Washington (Platts)--30Aug2007

The US Department of Energy's nuclear complex needs to shift its focus
from weapons production to such activities as intelligence and
nonproliferation, the official responsible for managing the agency's complex
said Thursday.

     "A transformation needs to happen," said Thomas D'Agostino, who is to
be sworn in Thursday as head of DOE's National Nuclear Security
Administration.

     In a conference call with reporters, D'Agostino said the complex needs
to be "much smaller, much safer and, primarily, less expensive." One of his
priorities, he said, is improved federal oversight of contractors, especially
in safety and security.

     For years, DOE has been bedeviled by a series of security breaches,
particularly at the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico. Those
problems led to the firing of D'Agostino's predecessor, Linton Brooks.

     D'Agostino said there have been recent moves at at Los Alamos to improve
security practices. Improvements in that area are important in establishing a
sound baseline for security performance, he said.

     Another priority is project management, D'Agostino said. One of NNSA's
most controversial projects is the construction of a facility to fabricate
mixed-oxide plutonium-uranium reactor fuel out of surplus weapons plutonium.
Cost estimates for the project, at the Savannah River Site in South Carolina,
have nearly quintupled from a 2002 estimate of $1 billion.

     One "tactical" area that will draw his attention is consolidation of
the weapons-usable materials located across the complex, D'Agostino said.

     Details on the plans for the transformation of the nuclear complex will
be part of a draft environmental impact statement that is to be released this
fall, D'Agostino said.

		--Daniel Horner, daniel_horner@platts.com