In virtual town hall, Thom Mason said he expects Congress to increase lab’s budget
Published November 13, 2026 - 3:46 p.m. Modified November 13, 2026 - 5:47 p.m.
Los Alamos National Laboratory Director Thom Mason said in a virtual town hall on Thursday that its 48-year-old plutonium manufacturing facility had its best year ever.
The lab has been ramping up production of the bowling-ball-sized plutonium pits — the triggers in nuclear weapons — in Los Alamos. The National Nuclear Security Administration says the U.S. nuclear weapons stockpile needs to be updated in tumultuous geopolitical times.
“Unfortunately, the geopolitical environment that we find ourselves in is not getting any better,” Mason said. “And what that means is sort of high expectations in terms of our ability to accelerate the execution of our national security missions to respond to those challenges.”
Critics of accelerated production point to a recent federal study that concluded the stockpile is not aging at a rate that affects performance. NNSA, a semi-autonomous Department of Energy agency, released that study in the summer following a lawsuit by the Santa Fe nonprofit Nuclear Watch New Mexico.
Production of the pits — the radioactive triggers in nuclear weapons — occurs in Plutonium Facility Building 4, or PF4, a 151,000-square-foot facility that opened in 1978. The 50-year life of PF4 is up in 2028.
Federal officials have said no issues exist that would preclude it from operating beyond that time.
But the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board, a federal agency overseeing nuclear weapons safety, has flagged what it described as a pattern of preventable fires inside PF4’s gloveboxes — sealed enclosures where workers handle hazardous, alpha-emitting radioactive materials such as plutonium.
Mason — who began hosting the virtual town halls during the COVID-19 pandemic — said injuries at the lab are declining, with most of them minor.
The lab produced 2.6 times as many plutonium pits as expected at the beginning of the fiscal year, according to Mason. Exact pit production figures are classified.
Greg Mello, executive director of the Los Alamos Study Group, a LANL watchdog, said the group is frustrated that it cannot review how many pits the lab makes and whether they are certified for readiness.
“He’s a salesman,” Mello said of Mason. “So I don’t know” whether LANL is meeting statutory requirements on pit production and readiness.
Triad National Security LLC operates the lab for NNSA. Triad is a consortium of Texas A&M University, the University of California and Battelle Memorial Institute, a private research and development nonprofit in Ohio.
“It was a very good year for the lab,” Mason said.
‘Steady as she goes’
Mason said the lab is operating under a continuing resolution, a short-term extension of the prior year’s funding that supports the lab through to the beginning of December. The Trump administration proposed increasing the lab’s annual budget to $6 billion.
“So although there are lots of big debates that go on in Congress, we’re in a corner of the budget where there’s actually a lot of consensus, and that’s what’s provided the stability,” Mason said. “It’s been kind of steady as she goes in terms of support for the budgets — and I expect that will continue.”
Mason said LANL expects to hire up to 1,000 people per year for the next few years, with the majority of that hiring to replace employees who retire. Turnover at the lab is roughly 800 to 900 employees per year, he said. In the 2025 fiscal year, the lab had 16,487 direct laboratory employees.
In 2023, the lab hired some 2,500 people, a peak that strained regional resources. Mason acknowledged that strain. He said the development of a transmission line from Santa Fe to the lab — which has affected traffic — is proceeding.
In FY26, LANL awarded some $2 billion in contracts, $803 million of which went to New Mexico companies, Mason said.
“So that’s an economic benefit to the state above and beyond just the payroll (and) the staff that we have,” Mason said.
Mason deflected a question about the underground plume of hexavalent chromium — a carcinogenic pollutant — that has migrated from LANL property to San Ildefonso Pueblo, saying that DOE’s Office of Environmental Management and its contractors are responsible for its cleanup.
“Our responsibility is to make sure that our current operations don’t create future legacy issues that people will have to worry about 50, 60, 70 years down the road,” Mason said.
He added that nuclear deterrence prevents geopolitical conflict across the world from reaching the U.S.
“And so that means that the modernization program that is underway has a lot of scrutiny, attention and desire to get it done and stay on cost and on schedule,” Mason said.
Justin Horwath covers energy and technology for the Journal. You can reach him at jhorwath@abqjournal.com.
