The Department of Energy today sent to Congress a "final baseline report for the National Ignition Facility (NIF). DOE said the report "confirms a construction cost of $2.2 billion and completion of the project by September 2008" These figures are consistent with an interim report sent to Congress in June (FPN00-29). DOE said that, in addition to actual construction costs, there are other related R&D costs. "Total project-related costs are $3.5 billion," DOE said. Originally, NIF was expected to cost $1.2 billion for construction, with a total project cost of $2.0 billion. LLNL officials stated previously that NIF cost could be reduced by about $300 million from the $2.2 billion figure if DOE had chosen a faster (2006) schedule for completion. Secretary Richardson reportedly chose a schedule that would limit total annual future expenditures to no more than $150 million per year. NIF originally was to be fully operational in 2004.

Secretary Richardson, in transmitting the report to Congress, reaffirmed the importance of NIF. "NIF is essential for our stockpile stewardship program to maintain the long-term reliability and safety of the nation's nuclear stockpile without nuclear testing," he said. "This report details the extensive work performed in getting NIF back on track. The final baseline takes into account the in-depth technical and cost reviews that I ordered so that we can move ahead with confidence." The rebaseline report and a DOE-led cost review are posted at www.dp.doe.gov

Richardson said that an independent technical review of the project, known as the Carlson-Lehman Review, "validated the project's revised cost and schedule baseline." He said the review team "consisted of forty experts with extensive experience in the management of major government and industrial projects, lasers, accelerators and procurement." He said, "The review concluded that the NIF project can be completed successfully using current technology within the total cost and schedule defined in the revised baseline."

John Gordon, Administrator of the newly-formed National Nuclear Security Administration, echoed Richardson's view. He said, "I am confident that NIF will deliver, beginning in 2005, key scientific data that will allow our scientists to continue to certify the safety, security and reliability of the stockpile." The NIF final baseline report includes a strategy to deploy the NIF laser beamlines in stages beginning in 2005, three years before completion of all 192 beamlines.

Not everyone agrees with DOE on the importance of NIF in stockpile stewardship. A report in this week's issue of Nature magazine by former Naval Research Laboratory laser branch chief Stephen Bodner and Christopher Paine of the National Resources Defense Council claims "this facility cannot produce the same extreme physical conditions generated in a nuclear weapon explosion. Some scaling is required. It would be risky and unwise to rely on such extrapolations to evaluate future modifications to, or ageing of, nuclear weapons." The pair also questions a number of technical assumptions on which the NIF is based, including the ability to develop adequate damage-resistant optics and the probability of reaching ignition. "We do not believe there is (any real target design with the potential to achieve ignition), and the NIF project is far too expensive to gamble that viable targets will simply materialize when needed," they say.

Funding is a critical issue for the NIF project. Congress has thus far refused to appropriate the additional funds to complete the project, waiting ostensibly for the new baseline report which it has now received. Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa) succeeded in offering an amendment last week to the Senate's version of the DOE appropriations bill that would limit spending for NIF to $74 and require a National Academy of Sciences study on whether the facility is necessary to maintain the safety and reliability of the nuclear weapons stockpile." The House previously passed an appropriations bill that included $74 million for NIF but did not require any additional studies. DOE states that $206 million is required in FY2001 for NIF to maintain the new cost and schedule. The matter is expected to be resolved in conference in the near future.