Update on Bombplex 2030

October 2007, from Bobbie Paul, Director of Atlanta WAND

Over 32,000 concerned citizens sent comments to the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) challenging Complex 2030 - a National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) plan to redesign our nation's nuclear weapons complex. Thanks to all of you who lifted your voice!

DOE has renamed Complex 2030 and is now calling it Complex Transformation. Whatever DOE calls it, we call it for what it truly is: Bombplex. Bombplex would allow the US to make at last 125 plutonium pits (the cores of nuclear weapons) per year sending a strong signal to the rest of the world that the US is firmly back in the bombmaking business.

We already have too many nuclear warheads and a recent Plutonium Pit Lifetime study showed that our "pits" last at least one hundred years. There is no need for a Consolidated Plutonium Center for such deadly manufacturing.

In the months ahead DOE will issue a Programmatic PEIS taking in to account the multitude of concerns posted by citizens, most notably how Bombplex flies in the face of our disarmament obligations under the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT).

Once the PEIS is issued DOE will host another round of meetings at the same locations where the initial scoping meetings were held. This will, most likely, take place in late January or early February of 2008. Stay tuned!