Today, the Government Accountability Office released testimony by Gene Aloise, GAO’s Natural Resources and Environment Director, on the status of current nuclear non-proliferation efforts.  Mr. Aloise’s testimony pointed out how more work needed to be done by the United States to secure and account for vulnerable nuclear materials.  Mr. Aloise discussed a few key points in his testimony:

-Federal agencies are currently not able to fully account for U.S. nuclear material that is exported overseas:

“We found that U.S. agencies—DOE, NRC, and State—are not able to fully account for U.S. nuclear material overseas that is subject to the terms of nuclear cooperation agreements because (1) the agreements do not stipulate systematic reporting of such information, and (2) there is no policy to pursue or obtain such information…. Specifically, DOE and NRC do not have a comprehensive, detailed current inventory of U.S. nuclear material—including weapon-usable material—that is located overseas. In addition, NRC and DOE could not fully account for the location and disposition of U.S. HEU overseas…”

-There are fragmentary and overlapping responsibilities among federal agencies that are tasked with combating nuclear materials smuggling and there are impediments to inter-agency coordination:

“However, we found impediments to the coordination of U.S. efforts to combat nuclear smuggling overseas. Specifically, we found that none of the existing strategies and plans for coordinating federal efforts to prevent and detect nuclear smuggling and illicit nuclear transfers overseas incorporate all of the desirable characteristics of national strategies, such as identifying the financial resources needed and monitoring mechanisms to be used to determine progress and make improvements.”

“We also identified potential fragmentation and overlapping functions among some programs. Specifically, we identified six programs that provide training to improve the capabilities of foreign border security and customs officials to prevent smuggling and illicit nuclear shipments…”

“Furthermore, we found that no single federal agency has lead responsibility to direct federal efforts to prevent and detect nuclear smuggling overseas.”

-Finally, Mr. Aloise said that while agencies have taken steps to secure domestic nuclear materials and sources, gaps remain:

“We found that the NRC controls have been implemented in a variety of ways in the hospitals and medical facilities we visited in seven states and District of Columbia. These approaches have created a mix of security controls and procedures that could leave some facilities’ radiological sources more vulnerable than others to possible tampering, sabotage, or outright theft. At some locations, the controls resulted in significant security upgrades, such as the addition of surveillance cameras, upgrades to locks on doors, and alarms. In contrast, we observed minimal security in other facilities.”

This testimony is reveals the cracks in the current state of nuclear security policy in the United States.  The lack of overseas accountability, poor inter-agency communication, inefficient use of resources, and uneven security controls demonstrates the fact that the United States still has a ways to go if it is to achieve the President’s nuclear security agenda.

The full testimony can be read here.

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