NNSA Principal Deputy Administrator Frank Rose Remarks at Groundbreaking for Lithium Processing Facility, Y-12 National Security Complex, October 19, 2023

Thank you, Teresa, for that introduction.  Good morning, everyone, it’s a pleasure to be here for today’s groundbreaking ceremony.  Both Administrator Hruby and I would like to thank our site project leadership, our partners from the Department of Energy’s Office of Environmental Management, and our local, state, and congressional elected officials for being here today.  Your tireless work and constant support, for this project and all our work at Y-12, has helped us reach this point and will be vital going forward.

Every time we gather at Y-12, we are reminded of the historic role this complex has played in the nuclear security enterprise.  Some of the earliest and most important research and breakthroughs for the Manhattan Project occurred right here.  Today, Y-12 remains critical to meeting the challenges the Nation and NNSA faces.

Like our Manhattan Project predecessors, today’s NNSA faces a daunting task in a hostile world.   As the U.S. Director for National Intelligence’s most recent Annual Threat Assessment concluded:

The United States and its allies will confront a complex and pivotal international security environment dominated by . . . strategic challenges [that] will intersect and interact in unpredictable ways, leading to mutually reinforcing effects that could challenge our ability to respond.

In addition to shared global challenges such as climate change, health security, narcotics trafficking, and terrorism, each of our main adversaries is engaged in some kind of destabilizing behavior.  Russia has invaded Ukraine and seized control of a nuclear power plant, stationed nuclear weapons in Belarus, suspended participation in New START and seems on a path to de-ratify the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty.  China is expanding its nuclear arsenal to the point where we are for the first time confronting the possibility of facing two near peer nuclear adversaries, and despite repeated attempts by the last several U.S. presidential administrations, Beijing has not shown any interest in engaging in either the strategic stability or arms control discussions expected of a responsible nuclear power.  North Korea continues to test and refine its ballistic missile capabilities.  And Iran continues to enrich uranium with less transparency. 

In addition to the more complicated nuclear security environment, NNSA has been asked to do more.  For example, through our nonproliferation and naval reactor programs, NNSA is supporting the U.S. – U.K. – Australia agreement – so called AUKUS – to deliver nuclear power submarines to Australia.  And we are also supporting new initiatives in nuclear energy as a means of providing zero-carbon electricity to combat climate change.  We need to tackle these challenges, ever-present and emerging, simultaneously, while staying ahead of our adversaries.  In short, we are asked to do more at a faster pace than at any time since the World War Two.

The key to meeting our expanded mission requirements is an enterprise that is resilient and flexible.  As Administrator Hruby has said countless times during her tenure as NNSA’s Administrator, one of the greatest challenges, and opportunities, facing NNSA is our infrastructure.  Infrastructure, along with people, serve as the foundation of our enterprise.  Unfortunately, our present infrastructure assets are not as capable of meeting our expected future mission requirements as we would like.  This is partly because, in the 1990s’ as the Cold War ended, NNSA envisioned a smaller enterprise.  We consolidated many of our production activities, closing some plants and idling some facilities.  This made sense during at that time.  As a result, however, NNSA finds itself with nearly 60 percent of its facilities beyond their life expectancy. 

So today, we are again reimagining our enterprise to match today’s environment.  This new enterprise is meant to be responsive to changing environments and scale more readily.  It is meant to be more resilient to outages and failures.  And it is meant to utilize modern capabilities to attract the best talent, to be efficient, and to deliver the highest quality products.  Although it is overdue, I am pleased to say we are making significant infrastructure investments to give ourselves the flexible, responsive, and resilient capabilities we need for the 21^st century.

Perhaps nowhere in the nuclear security enterprise is this push to modernize our infrastructure more evident than at Y-12.  As I said, some of the earliest work on the Manhattan Project took place here and many of those original facilities are still in use 80 years later.  That is why we are tightly focused on investing in Y-12 to modernize the facilities and capabilities and employ a world-class workforce.  For example, in January Administrator Hruby had the opportunity to be here for ribbon cuttings at both the new fire station and emergency operations center.  Together, these two facilities represented a $68 million investment to replace severely outdated buildings that dated back to the 1940’s.  Upgrading both locations reduced NNSA’s deferred maintenance costs, provided a better working environment, and deepened our cooperation with the local community.  I’d also like to note that both facilities were NNSA pilot projects aimed at executing projects more efficiently.  This approach saved time and taxpayer dollars.  Both projects got started in early 2021, and just two years later they were ready for use.

We also continue to make progress on our largest infrastructure project at Y-12, the Uranium Processing Facility, or UPF.  UPF is one of our most ambitious projects and is meant to reduce mission dependency on Building 9212, which is over 75 years old.  It will provide for the long-term viability and security of processing uranium that has already been enriched while significantly improving worker and public safety.  In committing to implementing the latest manufacturing processes in our critical infrastructure, UPF will incorporate electrorefining to provide purified uranium metal.  This new process will replace a high-hazard chemical method, improving worker safety and environmental stewardship.  We reached a major milestone last April with the full enclosure of the facility and while the project has faced funding limitations, I am confident it is on track to completion.

Importantly, we are here today to signal the start of the next major investment, the Lithium Processing Facility, or LPF.   Y-12’s current facility for processing lithium, Building 9204-2, or Beta-2, is an original Manhattan Project-era building that has degraded with time.  LPF will be a modern, safe, and reliable 245,000 square foot facility.  Like the Uranium Processing Facility, LPF will incorporate new technologies aimed at improving efficiency and safety.  New processes developed by folks right here at Y-12 will enhance efficiency, reduce operating costs, increase our capacity to recover, recycle, and produce enriched lithium materials and components, and above all, improve safety.  Initial site preparation work will begin this month and is expected to last about a year and a half with main construction set to begin in mid-2025.

Overall, the work on LPF will continue the transformation of both Y-12 and the nuclear security enterprise. We are thankful for Congress’s ongoing commitment to these projects.

Finally, on behalf of NNSA’s leadership, I would like to salute the entire Y-12 workforce.  You are the reason why the Nuclear Security Enterprise and our nation are so very strong, and why I’m confident that NNSA – and in particular Y-12 – will continue to accomplish our national security missions for the next 80 years.

Thank you.