, John
Dingell, and others, cautioned that this move would not solve
the complex management and structural issues that faced the
nuclear weapons complex and national labs, and would likely
lead to greater problems, and lo, their prediction proved true.
Over the course of the next decade, this very subcommittee
investigated and held hearings about the weapons labs,
examining accidents, missing or mishandled classified
materials, management and staff clashes, and mismanaged
projects that would ultimately cost taxpayers hundreds of
millions of dollars to fix. At one of those hearings, Chairman
Barton said, ``NNSA was a management experiment gone wrong.''
So here we are again today looking at ongoing challenges
and issues facing the nuclear security enterprise in national
labs and, more specifically, organizational and structural
issues affecting the NNSA. What is different, however, is that
rather than focusing on any particular mishap, we now today
have a highly regarded group of experts who have authored two
major reports with recommendations that can make the labs and
the NNSA function better.
So at the outset, gentlemen, let me thank you for the work
that you and your colleagues have done in this undertaking.
Both reports, one that focuses on the labs as a whole and one
that focuses on reforming the NNSA, offer an exceptional
blueprint on what is needed to improve the functioning of the
labs and the NNSA.
I am particularly interested in discussing the findings and
recommendations by the Advisory Panel on the Governance of the
Nuclear Security Enterprise. That panel, spearheaded by Admiral
Mies and Mr. Augustine, concluded what many of us have long
believed: the current structure of NNSA is not working. As
stated in the interim report, the NNSA experiment involving
creation of a semi-autonomous organization has failed.
Mr. Chairman, that is a sobering finding. NNSA is a
critical agency, its weapons labs are responsible for the
nation's nuclear deterrent, and as the panel pointed out, this
is no time for complacency. That is because as the report also
concludes, nuclear forces provide the ultimate guarantee
against major war and coercion. It is time that Congress really
rolls up its sleeves to address the multitude of problems that
we have known about for far too long but have failed to
correct.
The work of Mies-Augustine highlights several key areas
where attention is needed. For example, the panel's final
report concluded that the relationship between line managers
and mission support staff at NNSA is broken and is damaging the
management culture within the agency. The panel also found that
there continues to exist, a dysfunctional relationship between
the government and the contractors that operate NNSA sites
which has created a dysfunctional form of oversight.
Finally, the panel concluded that the creation of NNSA as a
separately organized, quasi-independent agency within DOE is
not working. Again, I am particularly concerned about this last
finding. The panel closely examined the current arrangement of
NNSA as a semi-autonomous entity within DOE. It concluded that
the solution was not to seek a higher degree of autonomy for
the agency, but to reintegrate it back into the DOE and place
its mission on the shoulders of a qualified secretary.
Mr. Chairman, this is a very important hearing. I want to
thank you for having it. But as I said it earlier this month at
the hearing that we had on biodefense, we can't do justice with
this topic with just one or two hearings. Today's panel
reports, like the bioterrorism blueprint, offer us a road map
for addressing the multitude of problems plaguing the labs and
NNSA. I have seen this for 20 years now. We can't make progress
if we don't conduct regular oversight of this agency and
everything that it oversees.
So similar to our last hearing, I am asking that this panel
follows through with the recommendations before us today and
conducts aggressive oversight on all of these issues that are
raised in these reports. NNSA's core mission is to develop and
maintain the very tools and capabilities that keep our nation
and allies secure. It is time we addressed these challenges,
and what our panelists have provided to us are two of the best
playbooks we have seen on these issues.
I will also say, like so many of the things this panel
deals with this is a completely bipartisan issue. And so I
think what we could do working forward is we could really do a
deep bipartisan dive into this. We could help implement some of
these panel's recommendations, and if we do the result of that
is increasing our nation's security and I think that is the
most important thing we could do. I yield back.
Mr. Murphy. Well said. We don't have any more opening
statements on our side. Do you have any more on your side?
Ms. DeGette. No.
Mr. Murphy. If not, we will proceed with our panel. But I
also want to ask unanimous consent that the members' written
openings statements are introduced into the record, and without
objection, the documents will be entered into the record.
So I would now like to introduce the witnesses for today's
hearing. The first witness today on the panel is the Honorable
Norman Augustine. Mr. Augustine is the retired chairman and CEO
of Lockheed Martin. He has held positions in government,
industry, academia, and nonprofit sector. He has been chairman
of the National Academy of Engineering; was a 16-year member of
the President's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology.
Mr. Augustine is here today in his capacity as co-chair of the
Congressional Advisory Panel on the Governance of the Nuclear
Security Enterprise.
And we thank you, Mr. Augustine, for preparing your
testimony and we look forward to your insights on these
matters.
We also want to thank Admiral Richard W. Mies. I am a
shipmate. I served in the Navy concurrently, and oftentimes
this summer we would stand on the deck of the USS Ronald Reagan
watching the submarine races at night. You can imagine the
excitement of that because you are a submariner or two, right.
He is a distinguished graduate of the Naval Academy.
Admiral Mies completed a 35-year career as a nuclear submariner
in the U.S. Navy and commanded the U.S. Strategic Command for
four years prior to retirement in 2002. Admiral Mies served as
co-chair to the Congressional Advisory Panel on the Governance
of the Nuclear Security Enterprise, and we thank him for his
service to our country and look forward to learning from your
expertise today.
Next, I would like to introduce Dr. Jared Cohon, a co-chair
of the Commission to Review the Effectiveness of the National
Energy Laboratories. Dr. Cohon is also president emeritus of
Carnegie Mellon University, where I have gotten to know him
over the years and have a great deal of respect, and he
currently serves as director of the Wilton E. Scott Institute
for Energy Innovation. In 2012, Dr. Cohon received the national
engineering award for the National Association of Engineering
Societies, and author, co-author or editor of more than 80
professional publications and a member of the National Academy
of Engineering. We look forward to your testimony this morning.
And finally, we also welcome the Honorable TJ Glauthier, a
former deputy secretary of the Department of Energy and current
co-chair of the congressional Commission to Review the
Effectiveness of the National Energy Laboratories. Mr.
Glauthier is president of TJG Energy Associates, LLC, where he
is an advisor and board member for public and private
organizations to the energy sector.
During his distinguished career, Mr. Glauthier has been
awarded medals for distinguished service from NASA, Department
of Energy, and the executive office of the President and Office
of Management and Budget. We appreciate his time today, and
once again thank all the witnesses for being here.
As you are all aware, this committee is holding an
investigative hearing, and when doing so has had the practice
of taking testimony under oath. Do any of you object to
testifying under oath? And seeing no objections, the chair then
advises you that under the rules of the House and rules of the
committee, you are entitled to be advised by counsel. Do you
desire to be advised by counsel during your testimony today?
And seeing no requests for that, in that case would you all
please rise, raise your right hand, and I will swear you in.
[Witnesses sworn.]
Mr. Murphy. Thank you. And all the witnesses have entered
they do, so you are now under oath and subject to the penalties
set forth in Title 18 Section 1001 of the United States Code.
We are going to start off with Mr. Augustine for your five-
minute summary of your written statement. Turn the mike a
little bit closer to you and watch the lights there, because
when they turn red that means your five minutes is up. Thank
you, sir.
STATEMENTS OF NORMAN AUGUSTINE, CO-CHAIRMAN, CONGRESSIONAL
ADVISORY PANEL ON THE GOVERNANCE OF THE NUCLEAR SECURITY
ENTERPRISE; ADMIRAL RICHARD MIES, U.S. NAVY (RETIRED), CO-
CHAIRMAN, CONGRESSIONAL ADVISORY PANEL ON THE GOVERNANCE OF THE
NUCLEAR SECURITY ENTERPRISE; JARED COHON, CO-CHAIRMAN,
COMMISSION TO REVIEW THE EFFECTIVENESS OF THE NATIONAL ENERGY
LABORATORIES; AND TJ GLAUTHIER, CO-CHAIRMAN, COMMISSION TO
REVIEW THE EFFECTIVENESS OF THE NATIONAL ENERGY LABORATORIES
STATEMENT OF MR. AUGUSTINE
Mr. Augustine. Well, Mr. Chairman and Ranking Member, thank
you very much for this opportunity to present the results of
the Congressional Advisory Committee on the Governance of
Nuclear Security Enterprise. And as you pointed out, Admiral
Mies and I served as the co-chairs of that endeavor.
