Nuclear Waste: Uncertainties About the Yucca Mountain Repository 
Project (23-MAY-02, GAO-02-765T).				 
                                                                 
The Department of Energy (DOE) has been investigating Yucca	 
Mountain, Nevada, as a possible repository for highly radioactive
nuclear waste. In February, the secretary of energy endorsed the 
Yucca Mountain site, and the President recommended that Congress 
approve the site. If the site is approved, DOE must apply to the 
Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) for authorization to build a 
repository. If the site is not approved for a license		 
application, or if NRC denies a construction license, the	 
administration and Congress will have to consider other options. 
GAO concludes that DOE is unprepared to submit an acceptable	 
license application to NRC within the statutory deadlines if the 
site is approved. On the basis of a reassessment done by DOE's	 
managing contractor in September 2001, GAO believes that DOE	 
would not have enough time to obtain a license from NRC and build
and open the repository by 2010. DOE lacks a reliable estimate of
when, and at what cost, a license application can be submitted or
a repository can be opened.					 
-------------------------Indexing Terms------------------------- 
REPORTNUM:   GAO-02-765T					        
    ACCNO:   A03425						        
  TITLE:     Nuclear Waste: Uncertainties About the Yucca Mountain    
Repository Project						 
     DATE:   05/23/2002 
  SUBJECT:   Agency missions					 
	     Internal controls					 
	     Licenses						 
	     Nuclear energy					 
	     Nuclear waste disposal				 
	     Nuclear waste storage				 
	     Radioactive wastes 				 
	     DOE Yucca Mountain Project 			 
	     Yucca Mountain (NV)				 

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GAO-02-765T
     
Testimony Before the Committee on Energy and Natural Resources, U. S. Senate

United States General Accounting Office

GAO For Release on Delivery Expected at 9: 30 a. m. Thursday, May 23, 2002
NUCLEAR WASTE

Uncertainties About the Yucca Mountain Repository Project

Statement of (Ms.) Gary Jones, Director, Natural Resources and Environment

GAO- 02- 765T

Page 1 GAO- 02- 765T Nuclear Waste

Mr. Chairman and Members of the Subcommittee: We are pleased to be here
today to discuss the Department of Energy?s (DOE) project to develop a
nuclear waste repository. As required by law, DOE has been investigating a
site at Yucca Mountain, Nevada, to determine its suitability for disposing
of highly radioactive wastes in a mined geologic repository. On February 14,
2002, the secretary of energy recommended to the president approval of this
site for the development of a nuclear waste repository. The next day, the
president recommended approval of the site to the Congress. The president?s
recommendation began a statutory review process for the approval or
disapproval of the site, including action by the state of Nevada, the
Congress, DOE, and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) within specified
time frames. If the site is approved, DOE must apply to NRC for
authorization (a license) to construct a repository. If the site is not
approved for a license application, or if NRC denies a license to construct
a repository, the administration and the Congress will have to consider
other options for the long- term management of existing and future nuclear
wastes.

Our testimony, which is based on our recent report on the Yucca Mountain
Repository Project, 1 addresses (1) DOE?s readiness to submit a license
application within the statutory time frame, (2) the extent to which DOE can
meet its goal of opening a repository at Yucca Mountain in 2010, and (3) the
extent to which DOE is managing the project consistent with applicable
departmental procedures.

DOE is not prepared to submit an acceptable license application to NRC
within the statutory limits that would take effect if the site is approved.
The president?s recommendation of the Yucca Mountain site to the Congress
triggered specific statutory time frames for the next steps in the
repository project. Nevada, which had 60 days from February 15 to disapprove
the site, did so on April 8. The Congress now has 90 days (of continuous
session) from that date in which to enact legislation overriding the state?s
disapproval. On May 8, the House of Representatives passed a joint
resolution approving the site for a repository. If the Senate also passes
this resolution- resulting in final approval of the site- the Nuclear

1 U. S. General Accounting Office, Nuclear Waste: Technical, Schedule, and
Cost Uncertainties of the Yucca Mountain Repository Project, GAO- 02- 191
(Washington, D. C.: Dec. 21, 2001). Summary

