Energy Dept: Laser Cost Doubled

["Sandy Perle" <sandyfl@earthlink.net>]

Energy Dept: Laser Cost Doubled

WASHINGTON (AP) - Development of the world's most powerful laser to 
monitor the nation's nuclear arsenal without testing - a project 
already dogged by cost overruns and delays - could cost nearly three 
times its original $1 billion price tag, congressional auditors say. 

The Energy Department told the General Accounting Office the cost of 
the laser project at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in 
California has soared to $2.2 billion - twice what it was predicted 
to be in 1995. But the GAO, the investigative arm of Congress, said a 
more accurate total is closer to $3 billion. 

As recently as January, its price was said to be $1.5 billion. 

The soon-to-be-released GAO report says that the project has been 
mismanaged by Lawrence Livermore and that technical problems as well 
as unexpected expenses and scheduling delays were withheld from 
outside reviewers and the Energy Department. 

While costs have soared, the project has lagged far behind schedule, 
with its completion date now put at 2008, six years behind schedule. 

The laser, which is to be the most sophisticated and powerful ever 
developed, is a key part of the department's nuclear weapons 
stewardship program. The project consists of 192 laser beams used to 
simulate a nuclear explosion. The beams are to shoot energy onto a 
single target, recreating in a laboratory the thermonuclear 
conditions caused by a nuclear detonation. 

Formally known as the National Ignition Facility, the laser is also 
part of a government effort to properly maintain, test and monitor 
the nation's nuclear weapons stockpile without resumption of actual 
testing of warheads and bombs at the Nevada Test Site. 

A draft copy of the GAO report was obtained Wednesday by The 
Associated Press from two citizen groups that have been critical of 
the National Ignition Facility. 

The GAO report attributes the cost overruns to an unrealistic 
original budget, poor management at Lawrence Livermore and ``an 
absence of effective independent reviews'' and oversight by the 
Energy Department. 

GAO investigators also found that senior managers of the laser 
project withheld their concerns about the technical and management 
problems from the Energy Department and the director of the Livermore 
Lab, which is operated by the University of California. 

Energy Secretary Bill Richardson last year ordered a review of the 
laser project after he learned of a $350 million cost overrun. 

Since then, the costs have continued to soar, with the Energy 
Department sending a $2.2 billion cost estimate to Congress in June, 
according to the GAO report. 

But the GAO said the actual costs exceed $2.8 billion, and warned, 
``technical problems may further drive up'' the cost if they are not 
easily resolved. 

The cost of related research and development needed for the laser to 
be used as planned also have increased, according the GAO, from $1 
billion in 1995 to nearly $1.8 billion. The Energy Department 
estimates the cost increases to be more modest - no more than $140 
million. 

Technical problems affecting both costs and the completion schedule 
for the laser were first raised in the summer of 1998 and documented 
over a three-month period in early 1999, the GAO said. Yet, 
Livermore's director, Bruce Tarter, told Congress in March 1999 that 
the project was ``on budget and on schedule.'' 

In early 1999, an independent contractor also reviewed the project's 
progress ``and did not report any significant cost, schedule or 
technical'' problems, although ``over two dozen senior NIF managers 
knew the project faced growing problems that threatened both its 
costs and schedules,'' according to the GAO report. 

``The GAO report shows a pattern of deception involving top 
managers,'' said Marylia Kelley, of Tri-Valley Cares, a citizen group 
in Livermore that has opposed the project. ``Officials took a see no 
evil, hear no evil, speak no evil approach and turned a blind eye to 
problems they knew or suspected.'' 

Kelley's group and another nuclear weapons watchdog organization, 
Alliance for Nuclear Accountability, obtained a draft of the GAO 
report, which may be released as early as this week. The report had 
been requested by the House Science Committee. 

------------------------------------------------------------------------
Sandy Perle					Tel:(714) 545-0100 / (800) 548-5100   				    	
Director, Technical				Extension 2306 				     	
ICN Worldwide Dosimetry Division		Fax:(714) 668-3149 	                   		    
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