Highlights
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The Department of Commerce’s R&D programs are a high priority for Congress,
with increases for R&D in both the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
(NOAA) and the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) despite tight
fiscal limits in the 2008 omnibus appropriations bill. Total
Commerce R&D would gain 6.5 percent or $68 million to $1.1 billion (see Table).
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NIST R&D gains 4.7 percent to $514 million, the same amount as the request,
but Congress rearranged the Administration’s priorities. Although earlier appropriations
had Congress agreeing to proposed increases for NIST’s intramural research as part of the President’s
American Competitiveness Initiative (ACI), in the omnibus bill Congress flattened
out intramural research in NIST’s Scientific and Technical
Research Services (STRS) to $369 million (down 0.8 percent) in order to save the
extramural Technology Innovation Program (TIP) from elimination and to boost construction
funding. The Construction of Research Facilities (CRF) account would nearly triple
to $160 million in 2008, but would fund competitively awarded extramural construction
grants and non-R&D external earmarks in addition to intramural construction.
Congress
rejected proposed cuts in NIST’s extramural programs.
Instead of eliminating NIST’s extramural Advanced
Technology Program (ATP) as requested, Congress gave the now-renamed TIP $46 million
(after rescissions) for its first full year, 40 percent off the last ATP budget.
Congress also rejected a proposal to slash funding for the non-R&D
Hollings Manufacturing Extension Partnership (MEP) program by half, and instead
gave it $90 million.
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Instead of a requested cut, R&D in the National Oceanic and Atmospheric
Administration (NOAA) would climb 7.6 percent to $573 million in 2008 (see Table).
Although most of the increase would go to earmarks, oceans-related research
and climate change research would gain strongly.
Commerce R&D in FY 2008 Final Appropriations
On
December 26, President Bush signed into law the FY 2008 omnibus appropriations
bill (HR 2764) that had cleared Congress a week earlier, bringing the 2008 appropriations
process to a close. The omnibus bill included a final version of the FY 2008 Commerce-Justice-Science
appropriations bill that was billions of dollars less than earlier House or Senate
versions of the bill providing funding for the National Science
Foundation (NSF), the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA),
and the Department of Commerce.
Nearly all the Department of Commerce’s R&D
portfolio comes from two very different science-oriented agencies, the National
Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and the National Institute of Standards
and Technology (NIST). Commerce’s February
budget for 2008 proposed large increases for NIST’s
intramural programs, but sharp cuts in NIST extramural funding and a small cut
in NOAA R&D. NIST’s intramural programs benefited
from the President’s American Competitiveness Initiative (ACI) that was
first previewed in the 2006 State of the Union address in response to a growing
wave of concern about the state of U.S. innovation. The ACI proposed to double
funding for three key physical sciences agencies over the next decade. NIST in
Commerce is one of the three favored agencies (the others are the DOE
Office of Science, and the National Science Foundation),
and received a substantial increase in 2007 with another large increase proposed
in 2008 after years of flat or declining funding, but only for its intramural
programs. The Administration proposed steep cuts in NIST’s
extramural programs, and declining funding for NOAA R&D, whose portfolio is
oriented toward environmental R&D rather than the physical sciences.
But
Congress decided to award increases to both the intramural and extramural parts
of the NIST portfolio and also NOAA. Commerce R&D totals $1.1 billion in
the final 2008 appropriation, an increase of $68 million or 6.5 percent (see Table).
While Congress trimmed the requested increases for NIST’s intramural programs, Congress at the same time rejected
proposed cuts in its extramural programs, and added millions of dollars to NOAA.
NIST
intramural research would stay flat at $369 million within the Scientific
and Technical Research and Services (STRS) account instead of a large requested
increase, while R&D facilities construction funding at NIST would nearly double
to $109 million. On the construction side, the large increase would allow for
major renovations at NIST’s Boulder (CO) site, repair
for aging facilities, and continuing construction of NIST’s Center for Neutron Research. But in a break from tradition,
Congress added $30 million to the normally intramural construction account specifically
for new extramural laboratory facilities grants, to be awarded on a competitive
basis to universities and other nonprofit research institutions performing R&D
related to NIST activities. There would also be $51 million in the construction
account for non-R&D extramural earmarked projects for specific performers,
bringing total Construction funding to $160 million.
Congress
boosted funding for both of NIST’s extramural programs,
one proposed for elimination and the other for near-elimination. The Bush Administration
once again proposed to eliminate NIST’s extramural Advanced
Technology Program (ATP), as it had in the past several budget requests, and in
a repeat of past years Congress has saved it. The ATP was restructured and renamed
the Technology Innovation Program (TIP) in the August 2007 America
COMPETES Act; the new TIP receives a 2008 appropriation of $46 million, down 40
percent from last year’s ATP budget. In another repeat of previous requests, the
request would have cut the non-R&D Hollings Manufacturing Extension Partnership
(MEP) by 56 percent down to $46 million, but Congress doubled the request to bring
2008 funding to $90 million. MEP is a program to operate a nationwide network
of extension centers to disseminate better manufacturing technologies to small-
and medium-sized manufacturers on a cost-shared basis with state governments and
with users.
Congress
added to the request to bring the NOAA R&D portfolio to $573 million in 2008,
an increase of 7.6 percent (see Table). Nearly
all of the additional congressional dollars would go to the NOAA’s
Office of Atmospheric Research (OAR), with particular attention to oceans and
climate change research programs; Congress added $13 million to the climate change
research request to bring funding to $206 million; within the program, competitive
research grants for climate change research total $130 million, up from $126 million
last year. In all, OAR R&D would climb 19 percent to $334 million. Among ocean-related
programs, the National Sea Grant College Program would hit $57 million in 2008,
after hovering near $54 million for the last several years. Other oceans-related
programs would also gain.
The
omnibus bill contains an unusual provision, first introduced in the House, setting
aside $6 million of the NOAA appropriations specifically for the National Academy
of Sciences (NAS) to establish a Climate Change Study Committee to investigate
issues related to global climate change and to make recommendations on policy
responses within two years of the committee’s formation. Although congressionally
requested NAS studies are far from unusual, it is unusual for such a study to
be funded explicitly in a bill’s legal text with a specific amount.
Figure 1. (click on the image for
PDF)
Impacts of Commerce R&D
The
increases in final 2008 appropriations for NIST and NOAA’s
R&D programs would result in a turnaround from the steady fall in Commerce
R&D for most of this decade (see Figure 1). Since 2002, the Commerce R&D
budget has declined in real terms every year; while the final 2008 appropriation
would be a boost, Commerce R&D would only return to the 2006 funding level
and would remain far below the funding levels of previous years.
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January 3, 2008
AAAS R&D Budget and Policy Program
1200 New York Avenue,
NW
Washington, DC 20005
(202) 326-6607
AAAS R&D Web site: http://www.aaas.org/spp/rd
