McTague Takes Reins at UC’s DOE Labs

John McTague, a retired vice president of technical affairs for Ford Motor Co, has been tapped by the University of California to oversee the management of three Department of Energy national laboratories: Lawrence Berkeley and two weapons labs, Los Alamos and Lawrence Livermore. UC has run the labs since they were created, but recently faced the possibility of losing its $3-billion annual contract because of a series of widely publicized management problems. To keep the contract for the two weapons labs, UC created McTague’s $300 000-a-year job and brought in outside contractors to review the labs’ security, safety, and project management.

Following the 1999 arrest of Los Alamos physicist Wen Ho Lee amid allegations of spying and the temporary disappearance of computer disks containing nuclear secrets, McTague led a National Research Council report on security at the weapons labs. After the report came out, staff education on security procedures improved, says McTague. But more effort is needed to focus security measures on the areas where they are strictly necessary, he adds. “And morale at the labs is better, but not good enough.”

Also in 1999, Livermore admitted massive cost overruns in the construction of its National Ignition Facility, a key component of DOE’s program to study and maintain nuclear weapons in the absence of nuclear testing. The ensuing task force on NIF, chaired by McTague, recommended that management should be overhauled, but construction could continue (see Physics Today, January 2001, page 21 ). Now, says McTague, “All indications I’ve seen are that project management out there is robust. The communications issue that existed between the university and the DOE has been overcome.”

And even more important than focusing on facilities, says McTague, is “continued attention to making the labs a place of choice for talented scientists and engineers to work and develop their careers.”