Attend Public Hearings in NM to Fight Nuke Weapon Production

These meetings provide an opportunity to express your concerns and ask questions about various aspects of the new DOE draft upgrade plan, including the renewed production of plutonium pits. See below for how you can submit your comments if you can't attend one or more of the hearings.

From the Union of Concerned Scientists:
The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) recently published its newest draft plan to upgrade the entire U.S. nuclear weapons complex and recreate the infrastructure to research, develop, and manufacture new nuclear weapons. First announced in 2006 as Complex 2030, the new plan is now called Complex Transformation.

I am writing to encourage you to attend one or more public hearings in New Mexico on Complex Transformation. These hearings are a part of a legally required review of the environmental impacts of the DOE’s plans; the review is called a draft Supplemental Programmatic Environmental Impact Statement (SPEIS). While applauding efforts at consolidating and eliminating redundant capabilities within the nation’s nuclear weapons complex, the Union of Concerned Scientists opposes the elements of Complex Transformation that would return the United States to the production of new nuclear weapons. Click here for the draft SPEIS.

Hearings Info

March 10, 2008, 6-10 PM
Socorro, New Mexico
Macey Center (at New Mexico Tech), 801 Leroy Place

March 11, 2008 - 11 AM-3 PM AND 6-10 PM
Albuquerque, New Mexico
Albuquerque Convention Center, 401 2nd Street, NW

March 12, 2008 - 6-10 PM
Los Alamos, New Mexico
Hilltop House, 400 Trinity Drive at Central

March 13, 2008 - 11 AM - 3PM
Los Alamos, New Mexico
Hilltop House, 400 Trinity Drive at Central

Santa Fe, New Mexico - 6-10 PM
Genoveva Chavez Community Center, 3221 Rodeo Road

As you likely know, New Mexico is home to two nuclear weapons research facilities, Los Alamos and Sandia National Laboratories. Under Complex Transformation, the role of Los Alamos in particular would grow, most notably with a new and unnecessary facility to annually produce up to 80 plutonium “pits,” the primary explosive component of a nuclear weapon. The United States has thousands of pits in storage and does not need to produce new ones. 

The New Mexico hearings are part of the SPEIS process. It provides the public with an opportunity to present comments or concerns, ask questions, and raise a range of issues. We encourage you to attend one or more of these hearings and tell the DOE that the United States should not be expanding its pit production capacity at Los Alamos nor return to the business of making new nuclear weapons. Instead, any major changes at Los Alamos or the nation’s nuclear weapons complex must be preceded by a comprehensive re-evaluation of the role and future of nuclear weapons in U.S. security policy.

A thorough re-evaluation would conclude that it is in the interest of the United States to pursue a world free of nuclear weapons. The DOE should focus on maintaining a safe, secure, and credible nuclear deterrent while supporting efforts to eliminate these weapons globally, and on dismantling warheads and safely securing weapons-grade materials. The United States should NOT pursue new nuclear weapons.

If you cannot attend the hearing, I strongly encourage you to submit comments on the Complex Transformation draft SPEIS proposal (by April 10, 2008) by fax, letter. or on our website. You can send them to:

Mr. Theodore Wyka
Complex Transformation SPEIS Document Manager
Office of Transformation, NA-10.1
U.S. Department of Energy/NNSA
1000 Independence Avenue, SW
Washington, D.C. 20585
by fax—1-703-931-9222
or on our website

Please mark your letters, faxes, or emails “Complex Transformation SPEIS Comments.”

If you are planning to attend the hearing and need assistance or have questions, please do not hesitate to call or email me at smeyer@ucsusa.org or 617-301-8065. Also, if you do attend, please let me know and call or email me with any feedback or information that may come out of the hearing and could be relevant to our work on the issue.

Sincerely,
Sean Meyer
Project Manager, U.S. Nuclear Weapons Policy Initiative
National Field Organizer, Global Security Program
Union of Concerned Scientists