- Cutting across traditional
government mission areas, federal
homeland security R&D would total $4.2 billion in FY 2005, a
substantial boost of 15.9 percent or $575 million over this year’s funding
level across a dozen federal agencies (see Table).
In the aftermath of the fall 2001 terrorist attacks, the federal investment
will have nearly tripled since 2002.
- The majority
of the portfolio would remain outside the Department of Homeland Security
(DHS), with the largest part of funding coming from the
National Institutes of Health (NIH) for its biodefense
research portfolio. NIH’s portfolio, mostly
in the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID),
would total $1.8 billion in FY 2005, up 4.6 percent.
- Total homeland security funding would rise $6
billion or 14.4 percent to $47 billion next year despite fiscal
austerity for other federal government missions
Figure 1. (click
on the image to view or download a color, full-size PDF version of the
chart)
The Bush Administration has requested $4.2 billion for homeland security
R&D in the FY 2005 budget, a substantial boost of 15.9 percent or
$575 million from the FY 2004 funding level (see Table).
As shown in Figure 2, homeland security R&D is funded by nearly
a dozen different federal departments, but the majority of funds would
remain outside the new Department of Homeland Security (DHS). In fact,
nearly half of all federal R&D funding for homeland security would
come from the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS; $1.8 billion
in FY 2005; see Figure 2).
Despite the creation
of DHS, homeland security R&D is an interagency effort. The concept
of homeland security itself is still new, and is an outgrowth of longstanding
multi-agency federal investments in counter-terrorism programs given
new urgency and new direction after the fall 2001 terrorist attacks.
Until FY 2001, counter-terrorism R&D was an effort of about $500
million a year with the majority of support coming from the Department
of Defense (DOD), because it was assumed that U.S.
military forces abroad were the most at risk from terrorist attacks.
After the September 11 and anthrax attacks, this thinking changed dramatically
and, as a consequence, homeland security as an effort to prevent, minimize,
and recover from terrorist attacks within the United States became a
new concept and mission for the federal government. Ultimately, this
newly-articulated mission found expression in a new cabinet-level federal
department to consolidate many but not all federal counter-terrorism
programs, and a dramatic expansion of federal homeland security spending
both inside and outside the new DHS.
Figure 2. (click
on the image to view or download a color, full-size PDF version of the
chart)
From $1.5 billion in FY 2002,
mostly new funding enacted in the immediate aftermath of the fall 2001
terrorist attacks, the R&D portfolio more than doubled to $3.3 billion in
FY 2003, primarily because of a $1.5 billion increase in the National
Institutes of Health (NIH) bioterrorism R&D
portfolio (see Figure 1). The portfolio grew again to $3.6 billion in FY 2004,
driven by substantial increases in the new DHS. In FY 2005, HS R&D would
move past $4 billion with a 15.9 percent increase to $4.2 billion because of
continuing growth in DHS and substantial new investments in the U.S. Department
of Agriculture (USDA).
The National Institutes of Health (NIH) has
supported bioterrorism-related research for years, but its research
portfolio became a high priority after the fall 2001 postal anthrax
attacks. In the FY 2005 request, biodefense
R&D continues to be a high priority. NIH identifies $1.8 billion
for biodefense R&D in FY 2005, up 4.5 percent from this year.
As recently as two years ago (2002), the NIH investment was only $162
million. Most NIH biodefense
R&D is funded by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious
Diseases (NIAID), which became the second-largest NIH institute in the
aftermath of the anthrax attacks. NIAID would continue to award biodefense
research grants in FY 2005, complete the establishment of 10 extramural
Regional Centers of Excellence in Biodefense
and Emerging Infectious Disease Research (RCE) with the designation
of the final 2 centers, provide $150 million for the second phase of
extramural construction grants for biosafety
level (BSL) 3 and 4 laboratories around the nation, and conduct animal
and clinical trials of various candidate vaccines. The remaining HHS
R&D funds in the Table come from the Centers for Disease Control
and Prevention (CDC), which funds bioterrorism
R&D at its own laboratories. (For more on NIH R&D, see the NIH
R&D Funding Update.)
