DOE, NSF get billions in R&D funding from stimulus act

It’s been a wild ride for federal science budgets this year, though unlike the markets, the trend is sharply upward. As unprecedented levels of funding began pouring into federal science and technology programs from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA), the major science funding agencies were poised for further budget increases as Congress finally finished the annual appropriations process nearly halfway through the fiscal year. Meanwhile, President Obama unveiled an FY 2010 budget proposal that reaffirms his campaign pledge to double federal funding for basic science over 10 years.

In his 24 February speech to a joint session of Congress, Obama touted the $787 billion ARRA he had signed days before, which included “the largest investment in basic research funding in American history—an investment that will spur not only new discoveries in energy but breakthroughs in medicine, science, and technology.” Of the agencies with science and technology missions, the US Department of Energy received the biggest share of the stimulus money. Consistent with Obama’s plan to increase renewable energy generation, most of DOE’s $38.7 billion in stimulus money will pay for clean energy research, development, demonstration, and deployment. But there’s $1.6 billion for DOE’s basic research programs too. Energy Secretary Steven Chu told the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources on 5 March that “getting this money into the economy quickly, carefully, and transparently is a top priority for me.”

NSF topped DOE in the basic research category; the $3 billion it received amounts to half its entire 2008 budget. Director Arden Bement said he was “humbled and honored” by the recognition of NSF’s importance in stimulating the economy. The stimulus money, he said in a statement, “will go directly into the hands of the nation’s best and brightest researchers at the forefront of promising discoveries, to deserving graduate students at the start of their careers, and to developing advanced scientific tools and infrastructure that will be broadly available to the research community.”

NASA and NIST also received sizeable increases from the stimulus package (see accompanying table). Congress directed that $400 million of NASA’s total $1 billion supplement be used to support its Earth science programs, $400 million go to space exploration, and $150 million go to aviation R&D. The remaining $50 million is to fund repairs to NASA facilities damaged by hurricanes or other natural disasters.

The recovery act includes $240 million for NIST’s scientific research activities and lab equipment and $180 million for construction of NIST facilities. Obama would keep alive NIST’s Technology Innovation Program, formerly the Advanced Technology Program—but barely, with just $70 million for it in the FY 2010 request.

Details left to NSF

But just how the bonanza for NSF will be spread around remains unclear. Unlike most appropriations bills, ARRA provides an extraordinary degree of latitude to agencies on how the money is spent. NSF was simply instructed to spread $2 billion of its stimulus money across the range of scientific and engineering disciplines. Lawmakers were a bit more specific with instructions for the remaining $1 billion, directing that $500 million go to existing programs that help research universities in financing major instrumentation and repairing and modernizing their research facilities. NSF’s Major Research Equipment and Facilities Construction program gets a $400 million boost to work through the backlog of telescopes and other major research facilities that have been approved by the National Science Board (NSB), and $100 million will be added to the foundation’s science and math education programs.

Although Bement declined to say how the funds would be distributed among the agency’s directorates, he did state that NSF, like other agencies, must have its plan vetted by the Office of Management and Budget and congressional appropriators before it can begin spending the money. But one NSB member, who did not want to be named, said Bement told the board that the plan was to spend the $2 billion portion of the stimulus money to fund about 3000 research proposals that are in the pipeline and that received high marks from reviewers. While that’s good news for investigators, new awardees could find that there’s no funding for renewals when the stimulus-funded awards expire in three years, warns Amy Scott, a federal relations staffer at the Association of American Universities. Although the stimulus funds are supposed to be obligated before FY 2011, NSF has been looking into whether it could stagger award payouts to smooth the funding profile somewhat. Michael Lubell, director of public affairs at the American Physical Society, said that a portion of the funding could be used to help academic researchers purchase lower-price-tag lab equipment and to aid universities with the cost of establishing labs for newly hired faculty—an expense that typically runs $500 000 or more. Obama’s 2010 request for NSF is $7 billion, up $500 million from the agency’s final appropriation for the current year, not counting the stimulus funds.

DOE cuts red tape

DOE also hasn’t detailed how the $1.6 billion for its Office of Science will be distributed. But Chu announced a streamlining of DOE’s procedures that he said would get the ARRA money flowing by early summer. The paper-work reductions and other reforms will enable DOE to pay out 70% of its stimulus funding by the end of FY 2010, Chu said.

In addition to its ARRA windfall, DOE’s science office will receive a 19% increase to its base budget under the omnibus FY 2009 appropriations bill. Department-wide, DOE receives a $2.5 billion increase to its base budget this year. But the agency purses would then shrink by $600 million in FY 2010, if lawmakers follow Obama’s budget proposal.

Much of ARRA will pay to begin modernizing the nation’s fragmented and inefficient electricity grid (see related story below). Under ARRA, a clean-energy finance authority will be set up to coordinate the federal government’s growing investments in renewable energy. Some $6 billion in new loan guarantees is expected to stimulate tens of billions more in new private financing for renewable energy facilities, Chu told the Senate energy committee.

Chu said he is in the process of finding a director for a new DOE entity to be known as the Advanced Research Projects Agency–Energy. The stimulus act appropriated $400 million for ARPA-E, which will fund high-risk research in energy technologies. The ARPA-E, he said, will consist of “a lean set of contracting people” to select technologies that are too risky to be financed by the private sector. The new office will be evaluated after two or three years and will be terminated if the concept doesn’t look promising, Chu said.

As he sent his FY 2010 budget request to Capitol Hill, Obama reiterated his campaign pledge to invest $15 billion a year for 10 years to develop renewable energy technologies like wind power and solar power and more efficient technologies for motor vehicles. That money would come from revenues generated by an economy-wide cap-and-trade system of controls on carbon dioxide that Obama is proposing to initiate in 2012. According to the budget document, the controls will cut US CO₂ emissions by 14% from their 2005 levels by 2020 and by 83% by 2050.