Special Report: War, Terrorism, and Growing Deficits Limit Bush FY 2006 R&D Budget; Civilian Science Funding Flat

For the third consecutive year, Bush administration officials are opening their discussions about the federal government’s proposed science and research budget by first talking about topics that have nothing to do with science: the need to support the ongoing war on terror and the mounting pressure caused by the growing deficit. This “context setting” is a sure sign that the budget numbers for civilian science and technology will not be good, and for fiscal year 2006, they aren’t.

Even John Marburger, director of the Office of Science and Technology Policy, who has managed to find silver linings in the past two years of flat or declining funding, recently described the president’s budget proposal as “the tightest in nearly two decades.” Despite that, at a Senate hearing in February, Marburger managed to be upbeat about the science budget, noting that R&D money makes up 13.6% of total discretionary spending, “the highest level in 37 years.” The federal R&D budget request of $132.3 billion is an increase of $733 million over FY 2005 and sets another funding record, he said.

But he also noted that the administration’s budget “maintains a strong focus on winning the war against terrorism while moderating the growth in overall spending, and this focus is reflected in the proposed R&D budget.” What isn’t mentioned in any of the administration’s FY 2006 budget discussions is the tens of billions of dollars that will go to the war in Iraq this year. That money will loom in the background of all of the budget hearings on Capitol Hill, but no one knows exactly what impact it will have on the rest of the budget.

With the context set, the details of the administration’s FY 2006 proposal reveal a budget that continues to squeeze civilian science. According to the R&D budget analysis by the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the high levels of federal R&D investment cited by Marburger are due mainly to increases in the FY 2005 budget for defense and homeland security funding. “In completing the FY 2005 appropriations last December,” the AAAS analysis says, “Congress went along with the president’s proposals to freeze most domestic discretionary spending at FY 2004 levels. As a result, the nondefense, non-homeland security R&D portfolio stagnates this year, with modest increases in some areas offset by cuts in others.” Even though overall defense spending is up significantly, defense R&D, particularly basic research, is flat or down. Homeland security, as expected, does very well under the budget proposal. And the overall NASA budget, reflecting the president’s Moon/Mars initiative, also receives a significant boost.

But if Congress passes the president’s budget proposal as is, “growth in the federal R&D portfolio would fail to keep pace with inflation for the first time in a decade, and most R&D programs would suffer cuts in real terms,” according to the AAAS. An overview of the numbers from the AAAS provides a general sketch of what the administration is proposing:

• ▸ The proposed FY 2006 R&D portfolio boost of $132.3 billion, although it’s a record setter as Marburger noted, is just 0.1% above FY 2005 and short of the 2% increase needed to keep pace with inflation. So in real terms, the R&D portfolio would decline for the first time since 1996, with total federal support for basic and applied research dropping 1.4% to $55.2 billion.

• ▸ Nondefense R&D investments would increase just 0.3% to $57 billion. NASA would receive additional money for the International Space Station and the Moon/Mars program, but almost all other nondefense R&D agencies would see their funding decrease.

• ▸ NSF would see an increase of 2.8% in its R&D budget, which would offset last year’s cut, but much of the 2.8% is directed at facilities and includes money transferred from the US Coast Guard as part of a transfer to NSF of icebreaking ships in Antarctica. The average NSF research grant support level would decrease for the second year in a row. The foundation’s much-touted Math and Science Partnership education program would take a big hit as much of its support is moved to the Department of Education.

• ▸ R&D funding at the Department of Energy’s (DOE’s) Office of Science would decline 4.5% to $3.2 billion. That cut would reduce the Office of Science budget to where it was five years ago.

• ▸ Defense R&D would fall by $16 million to $75.4 billion. This would come after multibillion-dollar increases over the past five years. Basic research at the Department of Defense would be cut sharply. Overall science and technology funding would drop 21% and weapons-related R&D would fall 2.6%, including cuts to inertial confinement fusion and advanced computing research. The missile defense program would see a $1 billion cut.