Our report was submitted about 15 months ago. It was put
together by 12 members of our commission. It was unanimous. It
drew upon many decades of experience of those 12 members. We
reviewed thousands of pages of documents. We visited probably
most of, if not all of the major facilities of the nuclear
enterprise, and we had the benefit of a large number of
witnesses that appeared before our group.
We should state at the outset in no uncertain terms that
the viability of America's nuclear deterrent today is not
questioned in any way. It is absolutely sound and based
successfully on the efforts today of science based stockpile
stewardship. No nation should question it.
On the other hand, in spite of the enormous technical
innovation capabilities of NNSA scientists, in spite of their
contributions to nonproliferation efforts, in spite of the
truly enormously successful efforts of the Naval Reactors
organization of NNSA, the remainder of NNSA to a very large
degree is highly inefficient and has been poorly managed for
many, many years as you have stated in your opening remarks.
At the time we did our work, Secretary Moniz and General
Klotz had been here only a brief time. I would have to say
they've made a great deal of progress since they took their
offices, but they have a very long way yet to go.
We thought it would be useful to describe four major events
that have occurred since we submitted our report that we
believe validate it further, the findings and recommendations
we made. The first of these of course would have to be that
Russia and China and North Korea and others around the globe
have been providing convincing proof that like it or not
America's going to be in the nuclear deterrent business for as
long as any of us can see.
A particular concern in that regard is the deteriorating
firewall between conventional and nuclear warfare particularly
as being espoused by Russia. Our nuclear deterrent forces are
of the utmost importance in preventing strategic warfare and
coercion that goes with it, and furthermore, our allies depend
upon this nuclear umbrella, if you will, and should they have
reason to doubt its viability they may well decide to provide
their own nuclear capabilities, further leading to nuclear
proliferation.
Secondly, the President's nuclear negotiations with Iran
and the deep involvement of that in those negotiations of
Secretary Moniz and the contributions made by the laboratories
of the Department of Energy seem to reaffirm the importance of
a close tie at the cabinet level of the Department of Energy
given the importance of this issue and that this has been a
very successful formula during this past year's negotiations.
Forty three percent of the DOE's budget pertains to the
nuclear enterprise, and that would seem to suggest to us that
it's all the more important that the Secretary of Energy have a
background in nuclear matters as well as energy matters,
furthermore that the Department be led by a person with
scientific credentials and at the cabinet level.
Finally, the lessons of the so-called WIPP, or the Waste
Isolation Pilot Plant, incident tend to underscore the need for
a better operating culture in the nuclear security environment.
You're familiar of course that in February of 2014, a drum
containing radioactive waste ruptured inside of the WIPP
facility. The DOE's own after-action review reads very much
like our report did some time before that. There was a complex
wave of responsibilities pointed out, lapses of leadership and
accountability. I was asked by Secretary Chu to investigate the
Y-12 incident with which you're all familiar, and I found
exactly the same sort of issues there.
Finally, we would point out the need for your support in
bringing about the reforms that are required in the NNSA
endeavors. The words of one witness before our panel at that
time said that the course to improve the nation's nuclear
security enterprise seems clear and the National Nuclear
Security Administration has not been on it. It will only be
with your strong support and the President's strong support
that we will be able to solve the sorts of problems that have
been befuddling the nuclear security enterprise.
With that Mr. Chairman, with your permission I would turn
to my colleague Admiral Mies who would describe some of the
findings and the recommendations of our committee.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Augustine follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Murphy. Thank you. Your time has expired. We will now
turn to Admiral Mies for 5 minutes.
STATEMENT OF ADMIRAL RICHARD MIES
Admiral Mies. Mr. Chairman and Ranking Member, let me add
my thanks as well for giving the four of us the opportunity to
testify. I'll try and briefly summarize the thrust of our
recommendations in each of the five areas addressed in our
report.
First, the first area is to strengthen national leadership
focus, direction, and follow-through. And at the root of all
the challenges faced by the nuclear enterprise, frankly, is the
loss of focus on the nuclear mission since the end of the Cold
War. Bluntly stated, nuclear weapons have become orphans in
both the executive and legislative branches. And this lack of
senior leadership attention has resulted in public confusion,
congressional distrust, and a serious erosion of advocacy,
expertise, and proficiency across the enterprise. Sustained
national leadership attention is needed to rebuild the
foundation.
Hence, our panel recommends first that the President adopt
a number of new mechanisms designed to provide oversight and
guidance to direct and align nuclear security enterprise-wide
policies, plans, programs and budgets across the departments.
Additionally, our panel recommends that Congress establish new
mechanisms to strengthen and unify its oversight of the
enterprise. Such efforts should seek improved coordination
across missions as well as between authorizers and
appropriators and thus better synchronize the work of multiple
subcommittees. These recommendations include adding the Senate
Armed Services Committee approval to the confirmation and
reporting requirements for both the Secretary and Deputy
Secretary of Energy.
Our second area is to solidify cabinet secretary ownership
of the mission. Again as has been previously stated, despite
the intent of the NNSA Act to create a separately organized
NNSA within DOE, the act as implemented has failed to achieve
the degree of clarity in enterprise roles and mission
ownership.
In retrospect, this should come as no surprise. No cabinet
secretary could be expected to relinquish control over a
mission that constitutes over 40 percent of his department's
budget, a mission that involves significant environmental
safety and security risks, and a mission that produces a
capability critical to our national security--a capability for
which he or she is personally responsible to annually certify
its safety, security and performance to the President.
In its deliberations, the panel explored a range of
organizational options including the status quo and an
independent agency, and we concluded that these were clearly
inferior to placing the responsibility and accountability
squarely on the shoulders of the secretary. Hence, our
recommendations are designed to clarify the secretary's
responsibilities for all of DOE's missions and to clear away
the redundancies, confused authorities and weakened
accountability that have resulted in the attempt to implement a
separately organized NNSA within DOE.
To achieve the right leadership structure, a cabinet
secretary who sets policy and then an operational director
who's empowered to implement the policy, our panel recommends
amending rather than appealing the NNSA Act to replace the
separately organized NNSA with a new office, an Office of
Nuclear Security within the Department.
Additionally, we recommend that the secretary establish a
management structure that aligns and codifies roles,
responsibilities, authority, and accountability across DOE and
eliminates redundant and overlapping DOE and NNSA staffs. And
finally, we recommend that the secretary and director do a
comprehensive reform of DOE regulations to strengthen risk
management and adopt accepted industry standards where
appropriate.
In the third area, we focus on adoption of proven
management practices to build a culture of performance,
accountability and credibility. And as our report describes,
NNSA is an organization with many pockets of talented
technically competent people operating within a dysfunctional
culture. Our panel identified a number of management best
practices based on high performing benchmark organizations that
if implemented could bring about the needed reform, and
prominent among them are a capable, empowered leadership with
well defined roles and responsibilities.
Our panel's recommendations include adoption of industry
best practices, strengthening program management and cost
estimating expertise, simplification of budget controls, and
development of a comprehensive plan to reshape the weapons
complex and workforce. In the fourth area, we seek to maximize
the contributions of the M&O organizations to perform a safe
and secure mission execution.
Again that open collaboration and mutual trust that has
historically existed has eroded over the past decade to an
arm's length, customer to contractor and occasionally
adversarial relationships, so our panel recommends a major
reform of those relationships continuing on steps already begun
by the current administration.
And finally, fifth, the fifth area is to strengthen partner
collaboration to rebuild trust and a shared view of mission
success. There's been a tremendous loss of credibility and
trust with other stakeholders, primarily DoD and Congress,
through insufficient communications, collaboration, and
transparency. The enterprise can't succeed if they aren't
aligned on major goals and priorities. So our panel recommends
stronger collaboration between the Secretaries of Energy and
Defense to foster better alignment and to strengthen the
Nuclear Weapons Council and to increase the role of that
Council in the drafting of Presidential guidance and an annual
assessment to the NNSA.
I apologize for running over. In conclusion, there is
little new in our panel's report. We inherited approximately 50
past studies and reviews of DOE and NNSA that reached very
similar findings and recommendations regarding cultural,
personnel, organizational, policy, and procedural challenges
that have historically existed within the DOE and now NNSA. And
many of these continue to exist because of a lack of clearer
accountability, excessive bureaucracy, organizational
stovepipes, lack of collaboration, and unwieldy, cumbersome
process.
What DOE and NNSA need are robust, formal mechanisms to
evaluate findings, assess underlying root causes, analyze
alternative courses of actions, formulate appropriate
corrective action, and effectively implement enduring change.
