(a) Any recipient that expends $500,000 or more in a year under Federal awards must have an audit made for that year by an independent auditor, in accordance with paragraph (b) of this section. If a recipient is currently performing under a Federal award that requires an audit by its Federal cognizant agency, that auditor must perform the independent audit. The audit generally should be made a part of the regularly scheduled, annual audit of the recipient's financial statements. However, it may be more economical in some cases to have Federal awards separately audited, and a recipient may elect to do so, unless that option is precluded by award terms and conditions or by Federal laws or regulations applicable to the program(s) under which the awards were made.

(b) The auditor must determine and report on whether:

(1) The recipient has an internal control structure that provides reasonable assurance that it is managing Federal awards in compliance with Federal laws and regulations and the terms and conditions of the awards.

(2) Based on a sampling of Federal award expenditures, the recipient has complied with laws, regulations, and award terms that may have a direct and material effect on Federal awards.

(c) The recipient must make the auditor's report available to the DOE contracting officers whose awards are affected.

(d) Before requesting an audit in addition to the independent audit, the contracting officer must:

(1) Consider whether the independent audit satisfies his or her requirements;

(2) Limit the scope of such additional audit to areas not adequately addressed by the independent audit; and

(3) If DOE is not the Federal agency with the predominant fiscal interest in the recipient, coordinate with the agency that has the predominant fiscal interest.

(e) The recipient and its Federal cognizant agency for audit should develop a coordinated audit approach to minimize duplication of audit work.

(f) Audit costs (including a reasonable allocation of the costs of the audit of the recipient's financial statement, based on the relative benefit to the Government and the recipient) are allowable costs of DOE awards.