Page 2 GAO- 02- 765T Nuclear Waste

Waste Policy Act requires DOE to then submit a license application to NRC
within 90 days of the effective date of the legislation. Thus, the process
gives DOE about 5 to 8 months from the date of the president?s
recommendation to submit the license application. However, a September 2001
detailed assessment of the repository program by DOE?s managing contractor
concluded that DOE would not be ready to submit a license application that
would be acceptable to NRC until January 2006. DOE did not accept the
contractor?s proposed new schedule and directed the contractor to develop a
proposal to shorten the time to a license application to December 2004, or
about 29 months from now. The contractor has now developed such a proposal,
which is under review within DOE. Moreover, while a site recommendation and
a license application are separate processes, essentially the same data are
needed for both. Waiting until DOE was closer to having the additional
information needed to support an acceptable license application would have
put DOE in a better position to submit the application within the time
frames set out in the law, and to respond to questions and challenges that
may emanate from the statutory review process subsequent to the president?s
recommendation.

DOE is unlikely to achieve its goal of opening a repository at Yucca
Mountain by 2010. On the basis of DOE?s managing contractor?s September 2001
reassessment, sufficient time would not be available for DOE to obtain a
license from NRC and construct enough of the repository to open it in 2010.
Even under the more recent proposal to submit a license application as early
as December 2004, it is questionable whether DOE could open the repository
in 2010. A key factor in the future licensing and construction of a
repository is whether DOE will be able to obtain the increases in annual
funding that would be required to open the repository by 2010. Because of
the uncertainty of meeting the 2010 goal, DOE is exploring alternative
approaches, such as developing surface facilities for storing waste at the
site until sufficient underground disposal facilities can be constructed.
Had DOE elected to defer a site recommendation until it was closer to having
an acceptable license application, it could have ensured that the site
recommendation was based on the approach to developing a repository that it
intends to follow. This would have enabled DOE to develop an estimated
schedule to design and build the preferred approach and to estimate its
cost, including the annual funding requirements, as part of the information
on which to make a site recommendation.

DOE currently does not have a reliable estimate of when, and at what cost, a
license application can be submitted or a repository can be opened

Page 3 GAO- 02- 765T Nuclear Waste

because DOE stopped using its cost and schedule baselines to manage the site
investigation in 1997. DOE needs to reestablish a baseline for the
repository program that accounts for the outstanding technical work needed
to prepare an acceptable license application and the estimated schedule and
cost to achieve this milestone. In conjunction, DOE needs to use the
baseline as a tool for managing the program, in accordance with the
department?s policies and procedures for managing major projects. Therefore,
our December 2001 report recommended that the secretary of energy
reestablish the baseline through the submission of a license application and
follow the department?s management requirements, including a formal
procedure for changing program milestones. According to DOE, it is currently
in the process of establishing a new baseline for the nuclear waste program.

Recognizing the critical need to address the issue of nuclear waste
disposal, the Congress enacted the Nuclear Waste Policy Act of 1982 to
establish a comprehensive policy and program for the safe, permanent
disposal of commercial spent fuel and other highly radioactive wastes in one
or more mined geologic repositories. The act created the Office of Civilian
Radioactive Waste Management within DOE to manage its nuclear waste program.
Amendments to the act in 1987 directed DOE to investigate only the Yucca
Mountain site.

The Nuclear Waste Policy Act also set out important and complementary roles
for other federal agencies:

 The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) was required to establish health
and safety standards for the disposal of wastes in repositories. EPA issued
standards for the Yucca Mountain site in June 2001 that require a high
probability of safety for at least 10,000 years. 2  NRC is responsible for
licensing and regulating repositories to ensure their

compliance with EPA?s standards. One prerequisite to the secretary?s
recommendation was obtaining NRC?s preliminary comments on the sufficiency
of DOE?s site investigation for the purpose of a license application. NRC
provided these comments on November 13, 2001. If the site is approved, then
NRC, upon accepting a license application from

2 The Energy Policy Act of 1992 required EPA to establish specific health
and safety standards for a repository at Yucca Mountain. Background

Page 4 GAO- 02- 765T Nuclear Waste

DOE, has 3 to 4 years to review the application and decide whether to issue
a license to construct, and then to operate, a repository at the site. 3 
The Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board (the board) reviews the

technical and scientific validity of DOE?s activities associated with
investigating the site and packaging and transporting wastes. The board must
report its findings and recommendations to the Congress and the secretary of
energy at least twice each year, but DOE is not required to implement these
recommendations.

