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GAO-12-770R: United States Government Accountability Office: Washington, DC 20548: June 29, 2012: Congressional Committees: Subject: Military Base Realignments and Closures: The National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency's Technology Center Construction Project: As part of the Department of Defense's (DOD) Base Realignment and Closure (BRAC) 2005 effort, the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA)--a defense agency--was required to close various satellite facilities and relocate them to a new NGA facility at Fort Belvoir, Virginia. This relocation included consolidating some data- storage capabilities into a data-storage center known as the Technology Center. DOD intended to use the BRAC 2005 process to transform the military, foster coordination among the services, and reduce excess infrastructure in order to produce savings.[Footnote 1] At the outset of BRAC 2005, DOD viewed BRAC 2005 as a unique opportunity to reshape its installations and realign its forces to meet defense needs for the next 20 years. This was the fifth round of base closures and realignments undertaken by DOD since 1988, and it was the biggest, most complex, and costliest BRAC round undertaken up to that point. To implement this round, DOD executed hundreds of BRAC actions that affected over 800 defense locations and included the planned relocation of over 123,000 personnel. By law, the BRAC 2005 recommendations were to be implemented by September 15, 2011, 6 years from the date on which the President submitted his base closure and realignment report to Congress.[Footnote 2] Under Recommendation 168 of the report of the 2005 Defense Base Closure and Realignment Commission, NGA was required to close some facilities and relocate them to a new NGA facility, now known as NGA Campus East.[Footnote 3] The 2005 BRAC Commission report noted that the onetime costs to implement this recommendation would be about $1.1 billion, but the actual cost rose to over $2.5 billion, because new requirements were added for supporting facilities that NGA identified as essential to mission operability.[Footnote 4] Implementation of this recommendation to close and relocate some facilities to the new NGA Campus East resulted in NGA deciding to consolidate some data-storage and information-technology (IT) capabilities into a Technology Center to be built on the new campus. NGA officials told us that prior to the construction of this center, NGA had limited experience establishing or working with consolidated data-storage facilities. The Office of Management and Budget had not yet issued its recent guidance on data-center consolidation.[Footnote 5] NGA had IT equipment in many smaller rooms consisting of general office space, which NGA referred to as "computer rooms." According to NGA officials, these computer rooms had been established gradually over time in older legacy NGA buildings although, in 2004, industry and NGA began moving toward more-efficient, single-use data-storage facilities known as data centers. The Technology Center was completed in 2009, before the rest of the NGA campus, to facilitate the transfer of data before personnel moved to the new campus. NGA had originally planned to construct and use the third and fourth floors of this four- story facility to meet its consolidated data-storage needs. However, it ultimately used only the fourth floor and therefore did not "fit out" the third floor.[Footnote 6] Nonetheless, the DOD budget request for Fiscal Year 2012 sought approximately $54.6 million in additional military construction funding for NGA to fit out the as-yet-unused third floor of the Technology Center to accommodate the need NGA identified to expand data-storage capability. This need for additional data-storage capability is unrelated to the BRAC consolidation. Consequently, in the conference report accompanying the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2012,[Footnote 7] the conferees expressed concern that the original BRAC military construction project may not have complied with the requirement that military construction projects include all construction work necessary to produce a complete and usable facility.[Footnote 8] The conference report directed GAO to examine this and related issues. To help manage the large BRAC 2005 effort across DOD, the Principal Deputy Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology and Logistics issued guidance in September 2005 that assigned business managers to be responsible for implementation of each BRAC 2005 recommendation. The assigned business managers were generally the service or defense agency with facility management authority at the site of construction. In the case of the NGA Campus East project, since the facility was to reside on part of Fort Belvoir--an Army site--the Department of the Army was assigned as business manager for the project. NGA was to be the only organization located on this campus and the primary user of the facility. In other instances, the assigned business manager was the primary user of the facility, rather than a military service. The September 2005 guidance also required business managers to develop and submit business plans for implementing the BRAC 2005 recommendations they were responsible for, including construction details. These business plans were internal DOD documents intended to help ensure that each plan's respective BRAC 2005 recommendation was implemented efficiently and effectively. We have issued a number of reports on issues related to military base closures and realignments, conducting studies on key factors contributing to BRAC results, the need for more-complete information