• ▸ Department of Homeland Security R&D funding, which has increased by more than $200 million in each year since the department began operations in 2003, would rise only $44 million, or 3.6%, to $1.3 billion. All of the DHS R&D would be consolidated into the directorate of science and technology.

The administration’s budget proposal must work its way through 10 appropriations subcommittees in the House and another 12 subcommittees in the Senate. What comes out of the process will, as always, look significantly different from what the president is proposing. Each year, the majority members on the House Committee on Science—in recent years Republicans—issue a “views and estimates” report, which is a reliable indicator of what Congress thinks of the president’s science funding proposals. Typically the Republican document is reasonably favorable, and the Democratic members issue their own more critical report. This year the Republican report highlights so many concerns that the Democrats simply endorsed it instead of writing their own.

Ranking committee Democrat Bart Gordon, of Tennessee, said the report was so on point that the Democrats supported it “to send a stronger message to the administration, budget committee, and appropriators that the science and technology budget the president submitted is not the best we can do even under the current fiscal circumstances. We have to do better.”

The report, released by committee chairman Sherwood Boehlert (R-NY), says that the committee’s “top objective will be to pass authorization legislation for NASA. This legislation is needed to provide congressional direction in the wake of the president’s space exploration vision.” The committee also intends to pass the Organic Act for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, an act recommended by the US Commission on Ocean Policy that would give NOAA more authority and make it a more science-based agency.

While NASA and NOAA are listed as the top priorities, the report says the committee will also work to strengthen funding and activities at NSF, the Office of Science at DOE, and NIST. The report points specifically to proposed cuts in NSF’s math and science education program and indicates that those cuts will have a difficult time making it through Congress.

The administration’s proposal contains cuts for all three multiagency R&D initiatives, and the committee report says increases, not cuts, are needed. Funding for the National Nanotechnology Initiative would fall 2.5% to $1.1 billion, well below the level authorized in 2003 by the Nanotechnology R&D Act. The networking and information technology R&D initiative would drop by 6.8% to $2.1 billion, and the Climate Change Science Program would decrease 1.4% to $1.9 billion. The cut in the climate change program, according to the AAAS analysis, comes primarily from steep cuts in NASA’s contribution through space-based observations of the environment.

The committee also noted that under the budget proposal, funding would remain flat for cybersecurity R&D programs at NSF, NIST, and the DHS. That funding is well below levels authorized by Congress, the report says, and an increase in funding is needed.

With the deficit growing and both the war in Iraq and the war on terrorism continuing, the squeeze on science funding is tighter than in the past two decades. Yet Boehlert and other political leaders are echoing statements from the science and technology communities that scientific research is critical to both sustaining the US economy and increasing security. The Republican report points to a statement by DHS Under-secretary Charles McQueary, who said at a science committee hearing, “The nation’s advantage in science and technology is key to securing the homeland.” How the science and technology budget plays out won’t be evident until late in the year, but the following agency highlights help define the playing field and indicate some areas of contention.

National Science Foundation. NSF is the only federal agency with responsibility for research in all major scientific and engineering fields, and in most of those fields the foundation is the largest, or second largest, source of federal funds. NSF is the second largest federal supporter of academic R&D, behind the National Institutes of Health, and sends 81% of its R&D support to colleges and universities.

Proposed cuts in NSF funding typically attract a great deal of attention on Capitol Hill, and this year promises to be no exception. Here are the numbers congressional leaders will be considering: The FY 2006 budget request for NSF is $5.6 billion, an increase of 2.4%, or $132 million over FY 2005. Because NSF received a 3.1% cut in FY 2005, the overall request for this year is actually 1% below the FY 2004 level.

The views and estimates report notes that the proposed 2.4% increase “includes money provided to foot the bill for icebreaking expenses currently paid by the US Coast Guard, so the increase for NSF in reality comes to about 1.5%.” Those numbers look even worse when compared to funding levels authorized by Congress in the National Science Foundation Authorization Act of 2002, which called for doubling NSF’s budget by 2007. Had the authorization levels been met, NSF would be looking at an $8.5 billion budget in FY 2006 instead of the proposed $5.6 billion figure.

