The same group that last year filed a FOIA for a cost analysis study of the Savannah River Site's MOX program is advocating for the release of another study that prices the program at $20 billion more.
SRS Watch - a group that monitors various site-related activities, filed a Freedom of Information Act requesting the release of a study that states the lifecycle cost of the nation's plutonium disposition program is $51 billion.
The study was conducted by Aerospace Corp., a California nonprofit corporation that operates a federally funded research and development center.
The study has yet to surface, and the National Nuclear Security Administration has reported it could be months before it is because Aerospace is working on a version of the report that has no distribution restrictions.
The Union of Concerned Scientists last week obtained a summary of the report that states that the entire plutonium disposition program - which includes the construction of the main MOX building, a separate waste building, processing and final disposition maintenance - will cost $47.5 billion more to complete. That number includes the $4.4 billion that has already been spent on the program.
Tom Clements, the director of SRS Watch, submitted a FOIA request dated April 27 requesting a response within 20 days.
"I hereby request a copy of DOE's congressionally required report on plutonium disposition, as delivered to Congress around April 22, 2015. This report analyzes the cost of disposal of plutonium via plutonium fuel (MOX) and as nuclear waste," Clements wrote.
Clements also requested cover letters and attachments to the study.
Clements and the Aiken Standard submitted a FOIA last year for a study conducted by the Department of Energy that priced the program at $30 billion.
Though SRS Watch and the Union of Concerned Scientists have placed faith in the numbers, other groups have disagreed. CB&I Project Services Group, one of the groups in charge of building the facility, spoke out against the study last week.
Spokesman Bryan Wilkes said the group's calculations indicate an additional $3.3 billion to finish the main MOX building and five to nine years to complete, depending on the amount of annual funding.
"The biggest costs are going to be labor costs, and that's how we can be certain in our estimates," Wilkes said.
The MOX program is part of a nonproliferation agreement with Russia that states each nation must dispose of 34 metric tons of weapons-grade plutonium.
The project is about 65 percent complete and employs about 1,700 people.
Derrek Asberry is the SRS beat reporter for the Aiken Standard and has been with the paper since June 2013. He is originally from Vidalia, Ga., and a graduate of Georgia Southern University. Follow him on Twitter @DerrekAsberry.