Warhead replacement is dead. Or it should be.
Several of us have been eagerly awaiting the release of the JASON report on Life Extension Programs, which reportedly concluded that Life Extension was preferred to warhead replacement.
It’s here. Arms Control Wonk.com has an early copy of the full text of the unclassified executive summary of Lifetime Extension Program (LEP), JSR-09-334E.
JASON concludes that stockpile stewardship, and the Life Extension Program, is working:
JASON finds no evidence that accumulation of changes incurred from aging and LEPs have increased risk to certification of today’s deployed nuclear warheads.
This finding is a direct consequence of the excellent work of the people in the US nuclear weapons complex supported and informed by the tools and methods developed through the Stockpile Stewardship program. Some aging issues have already been resolved. The others that have been identified can be resolved through LEP approaches similar to those employed to date. To maintain certification, military requirements for some stockpile warheads have been modified. The modifications are the result of improved understanding of original weapon performance, not because of aging or other changes. If desired, all but one of the original major performance requirements could also be met through LEP approaches similar to those employed to date.
This should drive a stake through the heart of the RRW and warhead “replacement” in general.
JASON adds a second, more subtle message at the end of the summary. After noting that certification of certain reuse or replacement options remains uncertain, JASON concludes with “a concern.”
All options for extending the life of the nuclear weapons stockpile rely on the continuing maintenance and renewal of expertise … The study team is concerned that this expertise is threatened by lack of program stability, perceived lack of mission importance, and degradation of the work environment.”
As I read that, this is a very polite way of saying the push for new warheads like RNEP and RRW, far from being a panacea, has endangered the stockpile by politicizing what ought to be a technical question, creating program instability and low morale.
I always knew Buster hated our freedoms.
That’s not the best money quote. This is: “Lifetimes of today’s nuclear warheads could be extended for decades, with no anticipated loss in confidence, by using approaches similar to those employed in LEPs to date.
…rely on the continuing maintenance and renewal of expertise
I think the expertise decay that the Jason’s fear is not so much in weapons physics or metallurgy…
It is that with the retirement of the Baby Boomers we will lose the key warhead skill required in using these:
The subtle message at the end of the report — ‘degradation’ of the work environment etc. — would not be addressed by RRW anyway.
The NAS study on the evaluation of the QMU approach specifically stated that any new untested warheads would have to ‘close’ to tested designs, so RRW would not especially exercise the creative juices of the weaponeers anyway.
In fact, the design work for WR1 has already been completed so the intellectually challenging part of that project is behind us.
For the sake of our national security, I am glad RRW is dying. Contrary to what proponents of untested new warheads assert, the more credible deterrent in the eyes of one’s adversary will always be the tested legacy weapons. On the other hand, if the proposed new warheads are eventually tested, this will make it more difficult to stop other nations from doing the same. Either way, the proposed RRW program to develop new but untested nuclear warheads would have been detrimental to U.S. security.
What I read is nuclear weapons are going to be with us for a very long time.
What I read is nuclear weapons are going to be with us for a very long time.
“Implementation of intrinsic3 surety features in today’s re-entry systems, using the
technologies proposed to date, would require reuse or replacement LEP options.”
JASON recognizes, like others, concern continues about improving intrinsic surety inside the W76 physics package.
The JASON report also found that new warheads might be needed for ICBMs and SLBMs if the U.S. decided to increase the safety requirements for its arsenal—which the NNSA is now interested in doing. Of course, all the weapons in the stockpile already meet high safety standards (the chance that a one-point detonation of the chemical explosives would lead to a yield of more than 4 pounds of TNT must be less than one in a million). There is no reason to believe the current standards are inadequate.
So JASON has now debunked the claims about plutonium aging and those about the problems of multiple LEPs, but NNSA still has at least one card left. If it succeeds in increasing the safety requirements, replacement warheads may rise from the dead.
The quote that really stood out for me was: “In this study “warhead” refers to the nuclear explosive package and associated non-nuclear components.” Totally lame.
There is not a detail to be found in that Executive Summary.
Guys, is there anything more detailed from official sources or our friends over at Mitre floating around in the open source?
How much of an advantage is a team of scientists with Cold War era experience with that eras nuclear devices, over a team of new people working from old plans?
How do you measure those things? How do you measure any one of those things?
Jeff, I find your last point to be right but unfair. Those who politicized the debate were NOT the proponents of RNEP and RRW (which by the way were, as you know, two entirely different ideas with different origins and different rationales), but their opponents, in the US Congress and, sadly in some think-tanks (and I don’t mean the one you work for). The latter should bear their fair share of responsibility in the declining morale of the designers and other members of the nuclear enterprise. Along with the Bush administration leadership, but for very different reasons – for having neglected the nuclear complex and nuclear weapons in general.
Where does it say we can do what we do today indefinitely?
