Finally, some solid numbers for federal science budgets

With a truce declared on partisan budget wrangling, the fiscal year 2014 budget process quietly concluded in January with mainly modest increases to federal R&D programs compared with FY 2013 levels. A deal struck in December between House and Senate budget committees produced an overall spending cap that paved the way for congressional appropriators to produce an omnibus funding bill and avert a second round of across-the-board spending cuts known as sequestration. That same budget agreement also set a spending ceiling for FY 2015, which all but ensures that Congress will follow the normal appropriations process when it considers the administration’s budget, likely to be delivered this month. In 2013 lawmakers resorted to a full-year stopgap continuing resolution, which simply carried over FY 2012 spending.

In most cases the year-to-year increases in R&D for FY 2014 are actually greater than shown in the table on page 29, since the FY 2013 figures don’t include the approximately 5% reduction due to the sequestration that was applied in January 2013. No official post-sequestration FY 2013 spending figures have been published by federal agencies, although some independent organizations, including the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), have estimated them.

Following are some highlights of the major physical sciences–related programs contained in the bill and the accompanying report.

Department of Energy

The Office of Science, which houses the Department of Energy’s nonweapons basic research programs, increased 9.7% from its FY 2013 post-sequestration level, according to AAAS estimates. Funding for the magnetic fusion program rose to $506 million, up from an estimated $381 million. The extra money will go to domestic fusion research programs, including $22 million to continue operating the Alcator C-Mod tokamak at MIT, which the administration wants to shut down. Funding was restored for a program at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory that explores the use of heavy ions as a potential driver for energy production from inertial confinement fusion. The US contribution to ITER, the international fusion reactor project, was cut to $200 million, $25 million below the administration’s request. Lawmakers instructed DOE to submit a 10-year strategic fusion plan within a year that assumes continued US participation in ITER and assesses priorities for the domestic fusion program. (For more on ITER, see Physics Today, February 2014, page 20 .)

Appropriators provided $26.5 million for Fermilab’s Long-Baseline Neutrino Experiment and $15 million to maintain minimal operations, such as pumping to prevent flooding, at the Homestake Mine LBNE site in South Dakota. But lawmakers denied funding for long-lead procurements or construction of the LBNE. (For more on the LBNE, see Physics Today, February 2013, page 19 .) Construction of the Facility for Rare Isotope Beams at Michigan State University was fully funded at $55 million, and $165 million was allotted for 22 weeks of operation by the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider at Brookhaven National Laboratory.

The National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) of DOE received an estimated 5.9% increase from last year. Congress included the full amount the administration requested for the controversial B-61 nuclear bomb life-extension program (see Physics Today, December 2013, page 26 ). The bill instructed the NNSA to commission the JASON scientific advisory panel to review extending the use of insensitive high explosives in all warheads. It noted that the W-76 and W-88 devices, which use the more volatile conventional explosives and are carried on Trident D-5 missiles, were a particular concern. The D-5’s multiple warheads sit alongside, not atop, the third-stage rocket motors.

The omnibus bill provides $514 million for inertial confinement fusion, of which $329 million is for the National Ignition Facility. All the increase from the administration’s $401 million request is designated for facility operations and target production.

The bill orders establishment by 1 May of an independent nine-member commission to review the effectiveness and efficiency of the entire DOE national laboratory complex. The panel, whose members are to be chosen from at least 18 individuals nominated by the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology, is to submit its report by 1 February 2015. The panel will examine opportunities for consolidation, changes to existing management models at the labs and at the NNSA, and other measures to improve laboratory efficiencies.

NASA

Lawmakers told the space agency to better justify and provide detailed cost estimates for its proposed mission to capture and redirect an asteroid into an orbit around Earth. House language prohibiting NASA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration from installing climate-monitoring sensors on the upcoming Joint Polar Satellite System was jettisoned, although the agencies are ordered to submit a development plan for congressional approval for each sensor.

The bill extends the ban on NASA and White House Office of Science and Technology Policy officials having bilateral meetings with representatives of the Chinese government. (See Physics Today, December 2013, page 24 .) It could be the last year for that measure; its author, Representative Frank Wolf (R-VA), is retiring in December.

NSF

Congress does not instruct NSF on how to allocate the funding it provides for research grants. The bill states that further growth of interdisciplinary research initiatives shall not come at the expense of the core disciplines.