The US Coast Guard and the Navy are collaborating to acquire up to three new heavy polar icebreakers. The US Government Accountability Office (GAO) reviewed the heavy polar icebreaker program’s acquisition risks. It examined the extent to which the program is facing risks to achieving its goals, reviewed USCG and Navy program documents, and analyzed USCG and Navy data.
USCG did not have a sound business case in March 2018, when it established the cost, schedule, and performance baselines for its heavy polar icebreaker acquisition program, because of risks in four key areas:
Design
The US Coast Guard set program baselines before carrying out a preliminary design review, which puts the program at risk of having an unstable design, increasing the program’s cost and schedule risks. While establishing baselines without a preliminary design review is consistent with DHS’s current acquisition policy, it is inconsistent with acquisition best practices.
Technology
The US Coast Guard intends to use proven technologies for the program, but did not perform a technology readiness assessment to determine the maturity of key technologies prior to setting baselines. USCG officials indicated such an assessment was not necessary because the technologies the program plans to employ have been proven on other icebreaker ships. However, such technologies can still pose risks when applied to a different program or operational environment. Without such an assessment, the program’s technical risk is underrepresented.
Cost
The lifecycle cost estimate that informed the program’s $9.8 billion cost baseline substantially met GAO’s best practices for being comprehensive, welldocumented, and accurate, but only partially met best practices for being credible. The cost estimate did not quantify the range of possible costs over the entire life of the program. Thus, the cost estimate was not fully reliable and may underestimate the total funding needed for the program.
Schedule
USCG’s planned delivery dates were not informed by a realistic assessment of shipbuilding activities, but rather driven by the potential gap in icebreaking capabilities once the USCG’s only operating heavy polar icebreaker – the Polar Star – reaches the end of its service life.
GAO found that the icebreaker program’s estimated construction time of 3 years is optimistic. As a result, the US Coast Guard is at risk of not delivering the icebreakers when promised and the potential gap in icebreaking capabilities could widen.
For this reason, GAO made six recommendations to the US Coast Guard, DHS, and the Navy. Some of these recommendations include:
- The program should conduct a technology readiness assessment;
- The program should re-evaluate its cost estimate;
- The program should develop a schedule according to best practices;
- The program should update program baselines following a preliminary design review.
DHS concurred with all six of GAO’s recommendations.
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