DOE has designated the nuclear waste program, including the site
investigation, as a ?major? program that is subject to senior management?s
attention and to its agencywide guidelines for managing such programs and
projects. The guidelines require the development of a cost and schedule
baseline, a system for managing changes to the baseline, and independent
cost and schedule reviews. DOE is using a management contractor to carry out
the work on the program. The contractor develops and maintains the baseline,
but senior DOE managers must approve significant changes to cost or schedule
estimates. In February 2001, DOE hired Bechtel SAIC Company, LLC (Bechtel),
to manage the program and required the contractor to reassess the remaining
technical work and the estimated schedule and cost to complete this work.

DOE is not prepared to submit an acceptable license application to NRC
within the statutory limits that would take effect if the site were
approved. Specifically, DOE has entered into 293 agreements with NRC to
gather and/ or analyze additional technical information in preparation for a
license application that NRC would accept. DOE is also continuing to address
technical issues raised by the board. In September 2001, Bechtel concluded,
after reassessing the remaining technical work, that DOE would not be ready
to submit an acceptable license application to NRC until January 2006. DOE
did not accept the 2006 date. Instead, it directed the contractor to prepare
a new plan for submitting a license application to NRC by December 2004.
DOE?s current plan is that, by the end of September 2002, Bechtel will
develop, and DOE will review and approve, a new technical, cost, and
schedule baseline for submitting a license application to NRC in December
2004.

3 The acceptance of a license application is not the same as approving an
application. A decision to approve or disapprove any application would be
made by NRC following extensive review and testing. DOE Will Not Be

Ready to Submit a License Application within the Statutory Time Frame

Page 5 GAO- 02- 765T Nuclear Waste

Moreover, while a site recommendation and a license application are separate
processes, DOE will need to use essentially the same data for both. 4 Also,
the act states that the president?s recommendation to the Congress is that
he considers the site qualified for an application to NRC for a license. The
president?s recommendation also triggers an express statutory time frame
that requires DOE to submit a license application to NRC within about 5 to 8
months.

The 293 agreements that DOE and NRC have negotiated address areas of study
within the program where NRC?s staff has determined that DOE needs to
collect more scientific data and/ or improve its technical assessment of the
data. According to NRC, as of March 2002, DOE had satisfactorily completed
work on 38 of these agreements and could resolve another 22 agreements by
September 30 of this year. These 293 agreements generally relate to
uncertainties about three aspects of the long- term performance of the
proposed repository: (1) the expected lifetime of engineered barriers,
particularly the waste containers; (2) the physical properties of the Yucca
Mountain site; and (3) the supporting information for the mathematical
models used to evaluate the performance of the planned repository at the
site.

The uncertainties related to engineered barriers revolve around the
longevity of the waste containers that would be used to isolate the wastes.
DOE currently expects that these containers would isolate the wastes from
the environment for more than 10,000 years. Minimizing uncertainties about
the container materials and the predicted performance of the waste
containers over this long time period is especially critical because DOE?s
estimates of the repository system?s performance depend heavily on the waste
containers, in addition to the natural features of the site, to meet NRC?s
licensing regulations and EPA?s health and safety standards.

The uncertainties related to the physical characteristics of the site center
on how the combination of heat, water, and chemical processes caused by the
presence of nuclear waste in the repository would affect the flow of water
through the repository.

4 See General Guidelines for the Recommendation of Sites for Nuclear Waste
Repositories; Yucca Mountain Site Suitability Guidelines (preamble), 66 Fed.
Reg. 57298, 57322 (Nov. 14, 2001). DOE Lacks Information for

a License Application

Page 6 GAO- 02- 765T Nuclear Waste

The NRC staff?s concerns about DOE?s mathematical models for assessing the
performance of the repository primarily relate to validating the models;
that is, presenting information to provide confidence that the models are
valid for their intended use and verifying the information used in the
models. Performance assessment is an analytical method that relies on
computers to operate mathematical models to assess the performance of the
repository against EPA?s health and safety standards, NRC?s licensing
regulations, and DOE?s guidelines for determining if the Yucca Mountain site
is suitable for a repository. DOE uses the data collected during site
characterization activities to model how a repository?s natural and
engineered features would perform at the site.