NSF’s research and related activities (R&RA) account, which funds most science research, would receive $4.3 billion—$113 million, or 2.7%, more than FY 2005. It is in this account that the icebreaker money skews the real funding outlook. Much of the 2.7% increase is due to the proposed transfer of $48 million from the Coast Guard icebreaker program to NSF’s Office of Polar Programs. The icebreakers, two large ships and a smaller one, are aging, and their operating costs are estimated by some on the hill to be closer to $70 million, which would cut further into the R&RA account. But if the $48 million icebreaker money is left out of the R&RA equation, then most of the research directorates would receive increases of about 1%. Only the engineering directorate, with a 3.5% increase, would receive a raise above the rate of inflation.

NSF’s integrative activities account within R&RA would increase by $5 million to $135 million, and within that account, funding for the Major Research Instrumentation Program would remain at the FY 2005 level of $90 million. The program, which awards grants to universities and colleges to purchase laboratory equipment, was cut last year from the FY 2004 funding level of $110 million.

Funding for the foundation’s participation in the multiagency Nanoscale Science and Engineering Initiative would increase 1.8% to $344 million, with major funding split between the engineering and the mathematics and physical sciences directorates. NSF’s participation in other multiagency initiatives would increase by only 1%.

One of the biggest fights on Capitol Hill, as reflected in the House science committee report, is likely to be over the administration’s efforts to transfer the Math and Science Partnership (MSP) program to the Department of Education. The committee report details the problem this way:

The administration is proposing to cut $19 million from NSF’s contribution to the MSP program, which NSF runs jointly with the Department of Education. While NSF’s participation in MSP drops under the president’s proposal, the Department of Education would see its MSP budget increase from $179 million in FY 2005 to $269 million in FY 2006.

One area that does get a big boost is NSF’s support of R&D facilities, which would increase 18.5% to $429 million. As part of that support, the major research equipment and facilities construction account would receive $240 million, a 44% increase from the $174 million in FY 2005. While there are no new starts in the facilities program, there are increases for two projects started in FY 2005. The Scientific Ocean Drilling Vessel project would receive $58 million, up from $15 million, and the Rare Symmetry Violating Processes project would increase from $15 million in FY 2005 to $42 million.

The Atacama Large Millimeter Array, EarthScope, and the IceCube Neutrino Observatory would be funded at FY 2005 levels. Several other projects that were being considered for FY 2006 startup have been pushed back at least a year.

Department of Energy. Overall, DOE would see its R&D funding drop by 1.9% to $8.5 billion, a decrease of $161 million. The proposed cuts to the Office of Science of 4.5%, to $3.2 billion, would be spread across many programs, including physics, biology, and energy sciences. Only two accounts, basic energy sciences and fusion energy sciences, would receive increases, but the money would be focused on two specific projects. In basic energy sciences, money for the Spallation Neutron Source would jump from $33 million to $149 million as the facility moves from construction to operations. The AAAS analysis notes that the SNS increase would leave other basic energy programs flat funded in FY 2006. The science committee report supports the SNS funding but is concerned that it will “come at the expense of research grant funding, which is down by about 10% in this request.”

In fusion science, ITER, an international prototype fusion energy project, gets the big boost, with its budget increasing from $5 million in FY 2005 to $56 million in FY 2006. Some on Capitol Hill have questioned why so much money is going to an international project that is stalled because of disputes over where the reactor should be located. With ITER receiving a large increase, the rest of the fusion programs would see cuts.

Another serious concern with the cuts to the Office of Science is the effect they will have on operations at DOE facilities around the country. The facilities are routinely used by outside researchers, and tight budgets in recent years have reduced the operating time at many facilities. The science committee report complains that “under the budget proposal, existing user facilities would be shut down for more weeks of the year because of lack of funds. These facilities are used by industrial and academic researchers as well as by researchers at the national laboratories themselves.” The facilities are expensive and, the report says, “it is wasteful to allow them to sit idle for much of the year.”

