Yucca shutdown lacks master plan, auditors say

WASHINGTON -- Department of Energy officials are moving so fast to terminate the Yucca Mountain program that they did not put together a master plan to guide the shutdown of such a major project, auditors said in a report Friday.

Department officials abandoned plans for a comprehensive blueprint under the rush to meet a Sept. 30 deadline to end the 28-year Nevada endeavor, according to a report issued by DOE Inspector General Gregory Friedman.

DOE officials instead organized focus groups to manage the shutdown. While that was significant, auditors said, it was no substitute for an overall plan.

The seven-page report also shed light on some details of the termination.

Some $2 million in equipment, desks, cubicles, printers and supplies have been removed from 900 offices in Las Vegas and at the Yucca site. Those items were transferred to the Hanford nuclear reservation in Washington, DOE officials said.

Other equipment was given to the Nevada Test Site, the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico and the Tonopah Test Range. Surplus emergency vehicles were transferred to Nye County.

While computers are being erased and redistributed to other DOE programs, some are being donated to schools in Clark, Lincoln and Nye counties, according to department officials.

Inspectors said a comprehensive shutdown plan "would have increased the likelihood of overall success of the effort" but were told the process was being quickened to meet a Sept. 30 deadline.

Instead, DOE officials briefed auditors on various focus groups that were managing the shutdown.

"Taken together these efforts were significant, although they did not in our judgment substitute for a master plan," according to Friedman. "Nonetheless, given the sequence of events and the timeline for shutdown completion, we have decided not to restart our audit."