Calendar Year 2020

The National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) is
and at risk of not achieving the first production unit for the
W76 refurbishment within its intended scope, schedule, and
cost parameters. In particular, we found that NNSA
(1) reduced the scope of activities planned to support final
design and production decisions; (2) delayed tests and
production related milestones; and, (3) could not reconcile
cost variances to supporting project documentation.

The Department of Energy (Department), including the National
Requirements Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA), was inconsistent in its
reimbursement for contractor post-retirement health benefit costs.
Further, as a result of these inconsistencies, contractors were
reimbursed for unreasonable costs. Specifically, while NNSA
reimbursed BWXT Y-12, LLC (BWXT Y-12) for the
post-retirement health benefits of corporate transferees, the Oak
Ridge Operations Office (Operations Office) disallowed similar
costs from the Bechtel Jacobs Company, LLC (Bechtel Jacobs)
contract for the East Tennessee Technology Park and denied a
request from UT-Battelle, LLC (UT-Battelle), to provide similar
benefits for the employees of the Oak Ridge National Laboratory.
BWXT Y-12 employees are able to use their corporate years-ofservice
credits when eligibility for post-retirement health benefits
is determined. According to the BWXT Y-12 contract,
"…employees transferring directly from a Bechtel or BWXT
affiliated company will retain the continuous or credited service
date recognized by the affiliated company from which they transfer
for the purpose of vacation eligibility, and savings plan, pension
plan, retiree medical plan vesting, and eligibility for early
retirement."

The Department of Energy’s (DOE’s) Nevada Test Site (NTS)
mission includes experimental and hazardous work in support of
the national Stockpile Stewardship Program; maintaining the
capability to resume underground nuclear testing; performing
characterization and remediation of legacy nuclear testing sites;
and managing nuclear waste operations. NTS is operated for DOE
by Bechtel Nevada and is under the cognizance of DOE’s National
Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA). In March 28, 2006, the
Department announced that National Security Technologies, LLC
had been awarded a contract to manage and operate NTS,
replacing Bechtel Nevada as the site contractor. Full performance
of the new contract is scheduled to begin in July 2006.

The Department of Energy's (Department) Property
Management Regulations require fleets of vehicles to be
kept at the minimum necessary to meet programmatic
needs. To that end, they require that organizations
establish controls to help ensure the most economical
utilization of vehicles. While fleet managers are allowed to
establish local utilization standards that are less than those
specified by the Department, they are also required to
maintain utilization records, review utilization at least
annually and identify all vehicles failing to meet local use
objectives. Once underused vehicles are identified, fleet
managers must take prompt action to reassign them to
higher use areas, dispose of them, or justify the continued
need for the vehicles. All requests to retain underutilized
vehicles must be approved by the Department. Despite
these requirements, we found that a significant percentage
of the Department's fleet vehicles were underutilized.