EnergySec: Los Alamos “actually manufacturing pits,” goal of 100 in admin, 80 per year by 2030 - ExchangeMonitor Secretary of Energy Chris Wright confirmed Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico has “just begun” pit production in testimony Wednesday to the

Secretary of Energy Chris Wright on plutonium pit production:

"Maybe the original plan we laid out wasn't ideal, maybe we could be smarter.”

Its also full-speed ahead at LANL, which will be asked to operate at or near max capacity for the foreseeable future, which is dangerous and unnecessary.

U.S. Nuclear Agency Releases Environmental Impact Statement, a “Legal Fig Leaf” for Plutonium Pit Program Decisions The NNSA released its draft environmental impact statement for production of plutonium pits for nuclear weapons, UCS calls it a "legal fig leaf"

“It’s disappointing to see the NNSA pushing out a legal fig leaf, with what amounts to a belated justification for decisions taken years before, which violates the intent and purpose of such analyses under the National Environmental Policy Act.”

Hearings | House Armed Services Committee The purpose of this hearing is to receive updates on Department of Defense missile defense and defeat programs, and review the associated policy, priorities, and requirements.

Today Gen. Guetlein, head of Trump's infeasible, wildy expensive Golden Dome anti-missile program, said this: "If boost phase intercept from space is not affordable and scalable, we will not produce it because we have other options to get after it.” armedservices.house.gov/calendar/eve...

Feds’ draft environmental review calls for expanded plutonium pit production at Los Alamos

Federal plan would boost Los Alamos plutonium pit production to at least 80 a year, triggering 50-year impacts and public review.

Primary season used to be about comparing the professional merits of the candidates. Apparently now, its just about waiting to see which ones have the least horrific histories of misconduct until the slate is down to 1.

Adjacent posts in a Bluesky feed advertise a faculty job opening to study the history of capitalism while the subsequent one says "Capitalism is a death cult".

Just appreciating these two posts next to each other. Peak Bluesky, at least in my eccentric feed.

So, basically plagiarizing the Arc de Triomphe, but with added gold (of course). I'm surprised he doesn't just demand the original from Macron. They gave us the Statue of Liberty, afterall.

Apparently some are not familiar with the story: Croesus of Lydia asked the Oracle what would happen once he attacked Iran. Oracle predicted: "a great civilization will die". Of course it turned out that the one that died was Lydia, not Iran. Seems relevant...

Congress Must Restrain the Trump Administration from Nuclear Weapons First Use For the safety and security of the U.S. and the world, Congress must intervene to prevent first-use of nuclear weapons in Iran

A statement from our team at @ucs.org on today’s dangerous rhetoric:

Prevent illegal US action and nuclear use Threats of indiscriminate violence are unacceptable, whether they come from nuclear or conventional weapons

If you need an extra nudge or some guidance for how to reach your representatives, please check out this action alert from the Union of Concerned Scientists:

Update: her office has issued a statement but can't help but feel that the delay, relative to her congressional colleagues, signals this was out of a sense of obligation rather than urgency. Either that or my frustrated call to her office actually worked...

Its about time you joined in making a statement, but your constituents want more than statements. They want action.

Democrats demand US cabinet oust Trump over Iran amid Republican silence Lawmakers call for use of 25th amendment after president brazenly threatens to commit war crimes in Iran

Even Marjorie Taylor Green is calling for invocation of the 25th ammendment, but my Democratic congresswoman, @dorismatsui.bsky.social? Silence for the past two days. Extraordinarily frustrating and shameful.

Artemis II photo of a crescent blue and white Earth behind the limb of the closeup Moon, with craters across the gray surface of the Moon

Because we all need something amazing today.
#artemisII

We might all be safer in an Ionesco plot. This also seems about right:

URGENT — Our land, our water, our community needs you RIGHT NOW Op-ed by Monica Ann Varn ACTION NEEDED! A Canadian company called Gamma Resources Ltd. is seeking federal approval to drill up to 12 uranium boreholes — some up to 500 feet deep — in the Carson...

Public comment opportunity to oppose new uranium mining and exploration in New Mexico:

Analysis: Iran likely transferred highly enriched uranium to Isfahan before the June strikes Satellite imagery shows that Iran could have transferred to Isfahan up to 540 kilograms—possibly all—of its highly-enriched uranium inventory before the June strikes last year.

Le Monde informed the Bulletin about the image on March 19. I wrote a detailed visual and technical analysis supporting my assessment that the cargo may have been highly enriched uranium. (8/n)

@thebulletin.org #Iran #nuclearweapons #uranium #OSINT #nukesky

Plutonium Pit Production The US plan to build new plutonium pits for nuclear weapons is unnecessary, risky, and dangerous to the health of workers and communities.

