[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 146 (2000), Part 13]
[Senate]
[Pages 19145-19147]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]



           SCIENCE AND SECURITY IN THE SERVICE OF THE NATION

  Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, I am pleased to make these remarks while 
the occupant of the chair is the distinguished junior Senator from 
Arizona because these remarks have to do with the Baker-Hamilton 
report. The Secretary of Energy asked these two men--one an ex-Senator, 
one an ex-House Member--to compile a report with reference to the 
national weapons laboratories and the missing hard drive incident. 
These hard drives were apparently taken out, put back, and found behind 
a copy machine, and everybody is wondering what happened. I will talk 
about this report.
  I urge--and I do not think I have to--the occupant of the chair to 
read it soon. It is short and to the point.
  The findings of this Baker-Hamilton report confirm what some of us 
suspected and have said in one way or another many times about the 
science and security at our National Laboratories.
  The report concludes that the vast majority of employees of our 
National Laboratories are ``dedicated, patriotic, conscientious 
contributors to our national security and protectors of our national 
secrets.''
  The report states, however, that these individuals, the ones who are 
responsible for the viability of America's nuclear deterrent, have been 
hounded by ongoing investigations and security procedures that render 
them incapable of achieving their mission.
  That is a very powerful statement. This commission is very worried 
about how the morale of the scientists at our National Laboratories, in 
particular Los Alamos, is affecting their ability to do their momentous 
work.
  They go on to say that while new security measures and processes 
continue to be imposed, the authors found that X Division--the one that 
was involved in the last episode--is: ambiguously lodged in a confused 
hierarchy, subject to unclear and diffuse authority, undisciplined by a 
clear understanding of accountability for security matters, frightened 
or intimidated by the heightened sense of personal vulnerability 
resulting from the efforts to address recent security lapses.
  These are hard-hitting, accurate findings.
  The scientists at our laboratories need clear lines of authority and 
accountability. The Department of Energy needs to simplify the lines of 
command and communication.
  The report overwhelmingly endorses the creation of the National 
Nuclear Security Agency--which we are beginning to understand exists, 
and we are going to begin to understand what it means when we say the 
NNSA--and the need to reinforce ``the authority of the NNSA 
Administrator.''
  The NNSA Administrator must have more authority, not less. General 
John Gordon, the general who is in charge, is in fact the head man and 
is an excellent person to lead this agency and implement the 
organizational structure needed for the job.
  They reached some other very important conclusions on the current 
environment at our national laboratories: Demoralization at Los Alamos 
is dangerous; that poor morale breeds poor security.
  There is a severe morale problem at the labs, and they cite four or 
five general conclusions:
  ``Among the known consequences of the hard-drive incident, the most 
worrisome is the devastating effect on the morale and productivity at 
the laboratory. . . .''
  They also say that ``. . . (the) current negative climate is 
incompatible with the performance of good science.''
  The report states, ``It is critical to reverse the demoralization at 
LANL before it further undermines the ability of that institution both 
to continue to make its vital contributions to our national security 
and to protect the sensitive national security information.''
  They recommend ``urgent action (is required) . . . to ensure that 
LANL gets back to work in a reformed security structure . . .''
  Incidentally, they conclude that while they laud the Secretary of 
Energy for trying to create more security with the appointment of a 
security czar and the like, as some of us said when it was created, it 
fails to do a job; and remember the Senator from New Mexico saying we 
are creating another box but it is not going to have clear lines of 
authority, it is not going to have accountability, people are still

[[Page 19146]]

not going to be in a streamlined process of accountability. I said it 
my way, they said it another way, but we concluded the same thing.
  There are many other conclusions in this brief report. I urge all of 
my colleagues to read this report and reflect on their conclusions.
  They call for a review of security classifications and procedures, 
security upgrades at LANL, need to deal with cyber security threats, 
and adopt or adapt ``best practices'' for the national labs.
  Then, under ``Resources'' they underscore:

       Provide adequate resources to support the mission of the 
     national laboratories to preserve our nuclear deterrent, 
     including the information security component of that mission.