and strategies to guide disposal efforts, and increases in costs and decreases in savings estimates. A list of GAO's prior work related to military base closures and realignments since the Secretary of Defense submitted his proposed BRAC actions to the BRAC Commission for review in May 2005 can be found at the end of this report. This report examines (1) the extent to which DOD carried out the original scope of work for the NGA Technology Center and whether the building it constructed constitutes a complete and usable facility and (2) the scope of work for the proposed new military construction project to fit out the third floor of the NGA Technology Center and DOD's rationale for this project. Scope and Methodology: To determine the extent to which DOD carried out the original scope of work for the NGA Technology Center and whether the building it constructed constitutes a complete and usable facility, we reviewed budget and project documents and interviewed officials from NGA, the Army, and the Office of the Secretary of Defense. In particular, we focused our information-gathering efforts on NGA's identified need for data-storage capability, the original scope of work for the NGA Technology Center, and the final status of that construction project as of September 2011, the end of the BRAC 2005 implementation period. We also identified guidance, directives, and policies that govern the process for BRAC military construction projects and compared the process used for the NGA project to the procedures outlined in those documents. To identify the scope of work for the proposed new military construction project to fit out the third floor of the NGA Technology Center, and DOD's rationale for this project, we reviewed budget and project documents and interviewed officials from NGA, the Department of the Army BRAC Office, the Army Corps of Engineers, and the Office of the Secretary of Defense about NGA's identified need for data- storage capability and the scope of work for the new military construction project. We conducted this performance audit from March 2012 through June 2012, in accordance with generally accepted government auditing standards. Those standards require that we plan and perform the audit to obtain sufficient, appropriate evidence to provide a reasonable basis for our findings and conclusions based on our audit objectives. We believe that the evidence obtained provides a reasonable basis for our findings and conclusions based on our audit objectives. Summary: NGA modified the original scope of work[Footnote 9] for the Technology Center but met the original data-storage requirement. DOD has limited written guidance on what constitutes a complete and usable facility. However, NGA, Office of the Secretary of Defense, and Army officials believe the Technology Center constitutes a complete and usable facility because it meets its intended purpose of creating 10 petabytes of data storage to replace the data-storage capabilities at the sites that were closed by the implementation of BRAC Recommendation 168. Although the construction of NGA's new Technology Center was planned as part of the implementation of a BRAC recommendation to consolidate various NGA satellite locations at a new NGA facility, advances in data-storage technology led NGA to revise downward the space in the Technology Center that it would need to fit out to accommodate its data-storage needs. NGA also increased the electrical density in the new facility, even though the amount of space was reduced. As a result, NGA modified the original scope of work for the center during the course of the BRAC construction project, and one of the two floors of the new building originally planned for data storage was not fitted out. NGA officials told us that they believed completing both floors would have provided more data-storage capability than their identified requirements called for and therefore would have gone beyond the intent of the BRAC recommendation to consolidate existing capability. The original documentation of the requirements for the NGA construction project lacked some details such as the identification of the Technology Center as a primary or supporting facility, and there was a lack of clarity regarding which DOD organization should be responsible for oversight of this project. As a result, the original decision to change the scope of the project by not fitting out the third floor of the Technology Center was not communicated to the Office of the Secretary of Defense, to the project's business manager--the Department of the Army--or to Congress. Therefore they were unable to participate in that decision. NGA did provide these officials with information regarding the decision at a later date. In January 2011, NGA proposed a new military construction project to address long-term data-storage needs that would utilize the empty third floor of the technology center. Looking ahead after the BRAC construction project was complete, NGA projected that its data-storage requirements would grow exponentially over the next 10 years due to factors such as planned intelligence collection sensors that were scheduled to be deployed over the next 10 years and the increasing use of "cloud computing" technology, which drives up data-storage requirements because data formerly stored on desktop computers will reside in data centers, in order to allow for remote access capabilities. NGA subsequently requested non-BRAC military construction funding to complete the fit-out of the unused third floor. This project was authorized in the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2012,[Footnote 10] and NGA officials told us that construction is expected to begin in August 2012. We