According to DOE, the additional technical work surrounding the 293
agreements with NRC?s staff is an insignificant addition to the extensive
amount of technical work already completed- including some 600 papers cited
in one of its recently published reports and a substantial body of published
analytic literature. DOE does not expect the results of the additional work
to change its current performance assessment of a repository at Yucca
Mountain.

From NRC?s perspective, however, the agreements provided the basis for it to
give DOE its preliminary comments on the sufficiency of DOE?s investigation
of the Yucca Mountain site for inclusion in a future license application. In
a November 13, 2001, letter to the under secretary of energy, the Chairman
of the NRC commented that

?[ a] lthough significant additional work is needed prior to the submission
of a possible license application, we believe that agreements reached
between DOE and NRC staff regarding the collection of additional information
provide the basis for concluding that development of an acceptable license
application is achievable.?

The board has also consistently raised issues and concerns over DOE?s
understanding of the expected lifetime of the waste containers, the
significance of the uncertainties involved in the modeling of the scientific
data, and the need for an evaluation and comparison of a repository design
having a higher temperature with a design having a lower temperature. The
board continues to reiterate these concerns in its reports. For example, in
its most recent report to the Congress and the secretary of energy, issued
on January 24, 2002, the board concluded that, when DOE?s technical and
scientific work is taken as a whole, the technical basis for DOE?s
repository performance estimates is ?weak to moderate? at this time. The
board added that gaps in data and basic understanding cause important
uncertainties in the concepts and assumptions on which DOE?s

Page 7 GAO- 02- 765T Nuclear Waste

performance estimates are now based; providing the board with limited
confidence in current performance estimates generated by DOE performance
assessment model.

As recently as May 2001, DOE projected that it could submit a license
application to NRC in 2003. It now appears, however, that DOE may not
complete all of the additional technical work that it has agreed to do to
prepare an acceptable license application until January 2006. In September
2001, Bechtel completed, at DOE?s direction, a detailed reassessment in an
effort to reestablish a cost and schedule baseline. Bechtel estimated that
DOE could complete the outstanding technical work agreed to with NRC and
submit a license application in January 2006. This date, according to the
contractor, was due to the cumulative effect of funding reductions in recent
years that had produced a ?? growing bow wave of incomplete work that is
being pushed into the future.? Moreover, the contractor?s report said, the
proposed schedule did not include any cost and schedule contingencies. The
contractor?s estimate was based on guidance from DOE that, in part, directed
the contractor to assume annual funding for the nuclear waste program of
$410 million in fiscal year 2002, $455 million in fiscal year 2003, and $465
million in fiscal year 2004 and thereafter. 5 DOE did not accept this
estimate because, according to program officials, the estimate would extend
the date for submitting a license application too far into the future.
Instead, DOE accepted only the fiscal year 2002 portion of Bechtel?s
detailed work plan and directed the contractor to prepare a new plan for
submitting a license application to NRC by December 2004. Bechtel has
prepared such a plan and the plan is under review by DOE. Although we have
not reviewed the entire plan, we note that the plan (1) assumes that the
program receives the $525 million in funds requested by the Administration
for fiscal year 2003, which would be more than $100 million above the funds
provided for fiscal year 2002, and (2) work on 10 of the department?s 293
agreements with NRC would not be complete by the target license application
date of December 2004.

5 DOE?s budget request for fiscal year 2003 is about $527 million, or $72
million more than assumed in Bechtel?s reassessment. The preliminary amounts
for fiscal years 2004 and 2005 are $538 million and $550 million,
respectively.

Page 8 GAO- 02- 765T Nuclear Waste

Under the Nuclear Waste Policy Act, DOE?s site characterization activities
are to provide information necessary to evaluate the Yucca Mountain site?s
suitability for submitting a license application to NRC for placing a
repository at the site. In implementing the act, DOE?s guidelines provide
that the site will be suitable as a waste repository if the site is likely
to meet the radiation protection standards that NRC would use to reach a
licensing decision on the proposed repository. Thus, as stated in the
preamble (introduction) to DOE?s guidelines, DOE expects to use essentially
the same data for the site recommendation and the license application.

