Senate budget proposal removes all funding for ITER

Science : The White House’s 2014 budget proposal includes increased spending for ITER , the international fusion demonstration reactor being built in France. However, although the Department of Energy plans to spend no more than $225 million annually on the project, it did not predict either total investment dollar amount or duration. That lack of information prompted a Senate subcommittee to return a version of the proposed budget that completely removes funding for ITER. The committee also voted to remove funding for the Energy Efficient Buildings Hub (EEB) in Philadelphia because of a failure to meet technical milestones and to not fund a planned hub for power grid systems. The returned budget leaves most of the rest of DOE’s budget proposal intact and still provides the requested $5.153 billion for DOE’s Office of Science and $379 million for ARPA-E, both significant increases over current spending.