Uranium Enrichment

Congressional Action Needed To Revitalize the Program Gao ID: RCED-88-18 October 19, 1987

In response to a congressional request, GAO assessed the problems of the Department of Energy's (DOE) uranium enrichment program and identified options to revitalize it.

GAO found that: (1) the program's financial problems include $8.8 billion in unrecovered costs, multibillion-dollar payments for unused power, market uncertainties due to ongoing litigation, and potentially large decommissioning costs; (2) DOE proposed to write off its unproductive assets, which would leave about $3.4 billion in unrecovered costs; (3) price flexibility would allow DOE to balance cost recovery objectives with other program objectives; (4) DOE lowered its production levels to meet the objectives even though the continued low production would cost more than $80 million over the next few years; and (5) DOE proposed to restructure the program as a federal corporation to increase competition, free it from budget restrictions, and permit flexible pricing.

Recommendations

Our recommendations from this work are listed below with a Contact for more information. Status will change from "In process" to "Open," "Closed - implemented," or "Closed - not implemented" based on our follow up work.

Director: Team: Phone:


The Justia Government Accountability Office site republishes public reports retrieved from the U.S. GAO These reports should not be considered official, and do not necessarily reflect the views of Justia.