In addition, the act specifies that, having received a site recommendation
from the secretary, the president shall submit a recommendation of the site
to the Congress if the president considers the site qualified for a license
application. Under the process laid out in the Nuclear Waste Policy Act,
once the secretary makes a site recommendation, there is no time limit under
which the president must act on the secretary?s recommendation. However,
when the president recommended, on February 15, that the Congress approve
the site, specific statutory time frames were triggered for the next steps
in the process. Figure 1 shows the approximate statutory time needed between
a site recommendation and submission of a license application and the
additional time needed for DOE to meet the conditions for an acceptable
license application. The figure assumes that the Congress overrides the
state?s disapproval of April 8, 2002. As shown in the figure, Nevada had 60
days- until April 16- to disapprove the site. The Congress now has 90 days
(of continuous session) from that date in which to enact legislation
overriding the state?s disapproval. If the Congress overrides the state?s
disapproval and the site designation takes effect, the next step is for the
secretary to submit a license application to NRC within 90 days after the
site designation is effective. In total, these statutory time frames provide
about 150 to 240 days, or about 5 to 8 months, from the time the president
makes a recommendation to DOE?s submittal of a license application. On the
basis of Bechtel?s September 2001 and current program reassessments,
however, DOE would not be ready to submit a license application to NRC until
January 2006 or December 2004, respectively. Essentially the Same

Information Is Needed for a Site Recommendation and a License Application

Page 9 GAO- 02- 765T Nuclear Waste

Figure 1: Comparison of Statutory Site Approval Process with DOE?s Projected
Schedule

a Ninety calendar days of continuous session of the Congress.

DOE states that it may be able to open a repository at Yucca Mountain in
2010. The department has based this expectation on submitting an acceptable
license application to NRC in 2003, receiving NRC?s authorization to
construct a repository in 2006, and constructing essential surface and
underground facilities by 2010. However, Bechtel, in its September 2001
proposal for reestablishing technical, schedule, and cost baselines for the
program, concluded that January 2006 is a more realistic date for submitting
a license application. Because DOE objected to this proposed schedule, the
contractor has now proposed a plan for submitting the application in
December 2004. Because of uncertainty over when DOE may be able to open the
repository, the department is exploring alternatives that might still permit
it to begin accepting commercial spent fuel in 2010.

An extension of the license application date to December 2004 or January
2006 would likely preclude DOE from achieving its long- standing goal of
opening a repository in 2010. According to DOE?s May 2001 report on the
program?s estimated cost, after submitting a license application in 2003,
DOE estimates that it could receive an authorization to construct the
repository in 2006 and complete the construction of enough surface and
underground facilities to open the repository in 2010, or 7 years after
submitting the license application. This 7- year estimate from submittal of
the license application to the initial construction and operation of the DOE
Is Unlikely to

Open a Repository in 2010 As Planned

Extension of License Application Date Will Likely Postpone 2010 Repository
Goal

Page 10 GAO- 02- 765T Nuclear Waste

repository assumes that NRC would grant an authorization to construct the
facility in 3 years, followed by 4 years of construction. Assuming these
same estimates of time, submitting a license application in the December
2004 to January 2006 time frame would extend the opening date for the
repository until 2012 or 2013.

Furthermore, opening the repository in 2012 or 2013 may be questionable for
several reasons. First, a repository at Yucca Mountain would be a firstof-
a- kind facility, meaning that any schedule projections may be optimistic.
DOE has deferred its original target date for opening a repository from 1998
to 2003 to 2010. Second, although the Nuclear Waste Policy Act states that
NRC has 3 years to decide on a construction license, a fourth year may be
added if NRC certifies that it is necessary. Third, the 4- year construction
time period that DOE?s current schedule allows may be too short. For
example, a contractor hired by DOE to independently review the estimated
costs and schedule for the nuclear waste program reported that the 4- year
construction period was too optimistic and recommended that the construction
phase be extended by a year- and- ahalf. 6 Bechtel anticipates a 5- year
period of construction between the

receipt of a construction authorization from NRC and the opening of the
repository. A 4- year licensing period followed by 5 years of initial
construction could extend the repository opening until about 2014 or 2015.

