Highlights
- The House would give the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) a dramatically
expanded R&D budget of $1.2 billion in FY 2005, up $200 million
or 19.3 percent from this year after an even larger increase last year
(see Table).
- The House would
add funds to the DHS request for university programs, interoperable
communications, shipping container security, and air cargo security
technologies. Compared to FY 2004, the largest DHS R&D increase
would go to biological countermeasures, including construction of a
new biodefense laboratory.
- In addition to
the R&D portfolio, DHS has already received $885 million in FY 2004
and $2.5 billion in FY 2005 for Project BioShield,
a procurement program to purchase biodefense
countermeasures that is designed to encourage private-sector biodefense
R&D investments. An authorization law establishing program guidelines
is expected to be signed into law this summer.
In March 2003,
the new Department of Homeland Security (DHS) took shape with the transfer
of nearly 180,000 federal employees in nearly two dozen federal agencies
to the new department. All told, the DHS brought together $31 billion
worth of programs (FY 2003 budget) in the largest reorganization of
the federal government since the 1940s. A year later, the DHS is well
on its way to integrating its component agencies and is in the process
of setting up numerous programs to address gaps in homeland security,
including the creation of new science and technology capabilities to
provide the knowledge and technology base for the federal government’s
homeland security efforts.
House Action on the DHS R&D Portfolio
On June 18, the House of Representatives debated
and approved its FY 2005 Homeland Security (HS) appropriations bill
(HR 4567), the second of the 13 appropriations bills to make it through
the House. The bill funds the Department of Homeland Security (DHS).
The House HS bill would provide
$1.2 billion for DHS R&D in FY 2005, a dramatic increase of
$200 million or 19.3 percent over FY 2004 following an even larger $300
million increase the previous year. The DHS itself requested a substantial
increase to $1.1 billion, but the House would add $97 million to the
request at a time when other agencies would count themselves lucky to
see their R&D budgets keep pace with inflation (see Table).
R&D in the Directorate of Science and Technology
Most DHS R&D programs have their home in the
Directorate of Science and Technology (S&T), one of five broad directorates
in the new department. This Directorate has responsibility for setting
homeland-security R&D goals and priorities, coordinating homeland
security R&D throughout the federal government, funding homeland
security R&D, facilitating the transfer and deployment of technologies
for homeland security, and advising the DHS Secretary on all scientific
and technical matters.
In the
House plan, the S&T Directorate would fund 86 percent of all DHS
R&D (see Table and Figure 1). Nearly
all of the $1.1 billion total S&T Directorate budget would go toward
R&D activities, except for $69 million in administrative and other
overhead costs. The House would add $77 million to the DHS request for
S&T R&D programs, for a total of $1.1 billion (up 22.4 percent
over FY 2004).
Figure 1.
(click on the image to view or download a color
full-size PDF version of the chart)
The House would add to the request for four specific program
areas. The House would provide
a total of $70 million for University Programs and Fellowship Programs,
a boost of $40 million over the request. This program would fund several
university-based centers of excellence and would be a funding source
dedicated exclusively to funding university-based research. The Department
expects to designate several university-based centers for homeland security
in FY 2005, adding to the three centers that have already been announced
(one on threat assessments and two on agro-terrorism). Universities
will not be limited to just $70 million; they will also be able to compete
for R&D funds in the other program areas. This program will also
fund fellowships that will bring scientists and engineers from academia
and private industry to work within the DHS for a year or two. The House
would add $10 million in new funds for the Safety Act (included in “Other”
in the Table), funds that would be used
to certify products as “qualified homeland security technologies” and
thus protected from potential liability, in the hopes of encouraging
their rapid deployment. The House would provide $21 million in new funds
for Interoperability in Communications (see “Other” in the Table)
to fund R&D in next-generation communications technologies for public
safety wireless communications interoperability. Finally, the House
would provide $10 million in new funds for a container security initiative
(included in “Conventional Missions” in the Table)
to develop new technologies for detecting biological, chemical, radiological,
explosive, or nuclear materials in shipping containers.
The largest R&D increase would go to biological countermeasures
with a House appropriation of $363 million, up 22.4 percent from FY
2004. The House appropriation does not include a separate $87 million
this year and $35 million in FY 2005 for construction of a new laboratory
named the National Biodefense Analysis and Countermeasures
Center in Fort
Detrick, Maryland.
Adding in this biodefense laboratory, it becomes
clear that biological threats are the top priority in the DHS R&D
portfolio (see Figure 1), accounting for nearly a third of all DHS R&D.
Within biological countermeasures, the House would agree to the request
of $65 million in new funds for a new BioSurveillance
initiative program to develop an integrated, real-time, human-animal-plant
surveillance system. These new funds would go to the BioWatch
program, which has been developing and testing biological detection
technologies in major U.S.
cities through a network of automated sample collectors. This year and
next year, the program will focus on improving these environmental monitoring
systems for better accuracy, faster data processing, and adapting these
systems for monitoring the U.S.
food supply.