provided DOD with a draft copy of this report to obtain agency comments. In response DOD provided technical comments, which we have incorporated as appropriate. NGA's Technology Center Was Completed with a Modified Scope of Work but Still Met the Original Data-Storage Requirement, and NGA Believes It Constitutes a Complete and Usable Facility: NGA's Technology Center was completed with a modified scope of work but still met the original data-storage requirement, and the agency believes it constitutes a complete and usable facility. The NGA Technology Center was performing its mission as of the end of September 2011. Nonetheless, while NGA's data-storage requirements were stable during the Technology Center's construction, NGA modified the scope of work for the center multiple times because the space it originally projected it would need for data storage was later reduced due to advances in data-storage technology. NGA officials told us that at the beginning of the project NGA had identified a data-storage requirement of 8 petabytes,[Footnote 11] and that in 2008 this requirement was modified to add about 2 additional petabytes of data storage that had been overlooked when the original requirement was generated. However, this modification did not add additional storage capability beyond what existed at the satellite locations being consolidated into the Technology Center during the course of the project. NGA had calculated this data-storage requirement based on the data-storage capabilities then in use across all of the NGA satellite locations that were to be consolidated into the NGA Campus East in response to the BRAC recommendation. However, the space needed to accommodate this data-storage requirement was later reduced due to technological advances in IT components becoming smaller while electrical density increased, and in response NGA changed the construction plans for the Technology Center and ultimately decided not to fit out the third floor. During the planning phase for a construction project like the NGA Campus East project, officials identify certain details, such as the primary and supporting facilities to be constructed. DOD organizations requesting funding for construction projects must fill out a DD Form 1391--which is the principal document that describes the organization's facility needs and justifies its request for funds.[Footnote 12] The DOD Financial Management Regulation requires that the DD Form 1391 identify each primary and supporting facility that must be built to complete the construction project, along with some specifications and cost information for each facility.[Footnote 13] Although BRAC construction projects are funded from a BRAC- specific appropriation rather than military construction appropriations, the DOD Financial Management Regulation also requires a DD Form 1391 for each construction project included in annual budget requests.[Footnote 14] At the beginning of this project, NGA's original DD Form 1391 for the NGA Campus East project did not provide complete information regarding the project's scope of work. For example, it did not identify each primary and supporting facility. In February 2006, NGA submitted a single DD Form 1391 for the entire NGA Campus East project to the Office of the Secretary of Defense for inclusion in the budget-justification documents submitted to Congress; this DD Form 1391 included three buildings, but it did not include the Technology Center. It did not fully describe all of the facility needs or identify each supporting facility that DOD had determined was required to complete the NGA campus. The Technology Center was not identified or discussed as a needed supporting facility. NGA officials told us that they did not include detailed information--such as identifying the Technology Center as a supporting facility--because they were at a very conceptual design phase at that point and did not have that information. In March 2006, the original conceptual IT plan for the NGA Technology Center called for constructing 108,000 square feet to meet NGA's data- storage requirements. This scope of work was based on the aggregate physical space currently in use to meet IT needs at the existing satellite facilities that were to close and relocate to the Technology Center. It did not account for the efficiencies that would be achieved by consolidating these data-storage spaces into one facility designed exclusively for this purpose, such as the ability to more-densely configure servers. In December 2006, NGA modified the plan for the Technology Center to call for 55,000 square feet of space--with electrical density increased from 50 watts/square foot to 150 watts/ square foot--to meet these same data-storage requirements, and this revised plan was used to develop the detailed design for a four-story Technology Center building. The top two floors were to provide 55,000 square feet to house the necessary data-storage capabilities. NGA planned to complete the fourth floor of the Technology Center first, to provide initial data-storage capability by adding items such as a raised floor and uninterruptable power supplies to prepare the space for the installation of information technology equipment. Once the fourth floor was completed, it planned to fit out the third floor in the same way. In 2007, additional actions were taken on the basis of NGA's revised design plans, including ordering structural steel for the four-story facility in October 2007. Contracting documentation for this period refers to the completion of the third floor as an "option," and its Program Management Plan--which defines the scope of work and overall plan for completing the project--calls for the completion of the third floor