Finally, these simple projections do not account for any other factors that
could adversely affect this 7- to 9- year schedule for licensing,
constructing, and opening the repository. Annual appropriations for the
program in recent years have been less than $400 million. In contrast,
according to DOE, it needs between $750 million and $1.5 billion in annual
appropriations during most of the 7- to 9- year licensing and construction
period in order to open the repository on that schedule. In its August 2001
report on alternative means for financing and managing the program, DOE
stated that unless the program?s funding is increased, the budget might
become the ?determining factor? whether DOE will be able to accept wastes in
2010. 7

6 U. S. Department of Energy, Independent Cost Estimate Review of the
Civilian Radioactive Waste Management Program, 2001 Total System Life Cycle
Cost (Washington, D. C.: Jan. 2001).

7 U. S. Department of Energy, Alternative Means of Financing and Managing
the Civilian Radioactive Waste Management Program, DOE/ RW- 0546
(Washington, D. C.: Aug. 2001).

Page 11 GAO- 02- 765T Nuclear Waste

In part, DOE?s desire to meet the 2010 goal is linked to the court decisions
that DOE- under the Nuclear Waste Policy Act and as implemented by DOE?s
contracts with owners of commercial spent fuel- is obligated to begin
accepting spent fuel from contract holders not later than January 31, 1998,
or be held liable for damages. Courts are currently assessing the amount of
damages that DOE must pay to holders of spent fuel disposal contracts.
Estimates of potential damages for the estimated 12- year delay from 1998 to
2010 range widely from the department?s estimate of about $2 billion to $3
billion to the nuclear industry?s estimate of at least $50 billion. The
damage estimates are based, in part, on the expectation that DOE would begin
accepting spent fuel from contract holders in 2010. The actual damages could
be higher or lower, depending on when DOE begins accepting spent fuel.

Because of the uncertainty of achieving the 2010 goal for opening the Yucca
Mountain repository, DOE is examining alternative approaches that would
permit it to meet the goal. For example, in a May 2001 report, DOE examined
approaches that might permit it to begin accepting wastes at the repository
site in 2010 while spreading out the construction of repository facilities
over a longer time period. The report recommended storing wastes on the
surface until the capacity to move wastes into the repository has been
increased. Relatively modest- sized initial surface facilities to handle
wastes could be expanded later to handle larger volumes of waste. Such an
approach, according to the report, would permit partial construction and
limited waste emplacement in the repository, at lower than earlier estimated
annual costs, in advance of the more costly construction of the facility as
originally planned. Also, by implementing a modular approach, DOE would be
capable of accepting wastes at the repository earlier than if it constructed
the repository described in the documents that the secretary used to support
a site recommendation.

DOE has also contracted with the National Research Council to provide
recommendations on design and operating strategies for developing a geologic
repository in stages, which is to include reviewing DOE?s modular approach.
The council is addressing such issues as the (1) technical, policy, and
societal objectives and risks for developing a staged repository; (2)
effects of developing a staged repository on the safety and security of the
facility and the effects on the cost and public acceptance of such a
facility; and (3) strategies for developing a staged system, including the
design, construction, operation, and closing of such a facility. In March
2002, the council published an interim report on the study in which it
addresses a conceptual framework for a generic repository program. The DOE
Is Reviewing

Alternative Ways to Accept Wastes in 2010

Page 12 GAO- 02- 765T Nuclear Waste

Council plans to issue a final report this fall, in which it intends to
provide specific suggestions for incorporating additional elements of staged
repository development into DOE?s repository program.

As of December 2001, DOE expected to submit the application to NRC in 2003.
8 This date reflects a delay in the license application milestone date last
approved by DOE in March 1997 that targeted March 2002 for submitting a
license application. The 2003 date was not formally approved by DOE?s senior
managers or incorporated into the program?s cost and schedule baseline, as
required by the management procedures that were in effect for the program.
At least three extensions for the license application date have been
proposed and used by DOE in program documents, but none of these proposals
have been approved as required. As a result, DOE does not have a baseline
estimate of the program?s schedule and cost- including the late 2004 date in
its fiscal year 2003 budget request- that is based on all the work that it
expects to complete through the submission of a license application.

