Aligning the Governance Structure of the NNSA Laboratories to Meet 21st Century National Security Challenges (2015) / Chapter Skim
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These capabilities are routinely applied to other areas, including energy, environment, industrial technologies, and -- important for this study -- on-nuclear national security needs. n The original mission of LANL, LLNL, and SNL focused solely on nuclear weapons, but the mission has evolved over time to include a broader array of national security challenges.
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The challenge now is how to meet multiple agency needs in an era of extended federal budget austerity while maintaining the performance, safety, and reliability of an aging nuclear stockpile. Several recent studies have argued that meeting this challenge will require a change in the governance of the NNSA laboratories away from sole control by DOE and toward a shared governance model in which the other national security agencies have a seat at the table.3 The problem of sustaining the NNSA laboratories by nurturing the engagement of the national security agencies that make use of them has received at least an initial response.
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The mission of the NNSA labo ratories has evolved over the past five decades from an exclusive focus on designing, engineering, testing, and maintaining nuclear weapons to a more diverse and largely undefined mission of advancing "national security." 2. Clear lines of authority and accountability are essential.
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While the national security agencies perceive that the NNSA laboratories provide unique and valuable capabilities that further their missions, they also find the laboratories to be significantly more expensive than other poten tial providers. These principles are the basis of the committee's findings, conclusions, and recommendations, discussed below.
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sponsorship of the NNSA laboratories, the other national security agencies should have a strategic partnership with DOE that should be formally recognized and should give those agencies a seat at the governance table for the laboratories. As strategic partners,5 the national security agencies would have the responsibility to help the laboratories and their sponsor understand the larger national security agenda and enable the laboratories to meet future national security needs beyond nuclear weapons.
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The four-party Governance Charter and the MEC it established are significant beginnings to implement the national security agencies' strategic partnership role in the governance of the national security laboratories. However, the MEC's performance to date has not met the need for shared, long-term research and devel opment (R&D)
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• A strategic dialog with the Office of Science and Technology Pol icy, the Office of Management and Budget, and the relevant au thorizing and appropriating committees of Congress to discuss future laboratory needs and funding priorities as they relate to the laboratories' broader national security mission. • Periodic consideration of other (non-NNSA-laboratory)
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NNSA should conduct a comparative assess ment of the Office of Science approach to Work for Others, includ ing planning, processes, working relationships between site offices and laboratories, and all associated oversight and approval actions. Committee interviews with the leadership of the PNNL site office and the management of Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL)
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However, adjustments are needed now to improve the governance of the laboratories and strengthen their strategic relationship with the non-DOE national security agencies. The implementation of a governance model involving direct sponsorship of the DOE/NNSA laboratories by multiple agencies would likely involve extensive modification of existing arrangements with these agencies and their associated congressional committees and would likely be strongly resisted by them.
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10 ALIGNING THE GOVERNANCE STRUCTURE OF THE NNSA LABORATORIES among DOE, the other national security agencies, and the national security laboratories. Implementing these recommendations would increase the probability that critical NNSA laboratory capabilities to support the national security of the United States will be available when needed in the future.
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