On February 1, the U.S. Department of Energy Task Force on Alternative Futures presented its final report at an open meeting of the Secretary of Energy Advisory Board. Led by Robert Galvin, Chairman of the Executive Committee of Motorola, Inc., the task force was formed in 1993, at the request of DOE Secretary Hazel O'Leary. The independent group was asked to carefully examine options for change within DOE Laboratories and the National Renewable Energy Laboratory.
The task force report, Alternative Futures for the Department of Energy National Laboratories, says major research and development facilities are important to DOE and are part of an essential, fundamental cornerstone for continuing leadership by the United States. The task force made recommendations in the areas of national security; energy, environment, and related sciences, engineering; clean up of radioactive and chemical wastes; economics; and governance.
Recommendations
The task force said DOE weapons laboratories must provide a safe, secure, and reliable nuclear stockpile in the absence of explosive testing. Since the department has chosen science-based stockpile stewardship to achieve this mission, skilled scientists, engineers, and managers must be hired and retained. In addition, multi-program laboratories should be managed as a system and lead laboratories should be established according to mission assignments and programmatic strengths. The task force suggested DOE could accomplish this by establishing Centers of Excellence within the laboratory system.
Critical of DOE's management organization, the task force said the current laboratory organization makes inter-relationships and funding difficult between support and non-proliferation areas. The task force said the laboratories should be organized to reflect their importance and interdependence. They suggested that DOE and Congress should develop and implement a new corporate type of laboratory system over a period of one to two years. The task force said Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory should retain its abilities in nuclear weapons design and technology and transfer its activities in nuclear materials development and production to Los Alamos National Laboratory over the next five years. The task force agreed that the National Ignition Facility should be built, balancing its costs with other major investments.
The report said national laboratories have a critical role to play in performing high-quality science and engineering for DOE's Environmental Management program. They should be available to the entire government system as a powerful environmental technical resource.
According to the task force report, DOE must address renegotiating unrealistic or unfeasible requirements in cleanup compliance agreements made with state and federal agencies. To reduce bitterness, distrust, and distress, members of the affected public should be involved in decision making. Environmental challenges, even those presenting no immediate threats to public health or safety, should be addressed with a heightened sense of urgency.
The report said DOE should strengthen its efforts in fundamental science and engineering, both at the laboratories and in the universities. The department should pay close attention to ensuring a proper balance between universities and the national laboratories performing DOE-related basic research, both now and in the future. Basic research at the laboratories should be more fully integrated into the national and international research community. Laboratory/university cooperation in basic research should be pursued.
The response
DOE Secretary Hazel O'Leary responded to the task force recommendations saying the task force gave the nation an ambitious set of proposals regarding the future of these institutions. "I wanted recommendations that challenged the department and its laboratories to reach new levels of performance in meeting national needs. To a large extent, the task force has met these expectations," she said, and DOE "will be able to embrace and aggressively act on the overwhelming majority of the task force's recommendations.
"The task force has clearly and forcefully validated the importance of the major R&D missions of the department and its laboratories. Words like vital, urgent, critical, and important are used throughout the report in describing the research agendas of the DOE laboratories in the areas of energy, environment, national security, and fundamental science."
O'Leary said she welcomed the task force's bullish stance on the department's fundamental science mission and shared the task force's view that "the laboratories' research role is part of an essential, fundamental cornerstone for continuing leadership by the United States." She also believes that energy and environmental R&D at the labs must be more closely integrated.
She was pleased by the task force's support of science-based stockpiles and their support for the construction of the National Ignition Facility. O'Leary said DOE will closely evaluate the recommendations regarding a reduction of some of the nuclear weapons functions at Lawrence Livermore and their transfer to Los Alamos. She was initially in favor of a careful phase-down of some of Livermore's nuclear weapons work, combined with a re-emphasis on nonproliferation, counter-proliferation, and verification activities.
O'Leary said she didn't think the task force made enough of an effort to fully understand the progress the department has made in directly addressing problems inherited from the past. Responding to the task force's critical assessment of DOE's Environmental Management program, O'Leary said, "Over the past two years, we have worked to assess and to quantify the vulnerabilities at each site and have established both a national advisory board ... and a host of site-specific advisory boards." She believes the department continues to take bold actions to cut costs, reinvent the program, and accelerate cleanup activities. She said that some of the task force's recommendations have already been implemented in this area. Although she agreed that the base for science and technology should be expanded, O'Leary said, "In our view, cost and performance of the labs vis-a-vis industry and academia must drive decisions regarding their relative roles in the development of cleanup technologies."
She also agreed that industrial competitiveness is not an appropriate primary mission of the laboratories, but added, "It has always been our intention that collaborations with industry be viewed as a derivative and critical success indicator of our other missions." Through DOE's "partnerships with industry, the department helps to maximize the value of the public investment in these institutions by increasing the prospects of getting taxpayer-financed innovations to the marketplace, while also meeting DOE mission requirements. The task force concludes that industrial collaborations at the labs should be tied to core DOE mission areas, and they acknowledge that we already are implementing this approach," said O'Leary.
"Responding to my request for alternate management schemes, the task force recommends a new and innovative governance structure for the laboratories. The proposal would be an unprecedented approach, and thus we will need to learn much more about its potential benefits and liabilities. We will ask the full Secretary of Energy Advisory Board to assist in further assessing this proposal and its implications," said O'Leary. She ended her response stating, "The bottom line: I welcome the task force's report and am heartened by their strong validation of the R&D functions of the department and its national laboratories."
Copies of Alternative Futures for the Department of Energy National Laboratories and O'Leary's initial comments can be obtained from the Secretary of Energy Advisory Board office, 1000 Independence Ave., SW, 8E-050 Forrestal, Washington, D.C. 20585. The report can also be obtained on the Internet through World Wide Web site http://www.doe.gov/html/doe/whatsnew/galvin/tf-doe.html.