DOE?s guidance for managing major programs and projects requires, among
other things, that senior managers establish a baseline for managing the
program or project. The baseline describes the program?s mission- in this
case, the safe disposal of highly radioactive waste in a geologic
repository- and the expected technical requirements, schedule, and cost to
complete the program. Procedures for controlling changes to an approved
baseline are designed to ensure that program managers consider the expected
effects of adding, deleting, or modifying technical work, as well as the
effects of unanticipated events, such as funding shortfalls, on the
project?s mission and baseline. In this way, alternative courses of action
can be assessed on the basis of each action?s potential effect on the
baseline. DOE?s procedures for managing the nuclear waste program require
that program managers revise the baseline, as appropriate, to reflect any
significant changes to the program.

After March 1997, according to DOE officials, they did not always follow
these control procedures to account for proposed changes to the program?s
baseline, including the changes proposed to extend the date for license
application. According to these same officials, they stopped

8 DOE?s 2003 budget request states that DOE now expects to submit the
license application between October and December 2004. DOE?s Current

License Application Milestone Date Is Not Supported by the Program?s
Baseline

Page 13 GAO- 02- 765T Nuclear Waste

following the control procedures because the secretary of energy did not
approve proposed extensions to the license application milestone. As a
result, the official baseline did not accurately reflect the program?s cost
and schedule to complete the remaining work necessary to submit a license
application.

In November 1999, the Yucca Mountain site investigation office proposed
extending the license application milestone date by 10 months, from March to
December 2002, to compensate for a $57.8 million drop in funding for fiscal
year 2000. A proposed extension in the license application milestone
required the approval of both the director of the nuclear waste program and
the secretary of energy. Neither of these officials approved this proposed
change nor was the baseline revised to reflect this change even though the
director subsequently began reporting the December 2002 date in quarterly
performance reports to the deputy secretary of energy. The site
investigation office subsequently proposed two other extensions of the
license application milestone, neither of which was approved by the
program?s director or the secretary of energy or incorporated into the
baseline for the program. Nevertheless, DOE began to use the proposed, but
unapproved, milestone dates in both internal and external reports and
communications, such as in congressional testimony delivered in May 2001.

Because senior managers did not approve these proposed changes for
incorporation into the baseline for the program, program managers did not
adjust the program?s cost and schedule baseline. By not accounting for these
and other changes to the program?s technical work, milestone dates, and
estimated costs in the program?s baseline since March 1997, DOE has not had
baseline estimates of all of the technical work that it expected to complete
through submission of a license application and the estimated schedule and
cost to complete this work. This condition includes the cost and schedule
information contained in DOE?s budget request for fiscal year 2003.

When DOE hired Bechtel to manage the nuclear waste program, one of the
contractor?s first assignments was to document the remaining technical work
that had to be completed to support the submission of a license application
to NRC and to estimate the time and cost to complete this work. The
contractor?s revised, unofficial baseline for the program shows that it will
take until January 2006 to complete essential technical work and submit an
acceptable license application. Also, DOE had estimated that completing the
remaining technical work would add about $1.4 billion to the cumulative cost
of the program, bringing the total cost of the Yucca

Page 14 GAO- 02- 765T Nuclear Waste

Mountain project?s portion of the nuclear waste program to $5.5 billion. 9
As noted earlier, DOE accepted only the fiscal year 2002 portion of the
proposed baseline and then directed the contractor to prepare a plan for
submitting a license application to NRC by December 2004. The resulting plan
is now under review within DOE.

Because of these management weaknesses, we recommended in our December 2001
report that the secretary of energy reestablish the baseline through the
submission of a license application and follow the department?s management
requirements, including a formal procedure for changing program milestones.
According to DOE, it is currently in the process of establishing a new
baseline for the nuclear waste program.

Mr. Chairman, this concludes our prepared statement. We would be happy to
respond to any questions that you or members of the subcommittee may have.

For further information about this testimony, please contact me at (202)
512- 3841. Dwayne Weigel, Daniel Feehan, Doreen Feldman, Susan Irwin, and
Robert Sanchez also made key contributions to this statement.

9 DOE estimated that the program cost $4.1 billion, on the basis of year-
of- expenditure dollars from the program?s inception in 1983 through March
2002. The $5.5 billion estimate for the license application is based on
year- of- expenditure dollars from 1983 through January 2006. Contacts and

Acknowledgments

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