some time in fiscal year 2012 or 2013. NGA officials told us that in February 2008 the IT contractor hired to put the IT equipment into the completed space determined that the 10 petabyte data-storage requirement could be accommodated using the fourth floor alone, because advancements in data-storage and server technology would allow them to store the same amount of data in less space. These officials told us that, as a result of the IT contractor's determination, the leadership of the NGA Campus East Program Management Office, which was charged with managing the entire construction project, decided not to fit out the third floor of the center. This reduced costs for the building by an estimated $31.4 million to $37.15 million by not incurring costs associated with construction activities such as installing raised floors, additional generators, and cooling systems for the third floor.[Footnote 15] However, NGA officials noted that, because the structural steel had already been ordered and other construction activities were under way, fully redesigning the Technology Center at that point to eliminate one floor would have cost hundreds of millions of dollars due to the effect on the entire NGA Campus East project and delayed its completion. Figure 1 shows a time line with the Technology Center's evolving IT and square footage requirements arrayed across the top and the progress of the construction process underneath. Figure 1: Timeline of the NGA Technology Center Project: [Refer to PDF for image: timeline] Information technology (IT) and physical space requirements: February 2006: Initial NGA DD Form 1391 does not include data center. March 31, 2006: 108,000 square foot data-center requirement identified. December 1, 2006: Data-center requirement reduced to 55,000 square feet (two floors). January 2007: Updated NGA DD form 1391 identifies data center as primary facility. April 6, 2007: IT Statement of Requirements, calls for initial data center space of 22,000 square feet (fourth floor) to be provided to the IT contractor. February 2008: IT contract begins, contractor indicates third floor not needed. Spring 2008: NGA determines not to fit out third floor. July 2008: IT installed in fourth floor. 2008-2010: NGA long-term data-storage study concludes more storage capability needed. Construction activity: November 2005: BRAG recommendation 168, requiring new NGA facility, goes into effect. March 2006-December 2007: Technology center structural design conducted. April 16, 2007: Construction specifications issued, third floor fit out an option. August 10, 2007: Construction contract issued, third floor fit out as an option. October 16, 2007: Structural steel ordered. October 2007-July 2009: Technology center constructed. September 21, 2009: Technology center substantially complete. October 12, 2010: Technology center achieves initial operational capability. February 2011: New funding request to fit out third floor. August 2012: Anticipated start of third floor. Source: GAO analysis of DOD information. [End of section] NGA officials did not notify the Office of the Secretary of Defense, the Department of the Army BRAC office, or any of the congressional defense committees regarding its decision to change the scope of the Technology Center by not fitting out the third floor because there was no clear requirement to do so. Additionally, the construction project's annual business plans, which were drafted by NGA, did not include any information regarding its decision not to fit out the third floor. NGA submitted these business plans to the Department of the Army, and the Army submitted them to the Deputy Under Secretary of Defense for Installations and Environment. The officials from the Office of the Deputy Under Secretary of Defense for Installations and Environment told us that they required the business managers to regularly brief them on their progress in implementing their BRAC recommendations. According to these officials, issues related to the construction of the Technology Center were not mentioned during any of these briefings. Officials from the Office of the Secretary of Defense told us that they learned of NGA's decision not to fit out the third floor of the Technology Center when NGA submitted a new DD Form 1391 in February 2011 seeking military construction funding to fit out the third floor after all. Officials from the Department of the Army's BRAC office learned of the decision when they were taking a tour of the completed NGA Campus East in 2011. NGA officials told us that they did not provide notification of these changes because they did not believe they had a requirement to do so. Although the Army was the business manager for the NGA Campus East project, Army officials told us they did not provide the same level of detailed oversight that they typically provided to BRAC projects relocating or consolidating Army facilities because they believed others were doing so. Army officials told us that for all BRAC projects for Army facilities the Army required notification and approval for any user-requested changes in project scope, regardless of size. For example, they told us that during the construction of a data-storage facility for the U.S. Army Forces Command at Fort Bragg, North Carolina, U.S. Army Forces Command decided to change the scope of the project to provide additional square footage for increased data-storage capability. Although U.S. Army Forces Command notified Army Headquarters of this proposed change in scope, the Army did not approve the change. Consequently, U.S. Army Forces Command completed the project to the initial specifications. Army officials told us that they believed the Office of the Deputy Under Secretary of Defense for Installations and Environment was providing detailed oversight of the NGA project, including review and approval of changes in scope. However, officials in the Office of the Deputy Under Secretary of Defense for Installations and Environment told us that since the Department of the Army had been assigned as the business manager, the Army was responsible for providing detailed oversight of the NGA project. Additionally, because the project requirements documents did not fully describe the facility needs or identify each supporting facility that was to be built to complete the entire NGA Campus East project, it is now difficult to effectively evaluate any cost or scope changes to the project--including the decision not to fit out the third floor--and determine if congressional notification was required.