The austere budget proposal is also creating problems for the Office of Science’s much-vaunted facilities plan, released in 2003, which prioritized the 20 research facilities it hopes to open during the next 20 years. One project included in that plan, the BTeV at Fermilab, is to be canceled later this year at the end of the engineering design phase. Another project, the Rare Isotope Accelerator, would be deferred under the FY 2006 proposal.

The increases in DOE R&D funding would go primarily to the hydrogen fuel initiative, increased 15% from $224 million to $257 million. This is part of an evolving initiative that would tie together DOE efforts in everything from developing hydrogen fuel cells to obtaining hydrogen from coal. Money would come from several existing DOE programs, and from the Office of Science. Nuclear energy R&D would receive an increase of 12%, to $95 million, but half of that money would go to a nuclear hydrogen production program.

NASA. Although NASA employees initially rejoiced at the news that their agency had received a proposed 1.6% budget increase in FY 2006 to implement the president’s Moon/Mars vision, that increase is half a billion dollars less than the agency previously said it would need to implement the program. Former NASA administrator Sean O’Keefe, before leaving NASA in mid-February, said that the agency’s proposed $16.5 billion budget remained healthy in “these challenging times” because of the “specific policy direction set by the president.”

Under the administration’s proposal, NASA’s R&D budget would increase 4.6%, or $507 million, over FY 2005. But as Congress takes a closer look at the budget, NASA is bracing for challenges to the choices the administration made for the agency. These include a proposed 6% aeronautics research cut that could cause the loss of thousands of jobs at NASA and threaten some research centers with closure. In addition, the Earth sciences program would drop 4%, while biological and physical research would fall 22%.

The FY 2006 budget also would mean the cancellation of a rescue mission to the Hubble Space Telescope and the delay of the Jupiter Icy Moon Orbiter. A significant delay in JIMO would likely lead to cancellation of the project. Although the HST seems doomed, the budget proposal reaffirms NASA’s commitment to the International Space Station and the space shuttle program. Indeed, the shuttle and space station programs account for about 40% of the agency’s entire budget. But even here there is controversy because the costs of returning the space shuttle to flight continue to increase, while the FY 2006 budget assumes they will drop.

More controversy involving the shuttle occurred when O’Keefe admitted in February that a proper risk analysis of a shuttle mission to service the HST had not been done, despite NASA’s claims to the contrary last year. The budget proposal includes $75 million for a de-orbit module for HST, and there is also $18 million for extending the telescope’s life without fixing it, said NASA’s Science Associate Administrator Alphonso V. Diaz. American Astronomical Society President Robert Kirshner said in a recent statement that he was “very disappointed with NASA’s current plan not to service HST. We know that NASA is committed to doing the world’s best astronomy, and servicing Hubble with the shuttle is part of the best program.”

Nearly $753 million of the budget would go toward development of a crew exploration vehicle that is intended to replace the shuttle in 2014, four years after the last shuttle flight.

The Prometheus nuclear power propulsion program did not get as much money as expected after NASA officials realized how costly JIMO would be. The craft is the flagship demonstration vehicle for the nuclear power propulsion program, but because of its spiraling costs, NASA may soon announce a less ambitious replacement vehicle. The loss of JIMO may strengthen the case for developing Juno, a spacecraft that would go into polar orbit around Jupiter to investigate the existence of an ice-rock core. Juno is currently competing for approval against Moonrise, a lunar sample return mission (see Physics Today, February 2005, page 26 ) and a final decision on which mission will get the go-ahead will be made later this year. Both Juno and Moonrise are part of NASA’s New Frontiers Program, which would be cut by 24% under the FY 2006 budget proposal.

Perhaps the most significant change at NASA may be organizational. Last month, Ames Research Center at Moffett Field, California, offered buyouts (capped at $25 000) to all but 70 of its 1400 federal employees. Other centers will soon follow. More than 350 employees left NASA last year due to buyouts and the agency expects more than 1000 employees to leave each year over the next five years under the program. NASA is currently evaluating whether to close some of its 10 research centers or to sell them to a third party and run them under contracts similar to that at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California.

