Continued Operation of Los Alamos National Laboratory, Los Alamos, New Mexico

The purpose of the continued operation of LANL is to provide support for DOE’s core missions as directed by Congress and the President. DOE’s need to continue operating LANL is focused on its obligation to ensure a safe and reliable nuclear stockpile. For the foreseeable future, DOE, on behalf of the U.S. Government, will need to continue its nuclear weapons research and development, surveillance, computational analysis, components manufacturing, and nonnuclear aboveground experimentation. Currently, many of these activities are conducted solely at LANL. A cessation of these activities would run counter to national security policy as established by Congress and the President (DOE 1999a).