Let me just emphasize that our panel's findings and
recommendations emphasize the need for cultural change rather
than simple organizational ones. I personally believe it was
naive of Congress to think that by simply creating NNSA as a
semi-autonomous organization they could legislate an enduring
solution without addressing the more fundamental, underlying
cultural problems. I believe we have a unique opportunity now
under Secretary Moniz. He's an individual well qualified in
national security with previous DOE experience who cares
passionately about the nuclear security mission and who's
surrounded by an exceptionally strong leadership team.
What is not needed is a congressional mandate for more
studies. What we really need is congressional support to help
enable Secretary Moniz to make the bold and decisive changes
that are necessary so those changes can be institutionalized
beyond his tenure. Thank you for your time.
[The prepared statement of Admiral Mies follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Murphy. I thank the gentleman. Because you are an
admiral and not a commander I let you run over for a few
minutes.
Dr. Cohon, I think you are going to testify for both
yourself and on behalf Mr. Glauthier, so you are recognized now
for your testimony.
STATEMENT OF JARED COHON
Mr. Cohon. I will indeed. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And my
understanding is I'll be granted 10 minutes since I'm speaking
on behalf of both of us?
Mr. Murphy. Yes.
Mr. Cohon. Thank you. Well, good afternoon, Chairman
Murphy, Ranking Member DeGette, Vice Chairman McKinley, other
members of the subcommittee, and others interested in the
national energy laboratories. We're very pleased to be here to
discuss the final report of the Commission to Review the
Effectiveness of the National Energy Laboratories.
Congress created the Commission in the fiscal year 2014
Appropriations Act. The President's Council of Advisors on
Science and Technology, or PCAST, developed a list of potential
nominees, and the Secretary of Energy selected the nine
commissioners from that list. The two of us, TJ and I, served
as the co-chairs of the Commission for almost 18 months. We
were privileged to serve with an outstanding group of
commissioners with strong backgrounds in the science and
technology enterprise of this nation.
We're pleased that it was a consensus report. We received
excellent cooperation and support from DOE, other relevant
congressional committees, the White House, the national
laboratories themselves, and many others. During the course of
our work we visited all 17 national laboratories, heard from 85
witnesses in monthly public hearings in the field and here in
Washington, and reviewed over 50 previous reports on this topic
from the past four decades.
We entitled our report, ``Securing America's Future:
Realizing the Potential of the National Energy Laboratories.''
Our overall finding is the national laboratory system is a
unique resource that brings great value to the country in the
four mission areas of the DOE: nuclear security, basic science
research and development, energy technology research and
development, and environmental management. However, our
national lab system is not realizing its full potential.
Our Commission believes that can be changed. We provide 36
recommendations that we believe, if adopted, would help the
labs become more efficient and effective and have even greater
impact, thereby helping secure America's future in the four
mission areas of the DOE. Our most fundamental conclusions deal
with the relationship between the DOE and the national labs. We
find that the trusted relationship that is supposed to exist
between the federal government and its national labs is broken
and is inhibiting performance as you just heard from Admiral
Mies. We note that the problems come from both sides, the labs
and the DOE.
We want to be clear though. We want to emphasize that this
situation is not uniform across the labs. In particular, the
labs that are overseen by the Office of Science generally have
a much better relationship with the DOE than do those in other
program offices. Many of our recommendations address this
fundamental problem. We conclude that the roles need to be
clarified and reinforced, going back to the formal role of the
labs as federally funded research and development centers.
Under this model, the two parties are supposed to operate as
trusted partners in a special relationship with open
communication.
DOE should be directing and overseeing its programs at a
policy level specifying what its programs should achieve. The
labs for their part should be responsible for determining how
to carry out and to achieve what the DOE has identified. In
doing so, the labs should have more flexibility than they do
now to implement those programs without needing as many
approvals from DOE along the way. In return of course, the labs
must operate with transparency and be fully accountable for
their actions and results.
This flexibility, in our view, should be expanded
significantly in areas such as the ability to manage budgets
with fewer approval checkpoints; managing personnel
compensation and benefits; entering into collaborations with
private companies including small businesses without having
each agreement individually approved and written into the lab's
contract; building office buildings on sites that are not
nuclear, not high hazard and not classified; conducting site
assessments that are relied upon by DOE and others to minimize
redundant assessments; and sending key personnel to
professional conferences to maintain DOE's work in leading edge
science and for their professional development.
In the congressional charge to us, we were asked to examine
whether there was too much duplication among the national
laboratories. We looked into this in detail and have included
two recommendations in this area. The first regards the NNSA
laboratories, where we conclude that it is important to the
nation's nuclear security that the two design labs and their
capabilities continue to be maintained in separate and
independent facilities.
The second recommendation in this area regards the way the
Department manages through the life cycle of R&D topics from
conception to maturity. In our view, the DOE does a good job of
encouraging multiple lines of inquiry into the early discovery
stages of new subjects and they're good at using expert panels
and strategic reviews to manage mature programs. However, at
the in-between stages, the Department needs to assert its
strategic oversight role earlier and more forcefully to manage
the laboratories as a system in order to achieve the most
effective and efficient overall results.
Let me turn to some of our recommendations for how we
believe Congress can help to improve the performance of our
national labs. We'd like to cite four in particular here in our
opening statement. First, we conclude that the Laboratory
Directed Research & Development, or LDRD, is vitally important
to the labs' ability to carry out their missions successfully,
and we recommend that Congress restore the cap on LDRD funding
to the functional level that it was historically up until the
year 2006.
Second, to support strong collaboration between businesses
and the national laboratories, Congress may need to take action
to clarify that the labs have sufficient authority to enter
into CRADAs and other forms of collaboration with domestic
companies without DOE approval of each one.
Third, we urge Congress to continue to recognize the
importance of the role of national labs in building and
operating user facilities for use by a wide range of
researchers in universities, other federal agencies and the
private sector.
Fourth, there does seem to be a serious shortfall in
funding for facilities and infrastructure at the national labs.
However, the scope and severity of that shortfall are not well
defined. We recommend that the Congress work closely with DOE
and OMB to agree, first, upon the size and the nature of the
problem, and then upon a long term plan to resolve it through a
combination of additional funding, policy changes and new
innovative financing mechanisms.
We'd especially like to highlight our final recommendation.
We found that in our past four decades there have been over 50
previous commissions, panels, and studies on the national labs,
as you know well. It's our view that Congress and the
Administration would be better served by some sort of standing
body of experienced people who could provide perspective and
advice on issues relating to the national laboratories without
having to create new commissions or studies every time.
Since releasing our report in late October, we've been very
interested in what actions DOE is taking to follow up on our
findings and recommendations. We're encouraged that Secretary
Moniz and the current lab directors seem truly committed to
reforming the relationship between DOE and the national labs to
restore trust and transparency. In the past few days, the
secretary has sent to Congress his response to our report.
Overall, he is quite supportive of our recommendations and he
and his staff have provided a very thoughtful and detailed
explanation of actions they have taken and are taking in a
continuing way in every area of our report.
We the Commission are encouraged by these actions and
intentions, but we recognize, as do you, the problems that the
labs have developed over many years and they won't be reversed
quickly. We urge the Congress to support all of the efforts
that the secretary and future secretaries have taken and will
take, and to hold them accountable for meaningful changes in
all of the areas that we've addressed.
We do want to add one final comment before closing. As I
just noted a little while ago, we recommended the creation of
an independent standing body which would provide oversight of
the implementation of our recommendations and ongoing advice to
Congress as well as to the secretary. The secretary's response
to Congress indicates that he plans to utilize existing
committees including the Secretary of Energy Advisory Board, or
SEAB, rather than create a new independent body.
The Commission supports this for creating advice and
ongoing advice to the secretary, but notes that no existing
body including SEAB can provide the independent advice to
Congress which we envision. On behalf of our nine
commissioners, we want to thank you for this opportunity to
serve the country on this important Commission. We hope our
work will be helpful, and we're happy to answer questions and
to discuss our findings and recommendations. Thank you very
much.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Cohon follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Murphy. Thank you. I thank all the panelists, and I
will begin by recognizing myself for 5 minutes of questions.
First, for Mr. Augustine and Admiral Mies, the members of the
advisory panel you chaired reflected a broad range of views and
substantial experience with DOE, defense, and other nuclear
matters; do I have that correct?
