This MedLibrary.org supplementary page on Stockpile stewardship is provided directly from the open source Wikipedia as a service to our readers. Please see the note below on authorship of this content, as well as the Wikipedia usage guidelines. To search for other content from our encyclopedia supplement, please use the form below:
Related Sponsors
Stockpile stewardship refers to the United States program of reliability testing and maintenance of its nuclear weapons without the use of nuclear testing.
Because no new nuclear weapons have been developed by the United States since 1992, even its youngest weapons are at least 16 years old. Aging weapons have many places in which they can fail or act unpredictably: the high explosives which condense their fissile material can chemically degrade, their electronic components can suffer from decay, their radioactive plutonium/uranium cores are potentially unreliable, and the isotopes used by thermonuclear weapons may be chemically unstable as well.
Since the United States has also not tested nuclear weapons since 1992, this leaves the task of its stockpile maintenance resting on the use of simulations (using non-nuclear explosives tests and supercomputers, among other methods) and applications of scientific knowledge about physics and chemistry to the specific problems of weapons aging (the latter method is what is meant when various agencies refer to their work as "science-based"). It also involves the manufacture of additional plutonium "pits" to replace ones of unknown quality, and finding other methods to increase the lifespan of existing warheads and maintain a confident nuclear deterrent.
Most work for stockpile stewardship is undertaken at United States Department of Energy National Laboratories, mostly at Los Alamos National Laboratory, Sandia National Laboratories, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, the Nevada Test Site, and Department of Energy productions facilities, employing around 27,500 personnel for the work and costing billions of dollars per year.
The government under President George W. Bush has introduced a new program to expand upon Stockpile Stewardship, called Reliable Replacement Warhead, or RRW, whose goal it is to enable the development of new weapons without physical testing (using computer simulations instead) within 18 months and construction of the new designs within 4 years.
Contents |
Stockpile Stewardship and Management Program
The Stockpile Stewardship and Management Program is a Department of Energy program to ensure that the nuclear capabilities of the United States are not eroded as nuclear weapons age. It receives approximately $4 billion annually in federal funds for testing of nuclear weapons and for construction of advanced science facilities, such as the National Ignition Facility (NIF). Such facilities have been deemed necessary under the program due to the signing of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty in 1996 by Bill Clinton.
Criticisms
The continued presence of a nuclear arsenal of any kind is criticised by those pushing for nuclear disarmament, and the Stockpile Stewardship and Management Program is an integral part of the United States' nuclear readiness. Also, the allocation of funds has been seen by some to be inefficient, whereas the NIF has a large price tag but is not likely to contribute substantially to the maintenance of the US nuclear arsenal.
See also
External links
- [1] 2007 DOE Stockpile Stewardship Report published by The Federation of American Scientists
- http://cache.technologyreview.com/articles/97/02/collina0297.asp?p=1
- The Stockpile Stewardship and Management Program (DOE document, May 1995)
- Remanufacturing of nuclear-weapon components within the DOE's Stockpile Stewardship Program
Wikipedia content modification information:
- This page was last modified on 12 November 2008, at 02:20.
Wikipedia Authorship and Review
Wikipedia content provided here is not reviewed directly by MedLibrary.org. Wikipedia content is authored by an open community of volunteers and is not produced by or in any way affiliated with MedLibrary.org.
Wikipedia Usage Guidelines
This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article on "Stockpile stewardship".
The URL for this specific entry is:
All Wikipedia text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License. (See Copyrights for details). Wikipedia® is a registered trademark of the Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.