U.S. Department of Energy Office of Inspector General report on audit of the Department of Energy`s Site Safeguards and Security Plans

The Department of Energy (Department) is required to protect its nuclear facilities from unauthorized access and theft, diversion, or destruction of special nuclear materials such as plutonium and uranium-235. The steps taken by the field sites to meet these requirements are outlined in a document entitled the ``Site Safeguards and Security Plan`` (SSSP). The authors initiated the audit at the request of the Office of Nonproliferation and National Security to evaluate the progress made in the SSSP process. The audit was performed to determine whether SSSP guidance was used as policy to evaluate and approve the site plans and whether new security requirements established by the guidance were justified. Of the five locations visited, three had identified facilities that would be pushed above the Office of Safeguards and Security`s acceptable level of low risk when new security (consequence) values were incorporated. Each of the sites will need to devise and install additional compensatory measures because of the increase in consequence values. The authors recommended that the Office of Nonproliferation and National Security discontinue using guidance as policy for evaluation, approval, and concurrence of Site Safeguards and Security Plans until they had been formally coordinated and concurred on by program and field elements. They also recommended that all proposed policy changes and guidance, when used as policy, be coordinated with affected program and field offices through the Department`s Directives System