Mr. Augustine. Yes, sir.
Mr. Murphy. OK. And the advisory panel made findings and
recommendations that were unanimous; they were a unanimous
vote?
Mr. Augustine. Yes, sir.
Mr. Murphy. And Mr. Augustine, you say in your testimony
that DOE governance and practices are inefficient, and in some
instances ineffective which puts the entire nuclear enterprise
at risk. Can these deficiencies be fixed and the benefits of
DOE's technical and engineering abilities be fully leveraged
by, sustained by leadership alone?
Mr. Augustine. I'm sorry. I didn't hear the last sentence.
Mr. Murphy. Could the abilities be fully leveraged and
sustained by leadership alone?
Mr. Augustine. I would say not. Leadership is of course
absolutely essential. There are also organizational issues that
have a bearing, and there are many government practices,
government-wide practices that I think contribute to the
problems that have been encountered in NNSA. As an example, one
of the main failings, in my view, has been the lack of
accountability. When I was involved in the Y-12 investigation,
the people, the company that was in charge of the issues at the
time was fired. The senior management was fired. I haven't to
this day been able to find out what happened to the people in
the government. They sort of just moved from one job to
another. That's partly because of the civil service rules that
were set up with very good reasons, but there are constraints
that make it very difficult to impose accountability to the
government.
I spent 10 years working in the government, most of my
career in industry, some in academia, and it is very hard to
provide the leadership in government. Having said that I think
that leadership is absolutely critical, but there are a lot of
other things that need relief. The lack of a capital budget is
one that comes to mind immediately.
Mr. Murphy. Is the key then as you are saying, and Admiral
Mies, I would like a comment on this too that could you comment
about what needs to be done with leadership; as soon as this
gets fixed here. We can put a man on the moon; we can't make a
microphone work in a congressional hearing room. Sorry. I am
going to do my best.
So Admiral Mies, your panel's unanimous finding is that
NNSA's current governance structure failed to accomplish what
Congress intended, so you recommended essentially reintegrating
NNSA more fully back to the DOE umbrella. So looking at what
needs to be done structurally and leadership, Congress can't
necessarily mandate that someone be a good leader, but we can
identify a number of things as mentioned as accountability in
there. So, but in what you are saying, what are the benefits of
doing this?
Admiral Mies. What are the benefits of doing this?
Mr. Murphy. Yes, if we----
Admiral Mies. Well, I think the benefits to a certain
degree should be obvious to all of us based on the 50 previous
reports and their findings and recommendations.
I would just comment first of all that the national
security enterprise to begin with is much, much larger than
just NNSA and it encompasses both, Congress, the executive
branch, White House, elements of DoD and the broader DOE, not
just NNSA. And so again, building a structure that promotes
greater collaboration and coordination across the enterprise is
really critical. As Norm indicated, leadership, first of all,
is probably the most important element.
But as we indicated in our report, most of the problems are
cultural not organizational, and simply changing the wiring
diagram and changing the NNSA Act alone is not going to deal
with the fundamental problems of a very risk-averse and
entrenched bureaucracy. And so there are a lot of cultural
issues that I think need to be addressed that can improve the
technical competency, the collaboration, the relationship
between the M&Os and the federal workforce in a much more
collaborative way than presently exists. So again I think it's
addressing those cultural changes.
To build on Dr. Cohon's testimony, I would tell you that as
a sign of the secretary's commitment to institutionalizing some
of the reforms he's asked both Dick Meserve and I to co-chair a
subpanel of the Secretary of Energy's Advisory Board to oversee
not just our report, but all of the previous past reports'
findings and recommendations on how the Department is
responding to them.
Mr. Murphy. Thank you. I will let Ms. DeGette go next
because I only have a few seconds left, but I will come back to
that later. Ms. DeGette, 5 minutes.
Ms. DeGette. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. One of the major
conclusions of the Mies-Augustine report is that the current
NNSA governance model has failed to provide the effective
mission focused enterprise that Congress intended. I would like
to walk through some of those key findings with you, gentlemen,
so I can understand how this affects NNSA's ability to
accomplish its mission. Now I only have 5 minutes so I am going
to appreciate yes or no answers.
Mr. Augustine, your interim report states ``one
unmistakable conclusion of the panel's fact finding is that as
implemented the NNSA experiment in governance has failed.'' Is
that correct?
Mr. Augustine. Correct.
Ms. DeGette. And in fact, your report concluded that the
NNSA Act, which intended to create a separately organized NNSA
within DOE, did not achieve the intended degree of clarity in
enterprise roles and mission ownership; is that correct?
Mr. Augustine. Yes. I believe that's true.
Ms. DeGette. And in fact, the creation of the NNSA has
caused a number of structural issues between it, the DOE and
the weapons labs; is that correct?
Mr. Augustine. I believe that's true.
Ms. DeGette. For example, your report found that there is
still an overlapping of staffs between the NNSA and the DOE.
This can lead to problems with oversight, blurred ownership,
and accountability when it comes to managing the nuclear
enterprise. Is that correct, Mr. Augustine?
Mr. Augustine. Yes. That is our view.
Ms. DeGette. Now I could go on here, but your report
concludes, ``significant and wide ranging reform is needed to
create a nuclear enterprise capable of meeting the nation's
needs.'' That is one of the key findings in your report, isn't
it, Mr. Augustine?
Mr. Augustine. Yes, indeed.
Ms. DeGette. So, let us talk about how to begin fixing
those problems. The panel recommends that the nuclear
enterprise would be most effective in performing its mission if
led by an engaged cabinet secretary with ownership of the
mission Department wide; is that correct?
Mr. Augustine. Absolutely.
Ms. DeGette. Now in other words, Mr. Augustine, the current
relationship among NNSA, the Secretary of Energy, and DOE
headquarters is not meeting the mission of the nuclear energy
enterprise, therefore we should bring NNSA back into DOE under
the secretary; isn't that correct?
Mr. Augustine. That is our belief.
Ms. DeGette. So, Mr. Augustine, in your testimony you talk
about the President's nuclear negotiations with Iran to
underscore the importance of having a qualified DOE cabinet
secretary be in control of the nuclear enterprise. And we
clearly saw this, I think you mentioned this, under Secretary
Moniz.
Tell us why having the NNSA led directly by a full cabinet
secretary is so important for the country's nuclear mission and
for our national security.
Mr. Augustine. Very briefly, the nuclear mission is one of
the most important missions that our country engages in. Given
that it should be represented at the highest levels of our
government if it's to be impactful. Two, if the enterprise is
spun off as an independent, self-standing entity, it's our
belief that we'll have neither the authority, the presence nor
the ability to attract and keep top level people. It needs a
seat at the cabinet table, and it also needs to draw upon the
other labs in the DOE.
So we looked at four different options. We believe the one
we've described is clearly the best. That's our unanimous
findings.
Ms. DeGette. So thank you. Admiral Mies, something that you
have said now twice in your testimony today really struck me.
What you said is that you can't just fix this by fixing the
structure. You have to fix the culture, correct?
Admiral Mies. Yes.
Ms. DeGette. Now, so here----
Admiral Mies. I mean----
Ms. DeGette. OK, hang on a minute. Here is the thing
though. If you have overlapping ownership, if you have
overlapping and unclear accountability, if you have a lack of
clear leadership from the top from a cabinet secretary who
knows what he or she is talking about, then that only helps
feed the culture, isn't that right? So I would say fixing the
structure will begin to help fixing the underlying culture.
Admiral Mies. Certainly they go together, but I think
ultimately the ownership, the leadership-ownership of the
mission and also the cultural changes that are necessary not
just within NNSA but DOE wide----
Ms. DeGette. Right.
Admiral Mies [continuing]. Are critical to the successful
more effective implementation of the mission.
Ms. DeGette. I totally agree with you. Thank you. I thank
all of you. And I didn't get a time to talk about to you other
gentlemen, but maybe we will talk about you later. I really
think that this is important that the panel follow through on
both of your panels' recommendations. Thank you.
Mr. Murphy. The gentlelady's time has expired. I now
recognize Mr. Cramer from North Dakota for 5 minutes.
Mr. Cramer. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thanks to the panel
for your expertise and for being with us and for the very hard
and good work that has been done. It is hard to get to one or
two points.