In other areas,
the House would stick closely to the request but would move some funds
to new accounts. The House bill calls for DHS to spend $61
million for R&D on antimissile devices for commercial aircraft,
in the hopes of developing and prototyping of antimissile devices that
can be fitted on airplanes (up from $60 million last year, funded through
the Critical Infrastructure program). These devices would counter the
potential threat from MANPADS (man-portable air defense systems), shoulder-fired
missiles that have been used (unsuccessfully so far) against passenger
aircraft. The House would provide $76 million for rapid
prototyping activities to assist private industry in rapidly developing
and prototyping new homeland security technologies, and would also give
$40 million for standards R&D.
The House
would go along with the DHS plan to make significant R&D investments
in other areas: $123 million for the development of radiological / nuclear
countermeasures (down slightly from $126 million in FY 2004); $63 million
for chemical and high explosives countermeasures to protect U.S. civilians
against chemical or explosives attacks; $69 million next year for threat
and vulnerability assessments to develop technologies to analyze and
evaluate threats, with a separate $18 million for cybersecurity R&D broken out from this year’s integrated
program; and $21 million for R&D on emerging threats.
Most of the above S&T
directorate funds will be spent in federal laboratories or federally
funded R&D centers (FFRDCs; government-owned,
contractor-operated laboratories). DHS has an Office for National Laboratories
that coordinates DHS interactions with DOE national laboratories possessing
expertise in homeland security. So far, DHS has relied the most on five
DOE laboratories (Los Alamos, Lawrence Livermore, Sandia,
Pacific Northwest, and Oak Ridge National Laboratories), which have
set up lab-within-a-lab structures to allow a core of laboratory employees
to work primarily for DHS with DHS funds while still drawing on the
resources of their DOE-funded colleagues. Recently, DHS set up its own
FFRDC, a new Homeland Security Institute (HSI). Most extramural R&D
will be handled by the Homeland Security Advanced Research Projects
Agency (HSARPA), which will manage competitive solicitations for R&D
grants to external performers, cutting across all the homeland security
technology areas.
R&D in Other DHS Directorates and Programs
- Directorate of Border and Transportation Security: The remaining $174
million in DHS R&D outside the S&T Directorate would be funded
by the Transportation Security Administration (TSA), located within
this directorate (see Table). TSA’s
R&D on aviation security would rise $20 million to $174 million
in the House plan, of which the additional $20 million (for a total
of $75 million) would go to air cargo security R&D, $49 million
would go to various R&D program areas at TSA’s Technology Center, and $50 million would go for ‘next-generation’
R&D on promising explosive detection technologies for commercial
aviation.
- Directorate of Emergency Preparedness
and Response: This directorate coordinates all federal assistance
in response to disasters (including natural disasters) and domestic
attacks, and folds in the former Federal Emergency Management Agency
(FEMA). There are no R&D programs within this directorate.
Within this directorate, there is $5.6 billion over the next 10 years
to procure biodefense countermeasures from
the private sector, which could provide strong incentives for private-sector
investments in biodefense R&D. The FY 2004 DHS appropriation provided
$885 million in FY 2004 and an additional
$4.7 billion between 2005 and 2013 for the program named Project BioShield
in the President’s State of the Union address. $2.5 billion of this
money will become available in FY 2005 without any further action by
Congress, of which DHS plans to sign contracts for $890 million in FY
2005 to follow on $885 million in contracts this year. The House HS
bill makes no changes to this plan. Although not an R&D program,
the program is designed to encourage private-sector R&D investments
in biodefense vaccines, therapeutics, and
other countermeasures by providing a guaranteed government market for
future products. The directorate will purchase and stockpile these countermeasures
using the $5.6 billion total appropriation, but the management of the
program, including the selection of eligible countermeasures, will be
handled by the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). The final
operating procedures and details of this program will be decided by
an authorization law, which is currently before Congress but could be
signed into law this summer.
- Directorate of Information Analysis and Infrastructure Protection (IAIP):
There would be no R&D funding in the $864 million budget for this
directorate, but IAIP would collaborate with the S&T directorate
in the Bio-Surveillance initiative (see above). The S&T Directorate
would assist this directorate’s activities with R&D funded through
its Cybersecurity and Critical Infrastructure programs (see Table).
- Coast Guard: The Coast Guard, formerly in the Department of Transportation,
is now housed in DHS. Its R&D portfolio totals $14 million in FY
2004, but beginning in FY 2005 its R&D needs will be handled by
the S&T Directorate under the line item “Conventional Missions of
DHS” (see Table; $68 million in the House
bill).
Next Steps
The House Homeland
Security bill awaits a companion bill from the Senate. The Senate version
of the bill may be on the Senate floor the week of June 21. Early accounts
indicate that the Senate allocations of DHS R&D will be similar
to the House. The AAAS R&D Funding Update on Senate DHS R&D
will be available the week of June 21.
- June 18, 2004
(This analysis is one of a series of AAAS R&D Funding Updates
on FY 2005 congressional appropriations. The complete series of AAAS
R&D Funding Updates, including continually updated analyses of
R&D by agency in FY 2005 appropriations, is available on the AAAS
R&D Web Site (http://www.aaas.org/spp/rd) in the "FY
2005 R&D" or the "What's New"
sections.)
AAAS R&D Budget and Policy Program
1200 New York Ave, NW
Washington, DC 20005
(202) 326-6607; -6600
www.aaas.org/spp/rd
