þÿ.<HTML><HEAD><TITLE>News Update 5/15/09</TITLE> <META NAME="description" CONTENT="An online resource for monitoring nuclear safety issues that effect citizens of New Mexico and the world."> <META NAME="keywords" CONTENT="WIPP Waste Isolation Pilot Project Concerned Citizens for Nuclear Safety wipp CCNS ccns DOE Department of Energy nuclear weapons nuclear transportation radioactive radioactive waste plutonium pit trigger production LANL Los Alamos National Laboratories nuclear waste disposal nuclear radionuclides radioactive air emissions Clean Air Act clean air act ecology carlsbad new mexico Ca rlsbad New Mexico environmental protection non profit activism"></HEAD> <BODY TEXT="#000000" LINK="#BE0000" VLINK="#EB0000" ALINK="#858585" BACKGROUND="../graphix/bgtile.gif"> <TABLE BORDER=0 WIDTH=632><TR><TD> <A HREF="../index.html"><IMG SRC="../graphix/logosmall.gif" WIDTH=182 HEIGHT=63 BORDER=0></A><BR> <DIV ALIGN=center> <TABLE WIDTH=500 BORDER=0><TR> <TD><br> <p><FONT FACE="ARIAL,HELVETICA"><SMALL><font color="#000000"><a href="non-proliferation"><p></a></small> <br> <br> <p><FONT FACE="ARIAL,HELVETICA"><SMALL><font color="#000000"><br><b><a name="non-proliferation"></a>President Obama, UN Look To Nuclear Non-Proliferation<p> May 15, 2009</b><br><p> <br> <a name="non-proliferation"></a> The United Nations is holding preparatory sessions for the 2010 review of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. The objective of the treaty is to prevent the spread of nuclear weapons, further the goal of achieving complete nuclear disarmament, and to promote cooperation in the peaceful uses of nuclear energy. <p> President Obama's April 5th speech in Prague promised steps toward a nuclear weapons-free world. <p> Ralph Hutchinson, peace activist and coordinator for the Oak Ridge Environmental Peace Alliance, spoke on a panel at the UN conference about the necessity of developing practical steps to take toward non-proliferation. He said, <p> "There is a different energy today than there was when I was last here, four years ago, and it feels good. I am not persuaded that we are yet on the road to a nuclear free future, but I allowing myself to be more hopeful.<p> I have come from Oak Ridge, Tennessee, home of the Y12 Nuclear Weapons Complex where the United States is busy manufacturing new 'secondaries' to replace the destructive thermonuclear core of aging warheads as part of the Life Extension Program. The effect of this work, according to one DOE official is to extend the life of our current nuclear arsenal by as much as 100-120 years. I will say more about this program in a moment.<p> What happens in Oak Ridge, and the other work that this panel will describe for you at other weapons facilities around the United States, is where we see the truth about the United States' intentions; it is at these facilities that nuclear policy turns from words into warheads and that is why it is important to understand what is happening at Los Alamos, Livermore and Sandia, Pantex, Kansas City, Savannah River, the Test Site, and Oak Ridge.<p> Here's why I am hopeful. In the past four months, the United States has come clean about torture. Not enthusiastically and not completely, but we are on a different road than we were on six months ago. And the reason, I think, is not because we wanted to, and not even because we have suddenly become noble or recommitted to our ideals. The reason is more practical: in order to move forward and to achieve our foreign policy goals, it is necessary to rebuild credibility, to regain status in the international community. And the only way we can do that is by developing relationships of mutual within the boundaries of international law. The US recognizes that a do-as-I-say-not-as-I-do policy is untenable, and ultimately counterproductive. So we have set out on a different path in order to achieve our security goals.<p> This is the very same dynamic that will be required for the United States to achieve it[s] security goals with respect to nuclear weapons and there are hopeful signs that the government is slowly coming to recognize that the path we are on--maintaining an enduring nuclear arsenal, will not achieve our security goals but instead undermines them.<p> President Obama's words suggest he wants to be on the path to a nuclear weapons free world. But he can not get on that path, and people like Henry Kissinger and Sam Nunn have realized this, he can not get on that path while he clings to the false security of nuclear weapons. As long as the US maintains commitment to an enduring stockpile and continues to produce nuclear weapons components and upgrade facilities, we are not walking toward a world free of nuclear weapons.