And despite the fact that a frequent critic attacks us in the comments, I would challenge anyone who has actually read the UCS report on pit production to conclude that we are 'greenlighting' NNSA plans or somehow in favor of expanded production at LANL.

Carl Sagan, Pale Blue Dot

Aggressive Los Alamos labs expansion plan wins approval from National Nuclear Security Administration The "expanded operations alternative" includes facilities upgrades and "actions that would expand operations and missions."

"Dylan Spaulding with the Union of Concerned Scientists decried both the near doubling of energy and water use that could come with the expansion and the potential impacts on Puebloan cultural sites via the addition of “a parking lot, bus transfer station, and several solar energy installations.”

Over 11,000 munitions in 16 Days of the Iran War: ‘Command of the Reload’ Governs Endurance Significant numbers of advanced munitions have been expended, revealing that battlefield dominance matters less than the industrial capacity to replenish critical stockpiles.

".. the US military is approximately a month, or less, away from running out of ATACMS/PrSM ground-attack missiles and THAAD interceptors. Israel is in an even more precarious spot, with its Arrow interceptor missiles likely to be completely expended by the end of March."

Dylan Spaulding A blog on science, solutions, and justice

Agree- its something to watch warily since there is a playbook and its something I've been working on and opposing. Some examples here:

U.S. set to resume underground nuclear tests The U.S. is preparing to resume underground nuclear tests in response to significant covert Chinese and Russian nuclear testing, a senior State Department official disclosed this week.

No... no, we're not. This headline is horribly misleading and dangerous. I know its the Washington Times, but still.. even the story says "no decision has yet been made to move ahead." No one who actually understands testing is taking these considerations seriously and stories like this don't help.

DOE Plans to Pave Pueblo People’s Cultural Sites, Put Up a Parking Lot DOE’s Los Alamo National Laboratory's new environmental impact statement would severely harm Pueblo cultural sites in favor of plutonium pit production

Today, LANL released their final Site-Wide Environmental Impact Statement, outlining plans for expansion over roughly the next decade. Its a big document and I'm still digging, but here are my first impressions:

The more we look, the more we find the building blocks of life in space. Not surprising, given how much comes out of a Miller-Urey type experiment. Still doesn’t mean putting these pieces together in a self-replicating manner is easy or common. Still, perhaps a reminder to be humble?

Trump’s Proposed Military Spending Would Be a “Bloody New Deal” If passed and sustained, President Trump’s new defense budget could become the largest discretionary spending increase in modern US history.

My amazing @scovillepf.bsky.social @seantmanning.bsky.social has a new @ucs.org piece on what he appropriately calls Trump's "Bloody New Deal," i.e., his proposal to dump $1.5 trillion into military spending, a massive 66% increase. See: blog.ucs.org/sean-manning...

The US–Israeli History Behind Their War Against Iran Any debates about nuclear security in the Middle East need to be set within the broader historical context of US and Israeli efforts to advance their interests in the region.

My colleague, Dr. Sara Al-Sayed, presents clear-eyed historical context around US and Isreali intervention in Iran and the resulting nuclear hypocrisy.

"For any chance of lasting peace in the region, the United States and Israel must eventually move toward diplomacy and multilateral approaches"

Oman says Iranian attacks on Gulf 'inevitable' response to US-Israeli assault Muscat's foreign minister says US must extricate itself from conflict as Iran escalates attacks on Gulf energy facilities

He added that only Israel stood to gain materially by overthrowing the Islamic Republic, and had little concern about who governs Iran subsequently. "This is an uncomfortable truth to tell... America has lost control of its own foreign policy. But it must be told."

‘Just a couple of guys’: How a little-known company could score big from a Trump trade deal President Donald Trump's levies on automobiles and auto parts were unaffected by the Supreme Court's Friday tariff decision, likely meaning Japan will stick to its pact with the U.S.

"A three-year-old energy company that appears to have fewer than five employees is being considered for a $25 billion contract from a massive trade deal President Donald Trump brokered with Japan last year.. The company... is largely unknown...[and has] never completed a nuclear project"

War can't entirely eliminate Iran's nuclear program, the U.N. atomic energy chief says International Atomic Energy Agency head Rafael Grossi said Iran's nuclear program is heavily damaged, "but the material will still be there and the enrichment capacities will be there."

Grossi: “At the end of this war, Iran will still have nuclear material and enrichment capacities”

The Iranians came to the table, both for the JCPOA and right up until the present war.

www.theguardian.com/world/2026/mar/18/ignorance-misunderstanding-obfuscation-iran-nuclear-talks-trump