I might just say as a point of reference, my interest
besides oversight and just concern for the entire situation is
of course that North Dakota hosts two-thirds of the nuclear
triad but we do have submarine named after us, so at least we
would like to take all three. But I want to get a sense of the
urgency of all of this, because obviously there is a lot of
work that has gone into this. It is very comprehensive; a lot
of good recommendations. The leadership stuff, I think we could
spend a lot of time just talking about the leadership issues,
but we all view it through the lens of a particular person or a
particular administration, and you are dealing with structure
that hopefully enhances culture.
Tell us about the urgency. What if these recommendations or
some of these proposals aren't enacted? What would be the most
important ones and in what order that we would have to get to
like tomorrow if we could? Could somebody sort of give us a
sense of the urgency of each or all of these recommendations?
And whoever wants to take it first can go for it.
Mr. Glauthier. Sure. I'll be happy to since I haven't had
the opportunity to speak earlier. I think that the culture
change that Admiral Mies talked about underlies all of the
things that we're dealing with and if we don't get this
relationship right, we run the risk of the life extension
programs, for example, for nuclear weapons getting off track.
There's been a significant amount of progress in the last year
getting them back on schedule, but that depends upon some
individuals. And it really has been a difficult project to
manage those things.
Our recommendations are that we need to return the whole
system to the FFRDC model, and that is the relationship of the
laboratories and the M&O contractors to the government needs to
be the one that Jared Cohon described in the testimony, whereas
the government is specifying what it is that needs to be done,
what the mission needs to accomplish, and then give the
laboratories more flexibility, more freedom to carry it out,
but being transparent and accountable.
And we don't have that relationship right now, and as a
result it risks not being effective. Too many people are in
charge and therefore nobody's in charge. And it also is less
efficient and we're spending more money than we would need to
do if we get this right.
Mr. Cramer. Others? That was very well said, although I
could apply it to several agencies and divisions of agencies,
but critically here. So on my urgency point then this is the
start. This would be the start that perhaps could lead to all
kinds of other benefits obviously.
I want to get to the oversight issue a little bit too then,
and I appreciate Ms. DeGette's point of the oversight, because
some of what you are talking about is certainly on the advisory
side. I appreciated the emphasis on existing advisors, OK, but
maybe not in this sense, we need independence.
What I worry about, and I think what a lot of Members of
Congress worry about, is that advisory committees, advisory
councils, commissions within agencies tend to adopt the
bureaucracy rather quickly. And as Members, the independence is
a really big deal because we don't want to be overly
duplicative, then that sounds overly duplicative. We don't want
to have duplication, but at the same time this independence
thing is a really big deal, I think, and it gives us a sense of
comfort if we know that they are advising us with the same
clarity and expertise and honesty as they would be advising the
secretary or anybody else. And I don't assume that anymore. I
think that is just maybe human nature, but yes, sir?
Mr. Cohon. If I could speak to that?
Mr. Cramer. Please.
Mr. Cohon. I'm very glad you raised it and that Ranking
Member DeGette raised it. I think it's a critical issue. As
you've heard several times and as you know well, there have
been more than 50 studies of the energy laboratories in the
last 40 years. Furthermore, as we learned in our review of
those studies, each subsequent commission or committee made
basically the same recommendations because the last ones hadn't
been implemented.
One thing we can predict almost with certainty is if you
don't do something else you'll create another commission pretty
soon and the same thing will happen, so this is exactly why we
proposed what we did. Now we don't have an answer as to how one
should situate such a commission or where you put it. National
Academies was one institution that we identified as a potential
home for it. It's hard to figure out, but I'm very glad you
raised it and stressed what you did. Independence is the key,
and I think Congress and the nation need it.
Admiral Mies. I would like to make one comment about the
independence. I think, I have recently been asked to join the
Secretary of Energy's Advisory Board, and I can assure you
under the leadership of people like John Deutch it has not
adopted any of the bureaucratic culture within the Department.
It is clearly independent. Its members represent a diverse
population of expertise much like our Commission. So I think
you should have at least confidence that the secretary has an
advisory board who really is giving him independent advice.
I would also give you an analogy as a submarine commander.
On a submarine I had three major departments: an engineering
department, a weapons department, and a navigation department--
and I don't think I could have successfully run a submarine if
one of those departments was semi-autonomous.
And I think again one of the cultural issues is the lack of
codified roles, responsibilities, authority, and accountability
within a department, and putting the responsibility squarely
under the ownership and accountability of the secretary, to me,
like the captain of a submarine, makes eminent sense.
Mr. Murphy. Thank you. Now I will recognize Mr. Tonko for 5
minutes.
Mr. Tonko. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Welcome, gentlemen. A key
finding of the nuclear security panel is that the intent of the
NNSA Act to create a separately organized NNSA within DOE has
not worked as originally intended. This has led to a number of
structural problems within the nuclear enterprise. For example,
the act as implemented has ``made organizational changes
designed to insulate NNSA from DOE headquarters without
specifying the secretary's roles, without stipulating the
relationships between NNSA and DOE headquarters staffs, and
without requiring actions to shift the Department's culture
toward a focus on mission performance.''
And so, Co-chair Augustine, to fix some of these structural
problems the panel concluded the NNSA should be brought back
under the Secretary of Energy and led by a knowledgeable and
engaged cabinet secretary. The panel also explored a range of
other options such as making the NNSA a separate independent
agency, but the panel concluded that each of the other
approaches had their own significant weaknesses.
So my question is, can you briefly explain what other
alternatives the panel explored and what were their weaknesses?
Mr. Augustine. I certainly can. There were four options,
basically; none are perfect, unfortunately. One option is to
create a totally independent NNSA as an agency like a NASA, for
example. Another option is to leave things as they are, which I
need say no more about the feelings of that. Another option is
to put NNSA within the Department of Defense. And our view
there is the Department of Defense has so many things on its
platter today, furthermore, much of what NNSA does ties in with
the rest of DOE. We discarded that option.
And so you come back to the one of why not make it a real
part of DOE? Today it's sort of half on half pair. It needs to
be either, the best option we can see is to make it part of
DOE. Put DOE in charge. Put a leader in there that understands
nuclear matters and give them the authority to run NNSA. The
second best option would be, in our view, to make it an
independent agency, but we view that as a very inferior second
best option.
Mr. Tonko. Thank you. And again to our co-chair, co-Chair
Augustine, what do you mean by further isolating the nuclear
enterprise? In your statement you talked about that further
isolation. What happens if the nuclear enterprise, and mainly
we mean NNSA and the weapons labs, are isolated from DOE or a
cabinet secretary?
Mr. Augustine. I think with regard to the latter, the
isolation from a cabinet secretary is that they don't have a
seat at the highest levels of the government, and we think
their mission is so important that they should have that seat.
The other problem with the isolation is it requires one to
create a whole new level of bureaucracy if you will that
already exists, or a support structure that already exists
within the DOE and that the NNSA shares much of what the other
DOE labs do, the four NNSA labs, the other 13 labs. And so it
seems to us there's a very natural tie.
And I think Admiral Mies and I would be very careful to say
that this is not perfect. It's complex, but it's by far the
best option we can think of.
Mr. Tonko. Thank you, and Admiral Mies.
Mr. Tonko. NNSA is in charge of the development and testing
of this nation's nuclear defense capability. It is critical
that we understand the important role NNSA plays in keeping our
nation secure and therefore understand the recommendations that
your panel made in its final report.
So what is at stake if we do not adequately address the
ongoing structural problems between DOE and NNSA that you have
uncovered?
Admiral Mies. Well, I think, within DOE, because you have a
semi-autonomous organization, separately organized NNSA, it's
neither fish nor fowl. It's not autonomous enough to have
complete autonomy to determine its own direction, but it's just
autonomous enough to upset a lot of the people in DOE outside
of NNSA who support the secretary.
And as Norm and I indicated, in the Department of Energy
NNSA controls 43 percent of the Department of Energy's budget.
What secretary or secretary's immediate staff wants to allow
that to be autonomous and not under the secretary's direct
control, particularly when it involves such a critical element
of national security? And particularly when the secretary has
to personally certify every year to the President the safety,
security and performance of our strategic stockpile? So again,
I think there's a structural issue.
But I would argue to, and this is my point about culture,
that professional, well qualified, technically competent people
can overcome organizational deficiencies, but no amount of
reorganization can compensate for an entrenched, risk-averse
bureaucracy with a lack of technical competence and a lack of
professionalism. And so the cultural changes to me are
critical, because if you have an organization of well
qualified, professionally competent people they can overcome
some of the organizational inefficiencies that exist, and I
think that's true of every organization.