<p> It is our job, representing the voice of the people, to lay out the path and to demand, cajole, demonstrate, consult, and do everything we can to get our government on that path. In the arms control and policy communities, markers are laid down: CTBT, Fissile materials cut off treaty, new START agreement. While all are laudable goals, they are also all, for now, paper.<p> Meanwhile, activities on the ground undermine these attempts to approach the goal of security through international agreements, which brings me back to my piece of the discussion: what is happening in Oak Ridge, Tennessee.<p> The Y12 Nuclear Weapons Complex<p> > Manhattan Project, HEU for Little Boy<p> ( > postwar, retooled to produce secondaries for thermonuclear<p> ( > HEU, beryllium, lithium deuteride, DU, +<p> ( Today<p> ( > Life Extension Program<p> ( > produces new secondaries for 'upgraded' warheads<p> ( > W87 (replacing W62), B61 bomb, Mods 7 & 11, and now W76<p> ( > W76 upgrade produces new warhead: W76-1 W76 warhead for MK4 missile, for Trident subs <p> Upgrade: new (modified) fuse to allow precision detonation height<p> ( With 'advanced fuzing options' the AF&F system will allowing targeteers to set the Height of Burst (HOB) more accurately and significantly improve the ability to hold hard targets at risk. Because 63 percent of the W76 stockpile (about 2,000 warheads) is being modified with the new fuze, the U.S. inventory of reentry vehicles with hard target kill capability will increase from 400 today to 2,400 in 2021.<p> ( The W76 LEP is a major overhaul of the warhead that involves changes to both the reentry body and the warhead package: Replacing 'organics' in the primary; replacing detonators; replacing chemical high explosives; refurbishing the secondary; adding a new Arming, Fuzing & Firing (AF&F) system, a new gas reservoir, a new gas transfer support system, a new lightning arrestor connector (LAC)<p> ( Tomorrow in Oak Ridge<p> > continued LEP<p> > Uranium Processing Facility, $3.4 billion production facility to replace six aging buildings that are currently engaged in production activities with one, new, super-secure, state-of-the-art facility.<p> ( Obviously, this heavy investment in a new production facility will be seen by others as a provocative act. In a moment you will hear about plans for two other production facilities--it is my belief that the road to a nuclear free future dead ends at these bomb plants. Only if they are removed from the path can we move forward.<p> US can not credibility claim compliance with Article 6--and credibility is crucial--while investing in an enduring stockpile through life extension, new production facilities, and 'backdoor' new weapons systems.<p> Optimism<p> The news that the Tritium Extraction Facility at Savannah River is being put on hold for 10 years is a hopeful sign--it appears to be turning the rhetoric into concrete reality. This facility cost more than half a billion dollars to build and has operated a little more than 2 years and, according to reports last week, will be placed on operational standby and is not expected to be used for tritium production for ten years.<p> ( The astonishing outpouring of public sentiment against the DOE/NNSA's Complex Transformation was also hopeful. More than 100,000 people submitted comments on the Environmental Impact Statement and the government was forced to back off some of its more ambitious goals.<p> ( The Bipartisan Congressional Commission will release its report on US strategic posture this week, apparently a month late due to an inability to come to a consensus on force structure, but according to reports, those who argued for a reduction in US dependence on nuclear weapons and for new reductions in the arsenal have prevailed. This perspective, which looks down the road to a world free of nuclear weapons, continues to grow within the policy establishment.<p> Finally, I believe the hard work that grassroots groups have done over the past two decades, when our advocacy of a world free of nuclear weapons was considered naive or unrealistic (it was actually just the opposite) had built a base; we have been creating an informed citizenry who are now poised to press for action to match the encouraging rhetoric coming from the White House.<p> ( In our case, in Oak Ridge, we are calling for an end to funding for the Life Extension Program, a conversion of the workforce and facilities to full-time disassembly and dismantlement, and the abandonment of plans for the Uranium Processing Facility."<p> <p> <p> <p></font></small></font> <br> <br> <BR> <BR> <A HREF="../index.html"><IMG SRC="../graphix/rad.gif" WIDTH=67 HEIGHT=67 BORDER=0></A> <P><BR> <a href="index.html"><b>Back to News Index</b></A> </TD></TR></TABLE> </div></TD></TR></TABLE> </BODY></HTML>