UT may make bid to run nuke lab

by Cindy Tumiel
July 17, 2004, Saturday
Express-News Staff Writer

The University of Texas System is moving closer to making a bid at running the birthplace of the atom bomb, Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico.

The troubled national nuclear weapons laboratory, which is suffering an unprecedented halt of classified research after the latest in a series of security breaches, has been operated by the University of California System since the days of the Manhattan Project during World War II.

Soon the contract will be up for grabs. And while the UT Board of Regents won't vote until later this year on whether to submit a formal proposal to the Energy Department, UT Chancellor Mark G. Yudof said Friday that the partnership would be good both for UT and the nation.

"When we discuss the possibility of managing and operating a national laboratory, we are contemplating not only the benefit to us but the profound service we would be providing the nation," Yudof said at a Board of Regents meeting in Austin. "Fundamentally, we would be helping this country separate the scientific wheat from the pseudo-scientific chaff."

UT already has allocated $500,000 to undertake preliminary work on a bid proposal. Last week it registered an "expression of interest" with the Energy Department that it may be among the contenders for the contract that will go out for bids early next year.

A committee of regents, scientists and administrators is making preliminary plans, which includes conferring with private companies that potentially could collaborate with UT on a bid proposal.

But opponents are gathering. Friday's meeting was the first opportunity for public comments, and anti-nuclear groups urged regents to turn away from Los Alamos.

"Ethically and morally, we should all be opposed to the university getting involved in managing the building of nuclear weapons," said Lon Burnam, a former state representative who now is director of the Dallas Peace Center.

Taking over the lab will mean taking over the responsibility for old toxic waste dumps, employee grievances and embarrassing security breaches, said Karen Hadden, chairwoman of Peace Action Texas.

"I just don't believe this is a mess that the University of Texas wants to wade into," she said. "This doesn't make sense."

But there are powerful proponents lining up as well, including U.S. Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison and U.S. Rep. Lamar Smith of San Antonio, a member of the House Science Committee.

"The partnership would apply the UT System's proven ability in academic science to the important national objective of nuclear research and development," Hutchison wrote to the regents.

Nobel Laureate Richard Smalley, a professor at Rice University in Houston, called Los Alamos "one of the great scientific temples in this country."

On Thursday, officials halted all classified research at Los Alamos as the search continued for two missing computer storage devices, the latest in a string of security lapses that have embarrassed University of California administrators.

It was the latest in a string of incidents, the most notable of which was the arrest of Wen Ho Lee, a scientist at the lab who was indicted in 1999 on 59 felony counts of mishandling classified information.

Lee ended up pleading guilty to one count involving computer security violations after the case against him collapsed.

Ongoing problems prompted the Energy Department to open the Los Alamos management contract to outside bidders when the current contract with UC expires next year.

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