The administration has proposed a plan to build a new nuclear weapons facility. This facility would have the capacity to build 125 to 200 plutonium “triggers” or pits for nuclear weapons annually. Plutonium pits are an essential component of modern nuclear warheads. The new plutonium pit production facility is a key element of what the administration is calling Complex 2030, a comprehensive plan to update, reorganize, and rebuild the nuclear weapons complex.
This is a step in the wrong direction. The U.S. government has a moral and legal obligation to eliminate its nuclear weapons, yet this proposal would indefinitely sustain our ability to build new nuclear weapons.
It has taken years to create and strengthen the international nuclear nonproliferation regime. The Complex 2030 proposal continues this administration’s pattern of undermining these international nonproliferation structures and agreements. At a time when the U.S. government is demanding other countries adhere to the nuclear nonproliferation treaty, the U.S. government is not meeting its own obligations to pursue nuclear disarmament “in good faith” as the treaty calls for.
A government report has estimated that Complex 2030 will cost over $150 billion, and FCNL estimates the new pit facility to be over $10 billion of that price tag. This is the wrong spending priority; these funds should not be spent creating the most destructive weapons know to humanity.
The administration claims that Complex 2030 is needed to reduce the U.S. nuclear arsenal. However, the United States government has the capability to decommission its nuclear warheads without the construction of a new facility that actually enables greater warhead production. FCNL agrees with the ostensible goal of stockpile reduction, but not the reality of a nuclear complex that increases production capabilities.
DoE representative, Thomas D’Agostino, has even implied that it is the DoE’s goal to increase nuclear weapons capabilities to reach Cold War levels.1 While the United States government is pressing Iran and North Korea to abandon their nuclear weapons programs, it is planning to build up its own nuclear arsenal. This is an untenable and morally wrong policy of “do as I say, and not as I do.” As Representative Ed Markey (MA) said, “America cannot preach nuclear temperance from a barstool.”
Now is your opportunity to speak out against this proposal at local public meetings in your area. The Energy Department is holding public meetings on Complex 2030 to solicit public comment on this first step toward site selection for the weapons plant and its future environmental impact on the community where it’s built.
1“ We have worked closely with the DoD to establish goals for ‘responsiveness,’ that is, timelines… these timelines would restore us to a level of capability comparable to what we had during the Cold War.”
- Statement of Thomas P. D’Agostino, Deputy Administrator for Defense, Programs, National Nuclear Security Administration. Before the House Armed Services Subcommittee on Strategic Forces, April 5, 2006.
See other Complex 2030 links and take action.