[Footnote 16] Because NGA did not inform them of its change of plans for fitting out the third floor of the Technology Center, Congress and the Office of the Secretary of Defense did not have an opportunity to provide input regarding this decision. Officials from the Office of the Deputy Under Secretary of Defense for Installations and Environment told us that if they had been made aware of the change of scope to the Technology Center, they might have recommended the use of non-BRAC funding for the completion of the building shell for the third floor of the facility, because BRAC funding can be used only for a project that results in a facility that is required in order to fulfill the project's designated BRAC purpose. While we are not making any recommendations in this report because of the limited scope of our review--we examined only one case-- the experience of this construction project and the lack of clarity regarding notification requirements suggest that, should there be any further BRAC rounds in the future, improved clarity regarding oversight of BRAC-driven military construction projects could be helpful. This may be particularly true if the business manager is a different component than the facility user. Our ongoing work looking at BRAC issues, including a review of lessons learned from the 2005 BRAC experience, will consider this issue. NGA officials also told us they believed that--even without the complete fit-out of the third floor--the NGA Technology Center was a complete and usable facility. As a result, they decided not to modify the original four-story design. There is limited guidance available on what constitutes a complete and usable facility, but one important determination is generally whether a given building, structure, or other improvement to real property satisfies the need that justified carrying out the construction project.[Footnote 17] NGA officials determined that the Technology Center, as constructed, was a complete and usable facility because--even with only three of the four floors fitted out--it meets its original intended purpose of reconstituting the IT capabilities of the sites closed under BRAC Recommendation 168. Officials from the Office of the Secretary of Defense and the Army also told us they believe the facility, as constructed, is complete and usable. While a fully fitted out third floor was part of the original plan for the center, NGA officials told us that completing it would have provided more data-storage capability than their identified requirements called for and therefore would have gone beyond the intent of the BRAC recommendation to consolidate the existing capability. NGA Identified a Need to Complete the Technology Center's Original Scope of Work to Address Its Growing Need for Additional Long-Term Data Storage on the Basis of a Detailed Internal Study: In January 2011, NGA proposed a new military construction project to address long-term data-storage needs that would utilize the empty third floor of the technology center. From 2008 through 2010, NGA conducted a detailed internal study reviewing the volume of new data the agency was then receiving and was expected to receive in the future. This volumetric study examined key NGA and non-NGA intelligence agency programs that would be coming online over the next 10 years and would require data-storage and IT capabilities. NGA officials told us that this study, conducted in three phases, was comprehensive in the sense that it included a review of all current and planned intelligence collection sensors on all platforms--space- based, national and tactical airborne-based, and ground-based--that were scheduled to be deployed over the next 10 years. This study also reviewed the data-storage implications of the increasing use of "cloud computing" technology, which drives up central data-storage requirements because data formerly stored on desktop computers will reside in data centers, in order to allow for remote access capabilities. NGA officials told us that this study led NGA to conclude that it would need hundreds of additional petabytes of data- storage capability over the next 10 years. To address these newly identified data-storage requirements, NGA developed a proposal to fit out the currently unused third floor of the Technology Center to provide additional data-storage capability. Figure 2 shows the currently unused third floor of the Technology Center in January 2012. Figure 2: Unused Third Floor of the NGA Technology Center: [Refer to PDF for image: photograph] Source: NGA. [End of figure] To fit out the third floor, NGA will install items such as raised floors, fire-detection and suppression systems, air conditioning, and uninterruptable power supplies to enable the installation of IT equipment such as servers.