  Mr. President, I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. KYL. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Domenici). Without objection, it is so 
ordered.
  Mr. KYL. Mr. President, the reason I wanted to exchange places with 
you for a moment was to commend you on the statement you just made from 
the floor regarding our Nation's energy policy. Related to that, of 
course, is the work of the Department of Energy on other matters, 
including our nuclear facilities, on which you reported with respect to 
the Baker-Hamilton report. I appreciate that report as well.
  Back to the energy policy, I have not heard as good a statement of 
the overall problem in this country as the Presiding Officer just 
presented: The fact that in each of the different components of the 
national energy potential, we have developed policies or, in some 
cases, failed to develop policies, all of which combine to result in a 
lack of capacity to provide the fuels to create the energy which our 
society is going to continue to demand more and more.
  When we put it all together, as the Presiding Officer did, it becomes 
very clear that there is no integration of policy; that the Departments 
of Government that, in effect, have a veto over the development of 
these resources prevail, so that there is no capacity to literally have 
an energy policy that produces the fuel with which we can produce the 
energy.
  An administration that had a policy would coordinate the activities 
of each of these Departments of Government--the EPA, the Interior 
Department, the Energy Department, and all of the others mentioned. But 
that has not been done. Instead, each has been allowed, as the 
Presiding Officer pointed out, to develop their own policy for their 
own reasons. The net result is to diminish the capacity of the United 
States to produce the fuel to produce the energy we need. I think his 
explanation that we are likely to see an even higher price because of 
the concentration now into one area--natural gas--is also something 
that is bound to come true. But I doubt people are thinking that far 
ahead at this moment.
  The last thing I would like to say is about the comments in relation 
to ANWR. I would like to expand on that a little bit because I get so 
many letters and calls from constituents of mine in Arizona who are 
very concerned about the protection of our environment, as am I. They 
have heard: If we were to allow exploration of oil in this area, it 
would destroy the environment. I write back to them and say: Look, I 
have been there. Now, granted not very many of our constituents can 
afford to go up north of the Arctic Circle a couple hundred miles. You 
have to work to get there. You have to have some people who know what 
they are doing to get you there and show you around.
  But when you have been there, you realize that the exploration that 
we have been talking about is in no way degrading of the environment. 
When you go there, the first thing you see is that in the other place 
where we have developed the oil potential--it is an area not much 
larger than this Senate Chamber--they have been able to put all of the 
wells--I think there are 10 of them; two rows of 5, or that is roughly 
the correct number--those wells go down about 10,000 feet, and then 
they go out about 10,000 or 15,000 feet in all directions, so that, 
unlike the typical view that Americans have of oil wells scattered over 
the environment, they are all concentrated in one little place, in an 
artificially built area out into the water.
  So it does not degrade the coastal areas at all. It is all focused in 
one place. It is totally environmentally contained. There is absolutely 
no pollution. There is no degradation of the environment. There is no 
impact on animals. There is no environmental damage from this. The 
pipeline is already there. It is undercapacity. So it is a perfect way 
to use our Nation's resource for the benefit of the American people.
  When this wildlife refuge was created, an area was carved out for oil 
exploration. This was not supposed to be part of the wilderness. We 
flew over that area. As far as the eye can see for an hour, there is 
nothing but snow and ice--nothing. There are no trees. There are no 
animals. There are no mountains. There is nothing but snow and ice.
  You finally get to the little place where they would allow the 
exploration. There is a little Eskimo village there where you can land. 
You go to the village, and the people say: When are you going to bring 
the oil exploration for our village? Because they are the ones who 
would benefit from it. It is not part of the wildlife refuge. When you 
say: What is the environmental impact of this? They say there is none.
  For almost all of the year, what you see is this snow and ice. For a 
little bit of the year--a few weeks in the summer--there is a little 
bit of moss and grass there where some caribou will come to graze and 
calve. The reason the caribou herds have about quadrupled in size in 
the area where the oil exploration has occurred is because there is 
some habitation in that area. And, of course, the caribou are a lot 
like cows; They like people just fine. They are willing to come right 
up to the area of habitation and have their little calves. But the 
wolves do not like people, so the wolves do not prey on them as much, 
and they don't eat as many of the calves. Therefore the herd is able to 
grow.
  So the only environmental impact anyone has figured out is we have 
helped the caribou herds expand. This is an area where we can explore 
for oil without doing any environmental damage. We need the resources, 
as the Presiding Officer pointed out.
  I commend the Presiding Officer for his expertise in this area, for 
his ability to put it all together in a very understandable way, and 
for urging this administration to get on with the development of a true 
energy policy.
  Does the Senator from Idaho want to speak now?
  Mr. CRAIG. Yes.
  Mr. KYL. Mr. President, I yield the floor to the Senator from Idaho, 
and I thank the Presiding Officer.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Idaho.
  Mr. CRAIG. Mr. President, I join with my colleague from Arizona in 
thanking you for your leadership in the work you have done on energy. I 
remember, several years ago, when the Senator from New Mexico was 
talking about the state of play of the nuclear industry and that 
failure to respond to an equitable process to bring about the 
appropriate handling of waste would ultimately curtail the ability of 
this industry to grow and provide an environmentally sound and clean 
source of electrical energy. That is when we were talking about energy 
when most of our supplies were in some margin of surplus. Today that 
surplus does not exist.
  In the past eight years, with no energy policy from the Clinton 
administration, we are now without surplus. We are now entering what 
could well be an energy crisis phase for our country and our economy. 
If that is true--here we stand with the longest peacetime growth 
economy in the history of our country--could this be the tripwire that 
brings mighty America down? Because we have a President and a Vice

[[Page 19147]]

President without an energy policy. In fact, under their 
administration, we have seen a drop in the energy production of our 
traditional kind. They even want to knock out big hydrodams out in the 
West that are now supplying enough electricity for all of the city of 
Seattle, WA. And they say, in the name of the environment, we would 
take these down. Shame on them.
  Why aren't they leading us? Why aren't they providing, as they 
should, under policy and direction, abundant production and reliable 
sources?
  Historically, our economy has been built on that. America has been a 
beneficiary of it.
  (Mr. KYL assumed the Chair.)

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