Mr. Tonko. Thank you for your insights, and with that I
yield back, Mr. Chair.
Mr. Murphy. Thank you. I now recognize Mr. Griffith of
Virginia for five minutes.
Mr. Griffith. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate this.
This is an important hearing, and I apologize to all of you. I
have been in another important hearing and have just arrived,
so forgive me if I tread on some territory, although I think I
am in an area that will be a little different than what you
have been asked before.
I am going to ask all of you, if you will tell me briefly
the answer when I get there, much of the focus on DOE's
national security programs is directed toward the work
undertaken at the three labs overseen by the NNSA. However, a
number of other labs also support vital national security
activities.
Does the Department recognize the role of the non-NNSA labs
in supporting the national security mission and are those labs
incorporated into the process? In other words, are they in the
loop for some of the things where they may have an expertise
that the three NNSA labs do not have as much expertise or where
they have overlapping expertise? Whoever wants to answer it.
Mr. Glauthier. All right. OK, sure. Yes, there is a real
strong effort to make sure that those labs are involved in the
joint assessments of the mission needs and the like. A couple
of the examples would be Oak Ridge in Tennessee and the Pacific
Northwest Lab up in Washington State, both very actively
involved in the nuclear weapons programs and all, and the
national security nonproliferation programs too. There's a lot
of that sort of integration and that's one of the things that
Norm Augustine just mentioned we would lose if you moved the
NNSA laboratories out, but those other labs are still in the
Department of Energy.
Mr. Griffith. Yes, I do appreciate that. And it is part of
why I asked the question, because while as the crow flies I may
be a good distance away from Oak Ridge, my district is in the
Tennessee Valley Authority region so we want to make sure we
take care of that.
In your opinion--I will just continue if I might, and feel
free to jump in if you have something to add. But in your
opinion, do you believe the labs work together effectively to
support the DOE mission overall? Are you aware that the labs
are working cooperatively to present joint mission research to
Congress? What else do you believe that the labs should be
doing to support the DOE mission?
Mr. Glauthier. This is an area that we did spend a good
deal of time looking at. We think that the labs are very
actively involved in supporting the mission or the missions of
the Department. But we also are concerned that there are times
that the laboratories do not share as much information with
each other and with the Department of Energy as they should,
and that in early stages of new technology or new issues in
exploration you want a lot of new ideas explored, you want a
lot of people to do a lot of things independently, but as that
matures and becomes a program area or an area of more
importance, the Department needs to step in and assert more
leadership in terms of where we're going to conduct that
research, what are the degrees of coordination that you want
among the laboratories and all, and right now the Department
has let that go on too long. There are some activities that
this secretary has begun to try to integrate that more and he's
got some cross-cut activities he talks about as making some
progress, but that's an area that we call out for increased
attention of the Department and the Department needs to step up
to its responsibilities in those areas.
Mr. Griffith. Well, I appreciate that. The labs have been
described as the nation's crown jewel in reference to basic and
applied science work they do. Do you believe, and it sounds
like you do, but do you believe the national labs have a unique
role and their work is not duplicated elsewhere? I am talking
about all the labs, not just the three.
Mr. Glauthier. Yes, we certainly do, and have come to that
conclusion and think that it's important as you look at all
those missions, which the national defense mission, the
nuclear's, the role is an important one, but also the whole
role in innovation for the country and the role in working with
the private sector and with the universities and the basic
research support. These are all very important and they are
ones that we do not feel are duplicated, but rather they
complement the other agencies and other roles of the
government.
Mr. Griffith. Now I have got about 50 seconds left and I
have a long question here, so I am going to skip the question
and just say, what else do you think can be done to bring about
that process where the labs are working together and what
should the DOE be doing to facilitate that?
Mr. Glauthier. Well, I'll go ahead, and since I've got the
microphone here. I think it's the relationship of the openness
and working in partnership that is really key. And that's a
partnership not just with the Department of Energy and the
labs, but among the labs as well, and that actually is better
now than it has been for years. I think that again this
secretary deserves some credit for this, and this set of
laboratory directors do too. So continuing to support the
Laboratory Directors' Council, supporting their work together
as a group is very important.
Mr. Griffith. Well, I appreciate that. If I could take just
a minute, Mr. Chairman, I used to be a small town lawyer. And
it sounds like what you are saying is, is that you ought to do
something maybe by Skype or by the Internet. But we had a
group, most of the lawyers in town were in one-, two-person law
firms, and I think the big one was three, and every Wednesday
when I was practicing and to this day, the lawyers that were
available would congregate at the local watering hole, Mac and
Bob's on Main Street, and share ideas and best practices and
what was working and what the judges were looking at and that
kind of thing.
Sounds like that is what you want to do for the labs, is
give them an opportunity to say what is working best and where
we are going so that we can make this process more efficient.
Mr. Glauthier. Yes. And they are learning a lot from each
other and actually improving the whole system. Did you want to
add something?
Mr. Cohon. I just wanted to add something to what TJ said,
which goes to your last question but ties back to your very
first one. That is, one of the things that we recommended, our
commission recommended, was that each of the lab create an
annual report, yet another report, but this one focused on a
very high level attempt to integrate all that the lab does.
The big multipurpose labs, Oak Ridge is a great example,
gets their support from many different offices within DOE, and
there's not been enough effort to try to understand the whole
of what Oak Ridge does. That would be a very valuable thing to
do for the laboratory and for DOE.
So it goes back to your point about whether we recognize
all that the non-weapons labs do for the weapons program, yes,
but going from the other direction I'm not sure we always
recognize all that the individual labs do, taking it in
totality especially the big multipurpose ones.
Mr. Griffith. Thank you very much, I do appreciate it. Mr.
Chairman, with that I appreciate your indulgence and yield
back.
Mr. Murphy. The gentlemen yields back. I now recognize Ms.
Schakowsky of Illinois for 5 minutes.
Mr. Schakowsky. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Like
Representative Griffith, I want to apologize, such a
prestigious panel. I too was at another hearing, this time with
the Secretary of HHS, and so I apologize for missing not only
your testimony but some of the questioning that has been done.
So I am hoping--you know how it goes, sometimes everything has
been asked but not everybody has asked it; I may be in that
situation.
But I did want to talk about some of the accidents that
have happened and what we may have learned. The major
consequences, there have been major consequences because of the
WIPP accident and we understand from the Department of Energy
that limited operations might resume in December, had to be
shut down. But it could cost over half a billion dollars to
fully remediate this site. So, Mr. Augustine, first of all, let
me ask what are the lessons that we have learned from the WIPP
accident and how do they relate to your report's finding and
recommendations?
Mr. Augustine. I think the lessons I've learned from each
of these incidents are very similar. The first is that someone
has to be in charge that's qualified to be in charge. That
person has to have the authority to cause what needs to be done
to be done. They have to have accountability which they can
pass down through the system.
One of the greatest feelings in government in my view, and
as I said, I think before you came in, I spent 10 years in
government and I'm very proud of that but accountability is
very hard to find in our government. So I think it was TJ who
said that everyone tends to be responsible for everything and
no one tends to be responsible for anything.
And we often try to solve the problem with organizational
change, and that's needed in this case in our view, but that
won't begin to solve the problem. This would be a problem
that's relatively easy to solve in the corporate world; it's
very hard to solve in the government. But basically what's
needed is qualified people, people to talk with leadership----
Mr. Schakowsky. What would be done in the private sector?
Mr. Augustine. Well, the private sector, when you're trying
to bring about change and I've lived through a lot of that you
have basically three kinds of people, one who are excited about
change and view it as an opportunity, others who can go along
with it, and those who will fight it. You fire the ones who are
going to fight it. It's as simple as that. You can't make
change with people that are going to fight it. And you can't do
that. I spent 4 years, 5 years to get rid of one person in the
government and finally succeeded, and there was plenty of
reason. And there's just not the accountability in government.
It's built in.
Mr. Schakowsky. I wondered if anyone else wanted to answer
that. Yes, go ahead.
Mr. Glauthier. I think the Y-12 incident may be an
interesting example.
Mr. Schakowsky. I was going to raise that one as well, yes.
Mr. Glauthier. OK. I think it goes to what is the
responsibility that you're giving to a contractor or a
laboratory. And if the responsibility is to keep the facility,
be secure and safe, then they should take that and look at all
of the aspects of what it does, what they're required to
accomplish that. Instead, if we tell them their responsibility
is to follow a set of checklists and to be able to do all these
things and to be sure that they have their inspections that
check off all the boxes every time somebody comes around, then
we're missing the real focus of that.