[Footnote 18] Since this work entails new construction, NGA determined that it was appropriate to use military construction funding. Further, it determined that, since the project would exceed $2 million, the military construction funding must be specifically authorized by Congress through the military construction appropriation process. In February 2011, NGA submitted a new DD Form 1391 seeking congressionally authorized military construction funding for this project. Approximately $54.6 million in military construction funding for this project was authorized by Congress in the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2012,[Footnote 19] and NGA officials told us that construction is expected to begin in August 2012. According to officials, construction is expected to take approximately 12 to 15 months to complete due to the lead time required to build and install the required electrical generators. Once fitted out, the third floor of the Technology Center will join NGA's three main data centers: the completed fourth floor of the Technology Center; the NGA Data Center West near St. Louis, Missouri; and a contractor-owned and -operated Interim Transition Capability facility located in Ashburn, Virginia. According to NGA officials, the Interim Transition Capability was intended to temporarily facilitate the transition of data to the new Technology Center and was originally scheduled to operate only until Fiscal Year 2013. However, those officials told us that the lease for the Interim Transition Capability facility was recently extended through Fiscal Year 2018 in order to provide sufficient data-storage capability to address newly forecast data-storage requirements. Some of these NGA data-storage facilities are also planned to host information for non-NGA intelligence agencies. For example, according to NGA officials, the Director of National Intelligence's Intelligence Community Strategy calls for approximately 50 percent of the data hosted on the third floor of the Technology Center, once completed, to be from non-NGA intelligence community agencies. As another example, NGA is planning to host Defense Intelligence Agency data as well as NGA data at the Interim Transition Capability facility. Agency Comments: We are not making recommendations in this report. We provided a draft copy of this report to DOD for review and comment. In response DOD provided technical comments, which we have incorporated as appropriate. We are sending copies of this report to interested congressional committees; the Secretary of Defense; the Secretary of the Army; the Director of National Intelligence; and the Director, National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency. In addition, the report will be available at no charge on GAO's website at [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov]. If you or your staff have any questions concerning this report, please contact me on (202) 512-4523 or by e-mail at leporeb@gao.gov. Contact points for our Offices of Congressional Relations and Public Affairs are on the last page of this report. GAO staff who made major contributions to this report include Harold Reich, Assistant Director; Pamela Davidson; Michael J. Hanson; Joanne Landesman; Gregory Marchand; Brian Mazanec; Charles Perdue; and Amie Steele. Signed by: Brian J. Lepore: Director, Defense Capabilities and Management: List of Committees: The Honorable Carl Levin: Chairman: The Honorable John McCain: Ranking Member: Committee on Armed Services: United States Senate: The Honorable Daniel Inouye: Chairman: The Honorable Thad Cochran: Ranking Member: Subcommittee on Defense: Committee on Appropriations: United States Senate: The Honorable Howard P. "Buck" McKeon: Chairman: The Honorable Adam Smith: Ranking Member: Committee on Armed Services: House of Representatives: The Honorable C. W. Bill Young: Chairman: The Honorable Norman Dicks: Ranking Member: Subcommittee on Defense: Committee on Appropriations: House of Representatives: [End of section] Related GAO Products: Military Base Realignments and Closures: Key Factors Contributing to BRAC 2005 Results. [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-12-513T]. Washington, D.C.: March 8, 2012. Excess Facilities: DOD Needs More Complete Information and a Strategy to Guide Its Future Disposal Efforts. [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-11-814]. Washington, D.C.: September 19, 2011. Military Base Realignments and Closures: Review of the Iowa and Milan Army Ammunition Plants. [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-11-488R]. Washington. D.C.: April 1, 2011. GAO's 2011 High-Risk Series: An Update. [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-11-394T]. Washington, D.C.: February 17, 2011. Defense Infrastructure: High-Level Federal Interagency Coordination Is Warranted to Address Transportation Needs beyond the Scope of the Defense Access Roads Program. [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-11-165]. Washington, D.C.: January 26, 2011. Military Base Realignments and Closures: DOD Is Taking Steps to Mitigate Challenges but Is Not Fully Reporting Some Additional Costs. [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-10-725R]. Washington, D.C.: July 21, 2010. Defense Infrastructure: Army Needs to Improve Its Facility Planning Systems to Better Support Installations Experiencing Significant Growth. [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-10-602]. Washington, D.C.: June 24, 2010. Military Base Realignments and Closures: Estimated Costs Have Increased while Savings Estimates Have Decreased Since Fiscal Year 2009. [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-10-98R]. Washington, D.C.: November 13, 2009. Military Base Realignments and Closures: Transportation Impact of Personnel Increases Will Be Significant, but