USEC uranium sale unlawful - Government Accountability Office

London (Platts)--14Jul2006

DOE UNLAWFULLY AUGMENTED ITS APPROPRIATIONS BY HAVING USEC SELL 900 METRIC
TONS of uranium between December 2004 and November 2005, according to a legal
opinion from the congressional Government Accountability Office. The July 12
letter report to Senator Pete Domenici, a Republican from New Mexico and
chairman of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, noted that USEC
sold the uranium for $62 million to four buyers. DOE had transferred the
uranium to USEC to pay USEC for decontaminating DOE- and USEC-owned uranium
that had excess levels of technetium. In November 2005, Congress passed
legislation that allows DOE to barter, transfer or sell uranium to cover the
costs of decontaminating its own uranium. The report said DOE circumvented
the receipts statute by using USEC as its sales agent and using the sales
proceeds to pay USEC for decontamination services. Under federal law, DOE
should have turned the sales proceeds over to the US Treasury and used funds
Congress had appropriated to pay USEC.

However, at the time of the transaction, DOE did not have such
funds in its budget to pay for the decontamination services. To remedy the
violation of a miscellaneous receipts statute, DOE should transfer $62 million
to the miscellaneous receipts of the Treasury, the report said. Alternatively,

DOE could seek congressional approval for transfer of the 900 MT, the report
said, which would also remedy the violation of the receipts statute.


 

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