LETTERS
June 1, 1997
Letter to Presidents Yeltsin and Clinton
By John P. Holdren, Former Director and Faculty Chair, Science, Technology and Public Policy Program and Evgeny Velikhov
We respectfully submit the Final Report of the U.S.-Russian Independent Scientific Commission on Disposition of Excess Weapons Plutonium. We strongly urge that the U.S. and Russian governments, with support and cooperation from the international community, take additional steps - beyond those already underway - to more rapidly reduce the security risks posed by excess weapons plutonium, ensuring that this material will never again be returned to nuclear weapons. Our report recommends specific steps to meet this objective, including the technologies that can be used, a step-by-step plan of action for bringing these technologies into operation as rapidly as practicable, an international cooperative approach to financing the program, and establishment of an international entity to coordinate the necessary financing and implement the effort.
January 1, 1997
Immobilization Form Peer Review Panel Report
By Matthew Bunn, Associate Professor of Public Policy; Co-Principal Investigator, Project on Managing the Atom
This letter represents the report of the Peer Review Panel, convened to review the recommendation and supporting documentation relating to the choice between glass and ceramic forms for immobilization of excess weapons plutonium. The Panel met August 18-21, 1997, and reviewed the second (partial) draft of the Technical Evaluation Panel (TEP) report and the initial working draft of the Final Immobilization Form Assessment and Recommendation prepared by immobilization program management at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL), both dated August 17. The Panel also considered additional documentation and presentations, including presentations by advocates for both the glass and ceramic waste forms.