Long-Term Costs Are Uncertain and Direct Federal Support Is Limited. [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-09-750]. Washington, D.C.: September 9, 2009. Military Base Realignments and Closures: DOD Needs to Update Savings Estimates and Continue to Address Challenges in Consolidating Supply- Related Functions at Depot Maintenance Locations. [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-09-703]. Washington, D.C.: July 9, 2009. Defense Infrastructure: DOD Needs to Periodically Review Support Standards and Costs at Joint Bases and Better Inform Congress of Facility Sustainment Funding Uses. [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-09-336]. Washington, D.C.: March 30, 2009. Military Base Realignments and Closures: DOD Faces Challenges in Implementing Recommendations on Time and Is Not Consistently Updating Savings Estimates. [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-09-217]. Washington, D.C.: January 30, 2009. Military Base Realignments and Closures: Army Is Developing Plans to Transfer Functions from Fort Monmouth, New Jersey, to Aberdeen Proving Ground, Maryland, but Challenges Remain. [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-08-1010R]. Washington, D.C.: August 13, 2008. Defense Infrastructure: High-Level Leadership Needed to Help Communities Address Challenges Caused by DOD-Related Growth. [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-08-665]. Washington, D.C.: June 17, 2008. Defense Infrastructure: DOD Funding for Infrastructure and Road Improvements Surrounding Growth Installations. [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-08-602R]. Washington, D.C.: April 1, 2008. Military Base Realignments and Closures: Higher Costs and Lower Savings Projected for Implementing Two Key Supply-Related BRAC Recommendations. [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-08-315]. Washington, D.C.: March 5, 2008. Defense Infrastructure: Realignment of Air Force Special Operations Command Units to Cannon Air Force Base, New Mexico. [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-08-244R]. Washington, D.C.: January 18, 2008. Military Base Realignments and Closures: Estimated Costs Have Increased and Estimated Savings Have Decreased. [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-08-341T]. Washington, D.C.: December 12, 2007. Military Base Realignments and Closures: Cost Estimates Have Increased and Are Likely to Continue to Evolve. [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-08-159]. Washington, D.C.: December 11, 2007. Military Base Realignments and Closures: Impact of Terminating, Relocating, or Outsourcing the Services of the Armed Forces Institute of Pathology. [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-08-20]. Washington, D.C.: November 9, 2007. Military Base Realignments and Closures: Transfer of Supply, Storage, and Distribution Functions from Military Services to Defense Logistics Agency. [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-08-121R]. Washington, D.C.: October 26, 2007. Defense Infrastructure: Challenges Increase Risks for Providing Timely Infrastructure Support for Army Installations Expecting Substantial Personnel Growth. [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-07- 1007]. Washington, D.C.: September 13, 2007. Military Base Realignments and Closures: Plan Needed to Monitor Challenges for Completing More Than 100 Armed Forces Reserve Centers. [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-07-1040]. Washington, D.C.: September 13, 2007. Military Base Realignments and Closures: Observations Related to the 2005 Round. [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-07-1203R]. Washington, D.C.: September 6, 2007. Military Base Closures: Projected Savings from Fleet Readiness Centers Are Likely Overstated and Actions Needed to Track Actual Savings and Overcome Certain Challenges. [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-07-304]. Washington, D.C.: June 29, 2007. Military Base Closures: Management Strategy Needed to Mitigate Challenges and Improve Communication to Help Ensure Timely Implementation of Air National Guard Recommendations. [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-07-641]. Washington, D.C.: May 16, 2007. Military Base Closures: Opportunities Exist to Improve Environmental Cleanup Cost Reporting and to Expedite Transfer of Unneeded Property. [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-07-166]. Washington, D.C.: January 30, 2007. Military Bases: Observations on DOD's 2005 Base Realignment and Closure Selection Process and Recommendations. [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-05-905]. Washington, D.C.: July 18, 2005. Military Bases: Analysis of DOD's 2005 Selection Process and Recommendations for Base Closures and Realignments. [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-05-785]. Washington, D.C.: July 1, 2005. Military Base Closures: Observations on Prior and Current BRAC Rounds. [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-05-614]. Washington, D.C.: May 3, 2005. [End of section] Footnotes: [1] The BRAC process is governed by the Defense Base Closure and Realignment Act of 1990, referred to as the "BRAC statute," originally passed as Title XXIX of the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 1991, Pub. L. No. 101-510, (1990) (10 U.S.C. § 2687 note). It has subsequently been amended many times, including in 2001, when Congress authorized BRAC 2005 as part of the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2002, Pub. L. No. 107-107 (2001). [2] Section 2904 of the BRAC statute requires DOD to implement all BRAC recommendations within 6 years of approval by the President and transmittal