Handling Nuclear Weapons for the U.S. Department of Energy
The Problem
The Pantex Plant, operated for the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) by the Mason and Hanger Corporation, is the sole assembly and disassembly facility for dismantling, evaluating, and maintaining the U.S. nuclear stockpile. The end of the Cold War brought new challenges to DOE and the plant: new focus on reducing nuclear arsenals and reducing the threat of proliferation, meeting treaty provisions for verification, and ensuring the safety, security, and reliability of the enduring stockpile. Pantex management recognized that the changing mission of the plant called for agility in allocating resources to meet evolving needs. They turned to analytics expertise in decision support and production planning and scheduling.
The Analytics Solution
Pantex decided to create a comprehensive planning and scheduling tool with enough scope and complexity to address all of its production activities. Systems integrator Sandia National Laboratories assembled a team composed of Sandia staff, Cornell University and Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute faculty, and Pantex production planning and scheduling department staff. The team developed the Pantex Process Model (PPM), a set of optimization modules coupled with a tightly integrated set of Pantex databases. PPM includes sophisticated user interfaces, a fully relational database, and analysis modules and optimization engines focused on planning short-term dismantlements, scheduling short-term evaluations, and planning long-term plant resources. Since its implementation, the PPM has become the primary tool for analyzing planning and scheduling issues at Pantex.
The Value
With PPM, Pantex can plan current and future production resources to meet mission requirements. It can provide timely, credible planning information to support decisions at the highest levels of the U.S. government regarding treaty negotiations, dismantlement, and long-range planning for nuclear-weapon-stockpile stewardship. And treaty negotiators can commit to treaty language knowing the direct impact their decisions will have on Pantex operations and U.S. national policy.
Said Bill Richardson, former Secretary of Energy, "The Pantex Process Model is not only increasing the efficiency of the nuclear weapons complex, but it is also proving to be a valuable tool in the efforts of our government to significantly reduce the global nuclear danger."