And I think that is one of the problems that we have in the
Department of Energy that there is a lot of attention to
specific directives and rules and approvals and not enough
focus on what the real objective is in these programs. And you
should be giving the people at the laboratories the
responsibility and accountability for actually carrying out the
specific actions and roles.
Mr. Schakowsky. Right.
Admiral Mies. I would like to add to that. One of the
observations in our report is that most of the contracts,
particularly the NNSA contracts, involve a significant amount
of the fee being award fee not fixed fee. And because of the
award nature, there is a whole body of federal oversight people
who are responsible for kind of grading how the M&O contractor
is performing to earn that award fee. And frankly that process
has become very wasteful and ineffective in terms of the things
that the people are overseeing. It involves more with contract
compliance rather than with mission executions, successful
mission executions.
So if you look at Y-12 as just one example, in the run-up
to Y-12 for a long period of time there were 600 or more alarms
per day--false alarms, or nuisance alarms in the command
center. And over a long period of time that built a culture of
complacency with the security force such that when an alarm
occurred the people did not respond like you would like to have
them respond.
And as a result of that it's no surprise, essentially, when
you have a real security incident with a nun and two elderly
assistants that the response is not what you would have liked.
I would argue that on the contractor side you had a problem in
that you had two separate contracts, a contract for security
and a contract for the M&O contractor, and so there was a
bureaucratic seam there which didn't necessarily have
accountability centered in a single organization. And you can
criticize that.
But more to the point, how could all of those federal
overseers not have gone into the command center and noticed the
frequency of alarms over a long period of time and reported
that and taken some degree of action to encourage the M&O
contractor and the security contractor to address those issues?
There is a very ineffective and wasteful transactional
oversight system that has evolved, and one of our
recommendations is do away with award fees, go to fixed fees
that really are commensurate with the M&O contractors'
responsibilities and the risk and financial risks they take,
reputational and financial, but hold the M&Os accountable.
Mr. Schakowsky. Well, I just want to thank you. My time has
long expired, but thank you for the good work that you have
done and the reports that you have issued. I appreciate it and
the recommendations.
Mr. Murphy. OK. The gentlelady's time has expired. Each of
us is going to ask a couple more questions. I don't know if any
of the members do, but I know that Ms. DeGette and I do. So let
me ask this, first, Dr. Cohon.
As former president of Carnegie Mellon, you understand how
to ensure an effective organization and you did a great job
there. But the report before us talks about alignment of
responsibilities and accountability. A success here would seem
to involve this structural reporting component and this
leadership component which we spent a lot of time talking
about; am I correct on that?
Mr. Cohon. [Non-verbal response.]
Mr. Murphy. So, can you have one without the other and
still have a fully effective laboratory? I mean, obviously we
want to set up, make sure there is a system that has the
flexibility, rewards innovation, gets people to speak up as
opposed to just saying I am not going to say anything. We have
had so many hearings here. General Motors, devastating
consequences of just people not even speaking up when they saw
something going wrong and they refer to as a ``Gentle Motors
shrug.''
We had hearings about Volkswagen where somebody changed
something in some piece of software and the next thing you
know, one day they couldn't meet the standards for diesel
engines and the next day they could. And I think it was Mr.
Collins of New York who pointed out, did he at least get a
patent? I wondered, did he get employee of the month? Did
anybody give him a free parking space for that? No one seemed
to know in the organization.
So you have to have this leadership and accountability. So
how critical is this lab leadership for ensuring this increased
focus and performance of the laboratory research and
development in particular?
Mr. Cohon. I think it's a wonderful question, Mr. Chairman.
I'm glad you're focused on that because I think it's key. It
goes to this issue of culture that Admiral Mies talked about
and the relationship question between DOE and its laboratories.
To answer you I want to pick up on something that TJ
Gaulthier was saying before in response to the question about
the incidences that have occurred. I think he said something
very important, and let me put it in a different way.
We visited all 17 labs, and one of the really interesting
thing was to me, but it shouldn't be a surprise, is how proud
people are to work at these laboratories. They have a real
sense of mission. They have a real sense that they're
contributing to the advancement and safety of this nation.
They're extremely proud of that. That's what we're buying, by
the way, by having this relationship that we've created for 16
of the labs where it's privately run, but government owned.
We're buying into that unique culture that each laboratory is
able to create. That's key, I think, to success. And certainly
leadership is part of that. You have to have leaders who
understand that and know how to promote it and to sustain it.
But just to underscore what TJ was saying, you're much less
likely, I think, to have someone put the wrong thing in a
barrel on its way to WIPP if they are invested in their mission
and they understand what they're doing as opposed to relying on
a check sheet with someone trying to do it completely by
compliance. So what you put your finger on, I think, is key to
the success of the labs in every way, both in terms of their
mission and being compliant.
Mr. Murphy. I want to talk about one specific lab, the
National Energy Technology Lab is the one in my district. I
understand Secretary Moniz issued his reply to your
recommendation to study whether NETL should be converted to a
government owned contractor operated laboratory, he said so
this week. And the secretary basically said there can be ways
to improve management and performance within the current model
and we will pursue that. Now do you agree that NETL performance
may be enhanced by some of the tools provided to similar
defense labs?
Mr. Cohon. I do. I admire the secretary's response. I think
it's correct, and I especially appreciate the fact that he
understood what motivated our Commission. We care less about
the specifics of how the National Energy Technology Laboratory
is organized, what we care about it is the increased focus on
R&D and making it more visible and giving the lab more
flexibility. And in both regards I think the secretary's
response is very good.
Mr. Murphy. I want to say for the record, multiple times I
have visited the National Energy Technology Labs near
Pittsburgh, and I do agree with you. Highly motivated people
proud of their work and oftentimes wondering, we are doing
great work here, why isn't anybody paying attention to it? How
do we get this to go up the chain of command, because that
itself is a stovepipe. Or when I see what they have done that
deals with methane released on unattended wells; when they say
we have advanced a lot with coal technology, carbon
sequestration, we can do this; when I hear about just a wide
range of other things going on there it is pretty amazing to
me.
I know one of our issues--and we will review this. I have
been talking to my colleague Ms. DeGette about some of the
recommendations, legislative recommendations, and we will
review that carefully. But it still comes down to this point we
have realized over the years, we cannot legislate character and
we cannot mandate morality and we sure as heck can't litigate
common sense, but that requires a certain type of leadership.
But the accountability, generally what happens in a federal
office is about the only person that has accountability for
whether they stay or not is the leader, so many other people
are there and there is some things we have to make sure we deal
with. So I thank you. Ms. DeGette for 5 minutes.
Ms. DeGette. Thank you. Well, I don't have so much
questions as an observation, which is this agency, the NNSA,
was formed in large part because of the issues that these two
commissions have identified. I have here, I was sharing this
with the chairman, some minutes of one of the many hearings we
had. This hearing was almost exactly 16 years ago. It was March
14th, 2000.
And at that time the chairman, it was the chairman of the
Energy Committee of Energy and Commerce said, the history of
poor security and safety practices at these sites, however long
it may be, is still recent enough to caution us again letting
the NNSA become a self-regulating entity. This was 2 weeks
after it was passed. And that of course was Fred Upton, now the
chair of the full committee here.
Then, the chair of this subcommittee, Oversight and
Investigations, said even before the NNSA passed, a number of
concerns were expressed by both Congress and the
Administration. For example, and then it goes on and on, then,
to talk about we have heard both Senator Rudman and the GAO
refer to a culture in--does this sound familiar, Admiral? A
culture in DOE which seems to espouse a bureaucratic form of
elitism and resistant to substantive change. That was Cliff
Stearns, who was the chairman several chairmen ago of this
committee.
Now everybody on the Energy and Commerce Committee realized
the set of problems that we had at these labs before the NNSA
was passed. We realized the culture, we realized the problems,
but what happened was in response to the Wen Ho Lee case and
some other really high profile cases coming out of Los Alamos
and WIPP and other places, Senator Rudman and others thought,
well, this will be super great to have a semi-autonomous
agency. The members of--and what happened was this agency was
established in the dead of night. No good ever happens as near
as I can tell when you go over to the other body and then you
establish something in the dead of night in a conference
committee. But that is exactly how this agency was established.