to Congress, which, for BRAC 2005, occurred on September 15, 2005. [3] Defense Base Closure and Realignment Commission, 2005 Defense Base Closure and Realignment Commission Report, vol. 1 (Arlington, Va.: September 2005). [4] Originally, it was estimated that recommendation 168 would save approximately $535.1 million over a 20 year period, but because requirements increased, these savings were not achieved; in fact, the project incurred a net cost. However, the recommendation was also intended to optimize NGA mission efficiencies, improve readiness, and enhance mission partner coordination, while addressing antiterrorism and force-protection deficiencies. [5] The Office of Management and Budget issued guidance for federal data center consolidation in February 2010. [6] Fitting out the floor refers to the installation of items, such as raised floors, fire detection and suppression systems, air conditioning and uninterruptable power supplies, which would enable IT equipment such as servers to be installed. In deciding to not fit out the third floor, the associated emergency electrical generator as well as water chiller units at the respective on-campus utility plants were also not installed. [7] H.R. Conf. Rep. No. 112-329, at 761 (2011). [8] Section 2801(a) of title 10, U.S. Code, defines the term "military construction project" to include "all military construction work … necessary to produce a complete and usable facility or a complete and usable improvement to an existing facility (or to produce such portion of a complete and usable facility or improvement as is specifically authorized by law)." [9] We use the term "scope of work" throughout this report to describe the project as specified in budget-request documents and associated plans throughout its development and construction, as opposed to a contractual scope of work. [10] Pub. L. No. 112-81, § 4601 (2011). [11] A petabyte is a unit of information equal to about 1 quadrillion bytes, 1 million gigabytes, or 1 thousand terabytes. One petabyte of data is roughly equivalent to the amount of information that can be stored in about 20 million four-drawer filing cabinets. [12] DOD Financial Management Regulation 7000.14-R (DODFMR), vol. 2B, ch. 6, Military Construction/Family Housing Appropriations (December 2010) designates that a DD Form 1391, Military Construction Project Data, is used by DOD to submit requirements and justifications in support of military construction funding requests to Congress. While this chapter of the DODFMR has been amended since the events described in this report occurred, the standards for the DD Form 1391 have remained substantially the same. [13] DD Form 1391s for the NGA Campus East project were submitted on an annual basis. [14] DODFMR, vol. 2B, ch. 7, Base Realignment and Closure Appropriations (December 2010). While this chapter of the DODFMR has been amended since the events described in this report occurred, the requirement to complete a DD Form 1391 has remained substantially the same. [15] While these costs were not incurred, according to DOD officials the NGA Campus East construction project was exceeding original budget estimates and it consumed the savings from not fitting out the third floor. [16] Section 2703 of the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2008, Pub. L. No. 110-181 (2008) amended the BRAC statute by specifying notification requirements for changes in cost and scope for BRAC 2005 military construction projects. The amended law prohibited DOD from increasing or reducing authorized costs for military construction projects carried out using BRAC funds by more than 20 percent or $2 million, whichever was less, of the amount specified for the project in the conference report accompanying the Military Construction Authorization Act authorizing the project. In addition, it barred reductions in the scope of work for such projects of more than 25 percent from the scope specified in the most recent budget documents for the project. The amended law also provided that these limitations did not apply if the Secretary of Defense determined that cost or scope increases or reduction needed to be made "for the sole purpose of meeting unusual variations in cost or scope," and provided notification to the congressional defense committees in advance of the variation. The Deputy Under Secretary of Defense for Installations and Environment--the office responsible for oversight of BRAC projects-- issued additional guidance in February 2008 delegating authority and responsibility to DOD components to provide these notifications to the congressional defense committees when required. This guidance further states that the military services and defense agencies must coordinate all notifications to Congress with certain directorates within the Office of the Secretary of Defense. [17] For example, GAO determined in an appropriations law decision, B- 234326.15, Dec. 24, 1991, that the Air Force should have financed the construction of multiple housing trailers as a single military construction project because the trailers separately did not to meet the identified Air Force housing requirement, and thus were not complete and usable. [18] Additionally, associated backup generators and water-chiller units will be added at the respective on-campus utility plants. [19] Pub. L. No. 112-81, § 4601 (2011). [End of section] GAO’s Mission: The Government Accountability Office, the audit, evaluation, and investigative arm of Congress, exists to support Congress in meeting its constitutional responsibilities and to help improve the performance and accountability of the federal government for the American people. 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