One of the issues in the JASON’s report is “intrinsic surety features”. A recent example of this is that LANL, LLNL and Aldermaston are working together to develop multi-point safety options for future warheads. (NNSA 2010 budget p 105 http://nnsa.energy.gov/about/nnsa_budget.htm)
The UK’s regulations for the nuclear weapons programme say “It shall be a design objective for nuclear warheads to be multipoint safe”.
However the multipoint-safe research may be little more than an academic exercise. If the US stick with the LEP approach for W76 then I expect Aldermaston will follow suite.
Does it also mean that the “RRWs” are included in the LEPs?, that is ,warhead reuse or warhead replacement.
News Media Contact(s):
NNSA Public Affairs (202) 586-7371 For Immediate Release
November 19, 2009
NNSA Thanks JASONs for Technical Review of LEP Programs
Washington, DC – The National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) today announced that it has transmitted a classified technical review of the Lifetime Extension Programs (LEPs) to the Congressional committee that requested it. The review was conducted by the JASONs at the request of the former Chair and former Ranking Member of the House Armed Services Subcommittee on Strategic Forces.
NNSA Administrator spokesman Damien LaVera issued the following statement thanking the JASONs for their review:
“At the request of the former Chair and former Ranking Member of the House Armed Services Subcommittee on Strategic Forces, the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) contracted with the JASONs to conduct a technical review of the Lifetime Extension Programs (LEPs) aimed at extending the lifetimes of weapon systems in the U.S. stockpile in the absence of nuclear testing. We thank the JASONs for their efforts to help find a way forward to a sustainable nuclear security enterprise.
“The JASON’s review confirms the challenges associated with adding performance margin and incorporating modern safety and security features into aging weapons systems, acknowledges the need to preserve our workforce, and reaffirms our long held belief that the strength of the science, technology and engineering at the laboratories and plants is the key to our success.
“While we endorse the recommendations and consider them well-aligned with NNSA’s long-term stockpile management strategy, certain findings in the unclassified Executive Summary convey a different perspective on key findings when viewed without the context of the full classified report. The full report addresses them comprehensively and validates our basic scientific approach to warhead life extension programs, specifically our commitment to evaluating each weapon system on a case-by-case basis and applying the best technological approach from a spectrum of options.”
The full review is classified, but a copy of the unclassified Executive Summary of the JASONs technical review is available upon request.
Follow NNSA News on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and Flickr.
Established by Congress in 2000, NNSA is a semi-autonomous agency within the U.S. Department of Energy responsible for enhancing national security through the military application of nuclear science in the nation’s national security enterprise. NNSA maintains and enhances the safety, security, reliability and performance of the U.S. nuclear weapons stockpile without nuclear testing; reduces the global danger from weapons of mass destruction; provides the U.S. Navy with safe and effective nuclear propulsion; and responds to nuclear and radiological emergencies in the U.S. and abroad. Visit http://www.nnsa.energy.gov for more information.
How reliable would any new weapons be as compared to the current set, and how would this ever be verified given that we would never test the new weapons (…allegedly)?
More importantly, would any deterrable enemy care if we hold 99%, 94% or 76% reliable weapons?
The obsession of the NNSA weaponeers to make their babies perfect (but untested of course…) is largely irrelevant to the psychological deterrent value of nukes.
The NNSA should have essentially no say in what reliability value they are tasked with shooting for.
I accidentally deleted a bunch of comments — apologies.
It is late and I am tired.
“The JASON report also found that new warheads might be needed for ICBMs and SLBMs if the U.S. decided to increase the safety requirements for its arsenal—which the NNSA is now interested in doing. Of course, all the weapons in the stockpile already meet high safety standards (the chance that a one-point detonation of the chemical explosives would lead to a yield of more than 4 pounds of TNT must be less than one in a million). There is no reason to believe the current standards are inadequate.”
One Point Safety is an important subset of overall safety for a nuclear weapon – not the ultimate surety required for a nuclear explosive.
FSB,
agreed — btw, these points, more or less, were also made in my Bulletin piece cited above.
Regarding the safety/surety brouhaha, Garwin has weighed in on this:
In my judgment, legacy weapons are safe enough….Neither the RRW nor the legacy weapons are likely to be proof against being used as a source of weapon material [for a terrorist]. However, a weapon may be a more difficult target than the hundreds of tons of highly enriched uranium and military and ‘civilian’ plutonium that could also be the target of terrorist activities.
“In my judgment, legacy weapons are safe enough,…”
I don’t see where Garwin has addressed the “Insider” threat. I guess he’s satisfied with existing measures.
so.. whatever happened to our nebulous friend FOGBANK? Have we figured out how to make it again, with or without the safety concerns?
“This should drive a stake through the heart of the RRW and warhead “replacement” in general.”
Thankfully, America is deeper than just one Administration.