U.S. Moves to Speed Nuclear Design, Weapon Production

May 2026
By Xiaodon Liang

The Department of Energy’s National Nuclear Security Administration is taking steps to design and produce new nuclear weapons faster, according to recent legislation and budget justification documents for fiscal year 2027.

The semi-autonomous agency responsible for U.S. nuclear weapons requested from Congress a total of $32.8 billion for this coming fiscal year in President Donald Trump’s budget proposal, released April 3. The vast majority of the spending, $27.4 billion, would be devoted to nuclear weapons activities, up from the $24.2 billion appropriated by Congress for fiscal 2026.

Expanded work on new nuclear weapons would be paid for in part by a proposed cut to the department’s environmental management division, which is responsible for cleaning up past weapons production, from its fiscal 2026 enacted budget of $8.6 billion to $8.2 billion.

The NNSA will reorganize its stockpile, research, technology, and engineering portfolio, a major top-line component of the agency’s work, by creating a unified “rapid and advanced capabilities” program.

The new program, which consolidates existing efforts in two older programs, has the mission of “assessing, designing, prototyping, and demonstrating advanced systems, as well as accelerating the delivery of new nuclear capabilities to meet national security needs.”

The new program will have a budget of $499 million in fiscal 2027 under the president’s proposal, up from the $305 million appropriated for the constituent offices last year.

The reorganization follows Congress’ instruction in Section 3113 of the fiscal 2026 National Defense Authorization Act that the NNSA stand up a rapid capabilities program. (See ACT, January/February 2026.)

Beyond creating a new top-level program, the NNSA also has responded by setting up a separate “cross-program, cross-enterprise” nuclear deterrent rapid capabilities team to “rapidly develop advanced system prototypes and ensure readiness for accelerated acquisition and fielding,” according to the agency’s budget request.

Three novel weapons designs are hinted at within a new “futures program” budget line, which has a first-year price tag of $100 million. These include a “Nuclear Deterrent System-Air-Delivered,” which the Air Force has already begun work on and is likely a modern bunker-buster bomb. (See ACT, March 2026.)

The other two weapons in the futures program may match ongoing studies within the Rapid and Advanced Capabilities office: a concept assessment for the WXX program, and a “pre-phase” study of a future strategic sea-based warhead. Last year’s budget request described the WXX as part of the “next generation re-entry capabilities” program.

The April budget request also funds several existing nuclear weapons programs. The W80-4 life extension program would receive $1 billion in fiscal 2027, down from $1.3 billion. The NNSA expects to achieve in fiscal 2027 the first production unit of the warhead for the Long-Range Standoff Weapon despite the budget cut, claiming that a carry-over of past appropriations will provide adequate funding.

The variant for the naval-capable, sea-launched cruise missile, now renamed the W80-5, would not receive any funding through regular appropriations under the president’s budget plan, as the office spends down the $2 billion provided in last year’s budget reconciliation act.

Continuing design and development of the W87-1 warhead would cost taxpayers $913 million in fiscal 2027, up from $649 million last year as appropriated by Congress. Budget documents attribute some of the increase to a new weapon development cost report, suggesting that there have been recent revisions to the NNSA’s estimate of the program’s total lifetime price. A prior cost report from fiscal 2023 put the weapon, intended for the new Sentinel intercontinental ballistic missile, at $15.9 billion in future-years’ dollars.

The W93 submarine-launched ballistic missile warhead will move into development engineering in fiscal 2027, according to NNSA plans, with an expected price tag of $1.1 billion for next year, rising from $807 million enacted last year.

The B61-13 high-yield gravity bomb would be funded at $46 million, down from $49 million the year before.

Continuing work to overhaul NNSA plutonium pit production capabilities and related facilities would cost $4.9 billion under the request, up from $3.4 billion spent last year through regular appropriations and reconciliation funding. That price is also more than 20 percent higher than what the Biden administration expected to spend on plutonium modernization back when it was preparing the fiscal 2025 budget request.

Although the agency says it remains focused on achieving established plutonium pit production goals in this year’s budget request—30 pits per year at Los Alamos National Laboratories and 50 per year at the Savannah River Site’s future Plutonium Processing Facility—costs for plutonium pit production could rise again if that goal is adjusted. In a draft environmental impact statement released April 10 for its two-site pit production plans, spread across Los Alamos and the Savannah River Site, the agency evaluates an expanded proposal for production of up to 80 plutonium pits per year at Los Alamos and 125 at Savannah River.

Although the impact statement notes that production of 30 pits per year at Los Alamos and 50 a year at Savannah River remains national policy, this marks the second time the NNSA has suggested an expanded production rate at Los Alamos. (See ACT, April 2026.)­­