Federal Reports

Depleted uranium hexafluoride (DUF6) is a byproduct of uranium enrichment at Department of Energy gaseous diffusion plants since World War II. Uranium enrichment, a process used to make fuel for nuclear power plants and for military applications, created a legacy of approximately 800,000 metric tons of DUF6 that was stored in about 67,000 steel cylinders at the Department’s gaseous diffusion plant sites Public Law 107-206, signed by the President in August 2002, requires that no later than 30 days after enactment, the Department must award a contract for the design, construction, and operation of DUF6 conversion facilities at the Paducah, Kentucky, and Portsmouth, Ohio, sites. Public Law 107-206 also stipulates that the contract require groundbreaking for construction to occur no later than July 31, 2004, at both sites. We initiated this audit to determine the Department’s progress in converting its DUF6 inventory.We found that the Department made limited progress in converting its DUF6 inventory into a more stable form for reuse, storage, or disposal. After encountering numerous problems with safely converting the DUF6 inventory, the Department revised its baseline in 2019 and estimated that it would then take an additional 18 years, until 2054, to convert the inventory. The Department revised its projected costs to convert the full inventory of DUF6 to around $11.7 billion, more than two and a half times its original estimate of $4.6 billion.In addition to COVID-19 impacts, delays in converting the DUF6 occurred, in part, due to inherent technical or mechanical flaws that resulted in numerous shutdowns of the plants. While the Department invested in plant modifications to address some of these flaws, it had not completed comprehensive studies of the plants’ inherent flaws and their realistic conversion capabilities.Management concurred with our finding and one recommendation, and its proposed corrective actions are consistent with our recommendation.

Semiannual Report to Congress, April 1, 2022 through September 30, 2022

The Office of Inspector General is tasked with ensuring efficiency, accountability, and integrity in the U.S. Postal Service. We also have the distinct mission of helping to maintain confidence in the mail and postal system, as well as to improve the Postal Service's bottom line. We use audits and investigations to help protect the integrity of the Postal Service. Our Semiannual Report to Congress presents a snapshot of the work we did to fulfill our mission for the six-month period ending September 30, 2022. Our dynamic report format provides readers with easy access to facts and information, as well as succinct summaries of the work by area. Links are provided to the full reports featured in this report, as well as to the appendices.

October 2022 Semiannual Report to Congress

To view the report, please click on the link below.

This report was submitted to the Comptroller General in accordance with Section 5 of the Government Accountability Office (GAO) Act of 2008. The report summarizes the activities of GAO’s Office of Inspector General (OIG) for the six-month reporting period ending September 30, 2022. During the reporting period, the OIG initiated work on two performance audits and continued work on an additional performance audit. In addition, the OIG closed seven investigations and opened 22 new investigations. The OIG processed 75 substantive hotline complaints, many of which were referred to other OIGs for action because the matters involved were within their jurisdictions. The OIG remained active in the GAO and OIG communities by briefing new GAO employees on its audit and investigative missions, briefing GAO teams on the work of the GAO OIG, and participating in Council of Inspectors General on Integrity and Efficiency committees and working groups, including those related to the Pandemic Response Accountability Committee.

The objective of our inspection was to determine the U.S. Department of Education’s (Department) compliance with Experimental Sites Initiative (ESI) reporting requirements.We found that the Department is not complying with ESI reporting requirements. The Department has not published a comprehensive ESI report since the 2010–2011 award year report. The Department published two ESI reports in 2020, but these reports did not satisfy the reporting requirements as they each covered only one experiment, not all recently completed and ongoing experiments. There are 15 ESI experiments that have been implemented by the Department since the issuance of the last comprehensive report that have not yet been reported on by the Department.