Department of Defense. Because the billions of dollars going to the war in Iraq are not included in the administration’s DOD budget proposal but are added later in separate “supplemental” budget requests, the FY 2006 request is misleading. In FY 2005 the DOD controls a record-breaking $476 billion budget, which includes a recently proposed multibillion-dollar supplemental request for Iraq. For FY 2006 the DOD budget request is for $419 billion, a dramatic decrease. But because FY 2006 supplemental war-related requests are expected to be in the range of $75 billion or more, the decrease isn’t real.

Of most interest to the scientific community is the DOD’s basic (6.1) and applied (6.2) research funding, which account for about 13% of all such federal research support. Basic research would fall 12.9% to $1.3 billion in the FY 2006 budget, and would include decreases in all of the military services. Much of the decrease would come through the elimination of FY 2005 congressional earmarks—money put in the budget by Congress for specific programs not in the DOD’s original budget request. But beyond the earmarks, according to the AAAS budget analysis, several core research programs would also be cut. The university research initiatives program, for example, would be cut 15.7% to $248 million. The program awards basic research grants to universities.

Applied research would drop 14.7%, or $711 million, to $4.1 billion in FY 2006. Applied research programs for the US Army, Navy, and Air Force would all undergo sharp cuts—40% in the army’s case. The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) would receive a 3.6% increase to $3.1 billion, the third increase in as many years.

Department of Homeland Security. The rapid growth that has marked DHS since the department was founded by the Homeland Security Act of 2002 shows signs of slowing in FY 2006, although DHS still does well compared with most other federal agencies. R&D at DHS would increase 3.6%, or $44 million, to $1.3 billion. That is respectable, but significantly less than the $200 million increases in the previous three budgets. The FY 2006 budget also would complete the centralization of all DHS R&D under the Directorate of Science and Technology.

The FY 2006 proposal sets radiological and nuclear countermeasures as a top priority with a request of $246 million. Of that amount, $227 million would go to establish a new domestic nuclear detection office that would have the task of developing a system for detecting and reporting on terrorist attempts to transport or use radiological or nuclear materials.

Biological countermeasures would remain as the largest part of the DHS R&D budget, receiving $362 million in FY 2006. Much of that money would continue R&D activities in detection technologies and the creation of a national detection network.

NIST and NOAA. The good news in the proposed NIST budget is a 12.7% increase for research at the institute’s laboratories. The bad news is that the money would come from the elimination of NIST’s Advanced Technology Program (ATP), something the Senate may not allow to happen. For the past three budgets, the administration and House Republicans have tried to get rid of ATP on the grounds that it is a government subsidy of private industry. The program provides funds to small companies to help develop new technologies that are deemed too risky for full private-industry investment. Program advocates claim it is very successful, but efforts to kill the program continue.

The FY 2006 budget would zero out ATP, not even providing enough funds to close out existing grants. In addition, a similar program, the Manufacturing Extension Partnership would be cut 57% to $47 million. If that cut is enacted, many of the MEP centers will likely close.

The tradeoff, according to the AAAS analysis, is that the savings from the ATP and MEP programs would fund the boost in the NIST laboratories. Two years ago, when the same problem existed, Congress saved ATP by taking money from the laboratories and MEP. This year, if the Senate decides to save ATP again and bolster MEP, the money could once again come from the laboratories.

NOAAs R&D budget would drop by 11.2% to $565 million, but from the administration’s point of view, the funding would remain about the same as it requested last year; the drop comes almost entirely from the elimination of congressional earmarks. NOAAs climate research program would stay at $178 million but would involve taking $18 million from congressionally earmarked programs and moving it to core research programs. Weather and air quality research would decrease from $51 million to $38 million, again because of the elimination of earmarks. The National Sea Grant College Program would stay at $61 million.