[DOE LETTERHEAD]

 

National Nuclear Security Administration

 

March 12, 2007

 

The Honorable A. J. Eggenberger

Chairman

Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board

625 Indiana Avenue, N.W., Suite 700

Washington, D.C. 20004-2901

 

Dear Mr. Chairman:

 

In a letter dated August 7, 2003, the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board (Board) closed Recommendation 97-2, Criticality Safety, and established an annual reporting requirement.  This report synopsizes the activities of the Department of Energy Nuclear Criticality Safety Program (NCSP) for Calendar Year (CY) 2006 and also includes some additional information requested annually by the Board.

 

Overall, the NCSP, established in response to Recommendation 97-2, is serving the Department well.  The funding has been stabilized and the program continues to receive adequate financial support from Defense Programs to execute program task elements focused on maintaining criticality safety capability.  A key accomplishment in CY 2006 was the establishment of a Hands-on Criticality Safety Training Course.  This training was developed and implemented by the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory as an interim measure until the Criticality Experiments Facility is operational in Nevada.  Five classes were held in CY 2006 and 49 individuals were trained.  This training course is specifically designed to meet the formal criticality safety engineer qualification requirements contained in DOE-STD-1173-2003 and DOE-STD-1135-99.

 

In an effort to increase communication and visibility of the NCSP accomplishments throughout the year, a new section has been added to the NCSP website.  The goal is to place almost all of the information about the NCSP on this website to facilitate improved communication with all NCSP stakeholders.  This annual report makes liberal use of references to information posted on the NCSP website:  http://ncsc.llnl.gov/.

 

The Department looks forward to continued close collaboration with the Board to ensure that all fissile material operations continue to be performed safely and efficiently from a criticality safety perspective.

 

If you have any questions, please contact me directly or have your staff contact Jerry McKamy at (301) 903-3081.

 

Sincerely,

 

Thomas P. D’Agostino

Deputy Administrator

for Defense Programs

 

Enclosure

 

cc (w/enclosure):

M. Whitaker, HS- 1.1

J. McConnell, NA-2.1