And members of the Energy and Commerce Committee realized
at that time, sadly, it would be like a comedy, one of those
congressional comedies, if it didn't deal with our nation's
nuclear security. And here we are 16 years later identifying
the same culture problems, identifying the same organizational
issues.
And so I think we are just kind of lucky that nothing has
happened. We did have the nun and the other people. We have had
some other breaches, but something really, really serious could
happen. And it is time that we really work in partnership with
all of you and your committees to make this happen.
The proposed legislation that you put as an appendix to
your report that is a good start. And I really have talked to
the chairman and his staff about undertaking a serious effort
because it is my opinion, I think we all are saying the same
thing, is when you have a culture that is an embedded culture
in these agencies, you have to have strong leadership to change
that culture. And so that is what we are all saying. That is
what we don't have, and we look forward--I hope you are not
sick of us yet, because we intend to make this a continuing
relationship. And I yield back, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Murphy. Thank you. Mr. Griffith, do you have any final
questions?
Mr. Griffith. I do not. Thank you.
Mr. Murphy. Thank you. If I could sum up what they just
said, I put up two of my favorite cartoons here. This is based
upon the quote by George Santayana that those who cannot
remember the past are doomed to repeat it. One is an elderly
man sitting next to and talking to a young man in a library and
he says, those who don't study history are doomed to repeat it,
yet those who do study history are doomed to stand by
helplessly while everybody else repeats it.
Or imagine two high school students walking out of school
one day and one student holding his report card says, I failed
history again. I guess those who don't learn from history are
doomed to repeat it. Another one there too.
We certainly don't want that because as was asked by some
of the folks before and it says so clear in your co-chair
reports, this can create a dangerous situation. And although we
may look at it with some--note it to the history also becomes
farce if we don't learn from it, these can be tragic
consequences and we have to do that.
I really thank you all for the effort you have put into
this. This is very valuable and we will continue to talk about
what we do with this and have more briefings and hearings on
this. I do want to ask the unanimous consent that the documents
of this binder, which is for the committee, be introduced into
the record and to authorize staff to make any appropriate
redactions. So without objections, the documents will be
entered into the record with any redactions the staff
determines are appropriate.
So, in conclusion, thank you all again this very
distinguished panel, and I want to thank the witnesses and
members that participated in today's hearing. I remind members
they have ten business days to submit questions for the record
and ask that the witnesses all agree to respond promptly to the
questions.
So with that this subcommittee of the Energy and Commerce,
Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations, is adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 1:03 p.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.]
[Material submitted for inclusion in the record follows:]
Prepared statement of Hon. Fred Upton
Today we consider the recommendations of two distinguished
panels that examined the Department of Energy's most important
functions--maintaining the strength of our nuclear security
enterprise and the national laboratory system that underpins
the scientific and technological work that supports nuclear
security and other DOE missions.
The work of the department is vital to the nation. The
testimony plainly explains the stakes if DOE loses its edge on
the nuclear deterrent, on nuclear security and its naval
programs, on its technological superiority. So as we look at
DOE's structure and decision-making for confronting the
challenges of the 21st century, we have to focus on these
fundamental operations to be sure they are working at maximum
potential. I want to commend the panelists for their work in
outlining what should be done to meet this goal.
The story of DOE's management and performance shortcomings,
particularly when it comes to its nuclear work, is long and
unpleasant. During my time as Oversight Subcommittee Chairman
over 15 years ago we took a hard look at agency failures in
security and project management, pressuring the agency to
reform. Some reforms have worked and some clearly have not
taken hold. In recent years, as demonstrated by our oversight
of security failures at nuclear weapons production sites,
safety failures at the national laboratories, and contractor
oversight failures overall, the reforms of 2000 did not achieve
the results Congress envisioned.
Under my chairmanship, under previous chairmanships, the
goal of Energy and Commerce has been to ensure the
accountability to the president, through the Secretary of
Energy, for the safety, security, management, and ultimate
performance of DOE's nuclear weapons and nuclear security
enterprise. This accountability has been put to the test,
particularly in the wake of the creation of the semi-autonomous
National Nuclear Security Administration.
The panelists today make a very important point: Cabinet-
level leadership, by the Secretary of Energy, is essential for
the success of DOE, particularly its nuclear security mission.
we'll discuss a key recommendation to strengthen the
secretary's ownership of this mission today, which will require
continued administration and congressional focus on making sure
future secretaries are well prepared for their nuclear security
responsibilities. Solidifying secretary's ownership of his
nuclear security responsibility also includes reforms to the
governance structure of NNSA. The goal is to allow for the best
of NNSA's focused mission and to discard the duplicative,
inefficient structures and offices that inhibit operations and
restrict the ability to benefit from all the technological,
operational, management experience of the full department.
This is a worthy goal that we must collectively work
toward. The big lesson is that DOE's safety, security, and
contract management problems span administrations, span
Congresses. From my experience, and as our witnesses will
explain, improving DOE's performance requires long, sustained
attention to ensure sustained improvement in agency
performance. DOE has huge responsibilities that will not go
away. This committee's job will be to ensure the department is
managed to meet these responsibilities, and structured to
ensure they are executed to their full potential and in the
best interest of the American taxpayer. This hearing continues
this important work.
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Prepared statement of Hon. Frank Pallone, Jr.
Thank you for holding this important hearing on one of the
nation's most vital national security programs.
The work of the National Nuclear Security Administration
(NNSA) and the DOE laboratories is critical to keeping this
nation and our allies safe.
DOE's work maintaining the nation's nuclear deterrent and
advancing science in a variety of energy and security fields
has also been a cornerstone of the Energy and Commerce
Committee's oversight efforts. For example, we have held
numerous hearings on a wide variety of challenges facing the
national labs and examined various solutions to some of the
problems we have uncovered.
Continuing that work, we have the heads of two
distinguished panels that have completed very thorough reviews
of the nuclear security enterprise and of DOE's national
laboratories more generally. The reports produced by these
panels underscore that the weapons complex and national labs
have achieved a great deal in both national security and
science endeavors.
However, ongoing achievements in these areas is neither
inevitable nor guaranteed. Both panels highlight a variety of
structural and cultural challenges facing NNSA and the labs. In
particular, the Panel on the Governance of the Nuclear Security
Enterprise concludes that the current arrangement between DOE
and a ``separately organized'' NNSA has failed to provide the
effective, mission-focused capability that Congress envisioned.
The panel, for example, concludes that overlapping staffs
and the lack of clear lines of authority and responsibility
have created confusion and tensions among headquarters, field
sites, and contractors, as well as a host of other issues
involving management and organizational culture.
As a result, the panel has concluded that NNSA is in need
of major reform.
Members of this Committee are no strangers to the
accidents, missed deadlines, and massive cost overruns that
have plagued NNSA and the nuclear weapons labs over the years.
Just this past June, we held a hearing on the radiological
release that closed the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) in
New Mexico. This facility likely will be reopened, but not
before taxpayers will pay more than half a billion dollars or
more in cleanup and restoration costs.
If we fail to address the governance and management issues
at NNSA, we risk continued accidents and spiraling costs, which
ultimately will be borne by the taxpayer. More importantly,
given NNSA's mission, failure to address the problems at the
agency can ultimately affect our national security. Over the
long term, nothing less than the overall efficacy of our
nuclear deterrent is at stake. We must make this right.
Fortunately, the panel before us today has provided the
Congress with an excellent roadmap for reforming NNSA and the
labs. The panel recommends, for example, that Congress amend
the NNSA Act and adopt related legislation to reintegrate NNSA
into DOE. The panel also makes a number of other critical
recommendations across a range of operational and management
areas, including empowering leadership with well-defined roles
and undertaking major reform of the relationships between DOE,
NNSA, and its contractors.
NNSA was established 16 years ago, but these management
challenges began almost immediately. Problems that many leaders
at the time predicted--including leaders of this Committee and
President Clinton--have indeed occurred.
The mission of maintaining a safe, secure, and effective
nuclear deterrent is too important and there are simply too
many detailed recommendations to be addressed properly in a
single hearing.
I urge the Chairman to take both of these panel's reports
and conduct extensive oversight on how to begin correcting the
multitude of problems that have affected NNSA for too long. In
particular, it is critical that we explore how to best enact
the significant reforms to NNSA's governance that the panel
cites as a first step to getting the nuclear security
enterprise on a sustainable path.
This Committee can make a real difference here, and I stand
ready to work with my colleagues to take on this work.
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