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) would continue its dramatic
expansion of R&D capabilities with an R&D budget of $1.2 billion,
up $163 million or 15.5 percent after an even larger increase last year
(see Table). DHS plans to shift its efforts
away from near-term technology development this year to a more balanced
portfolio of basic research, applied research, and development in FY
2005. Still, development would dominate the FY 2005 DHS portfolio.
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 use by other DHS units,
and advising the DHS Secretary on all scientific and technical matters.
The S&T Directorate would fund 81 percent of the R&D in DHS
($987 million out of $1.2 billion).
Most of the 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).
The extramural
R&D portfolio in the S&T directorate is managed by the
Homeland Security Advanced Research Projects Agency (HSARPA), modeled
on the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) in the Department
of Defense (DOD). HSARPA awards extramural grants for basic and applied
research to promote revolutionary changes in homeland security technologies;
develops and tests potential homeland security technologies; and accelerates
or prototypes the development of homeland security technologies to get
them ready for deployment. Because HSARPA is not a budget line item,
its funding will vary throughout the year but a recent estimate is that
it will award $210 million of external R&D funds in FY 2004 across
most of the DHS’ mission areas. These funds will go to industry contractors,
research institutions, and universities; universities also have a separate
$69 million pool of funds in the University Programs account. Last fall,
HSARPA conducted its first solicitation of proposals for detection technologies
for biological and chemical countermeasures, followed by a solicitation
for detection technologies for radiological and nuclear countermeasures
earlier this spring, with a possible solicitation of proposals for low
vapor pressure chemicals detection later this year. (For more information
on the DHS R&D portfolio, see the FY 2005 DHS
R&D Funding Update).
The Department of Defense (DOD) would boost
its homeland security R&D funding dramatically by 27 percent to
$340 million in FY 2005. While the three services (Army, Air Force,
and Navy) would keep their investments flat at a combined $99 million,
the majority of the investment and the entire increase would come from
the Defense Agencies, particularly the Defense Advanced Research Projects
Agency (DARPA), which focuses primarily on military applications in
areas such as biological warfare defense, and the Chemical and Biological
Defense Program (CBDP). While these agencies focus primarily on protecting
U.S.
soldiers from biological and chemical attack on the battlefield, the
R&D results could have important insights on better protecting civilian
populations against attack.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) has only a small dedicated homeland
security research effort, but in recent years has made enormous investments
in securing its laboratory facilities, which house pathogens such as
anthrax, against terrorist attack. After a pause in FY 2004, USDA HS
R&D funding would increase nearly six-fold to $262 million in FY
2005. The bulk of this investment would be $178 million to complete
animal research and diagnostic facilities at the National Centers for
Animal Health in Ames, Iowa,
that would be the heart of a USDA-wide food and biosafety
initiative aimed at securing the U.S.
food supply against both natural and terrorist threats. There would
also be $37 million in new intramural research on food and agriculture
defense, with the remainder of the USDA investment going toward ongoing
homeland security and agriculture programs.
An agency with
a sharp cut in homeland security R&D funding in FY 2005 would be
the Environmental Protection
Agency (EPA). From $95 million in FY 2002, the EPA investment has
steadily declined and would drop to $31 million in FY 2005. Much of
the earlier investments were for building decontamination research provided
as support to EPA’s work in decontaminating congressional office buildings
of anthrax, and for now-completed drinking water vulnerability research
projects.
Among other agencies, the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) in Commerce
funds R&D on cryptography and computer security and will provide
scientific and technical support to DHS in these areas. The National Science Foundation (NSF) funds research to combat bioterrorism in the areas of infectious diseases and microbial
genome sequencing; these programs would increase to $317 million in
FY 2005. The Department of Energy
(DOE) has longstanding expertise in countering radiological and
nuclear threats, and would continue its R&D efforts in FY 2005.
As
the Table shows, total homeland security funding would rise $6 billion or 14.4 percent to $47 billion next year
despite fiscal austerity for other federal government missions. The
majority of this $47 billion effort would be in the DHS, which will
have a budget of approximately $40 billion in FY 2005.
This analysis
will be updated as the FY 2005 appropriations process continues, to
provide AAAS estimates of homeland security R&D in FY 2005 appropriations
bills.
(This analysis is an issue brief
highlighting budget data detailing the federal investment in homeland
security R&D. 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.)
- May 12, 2004
AAS R&D Budget and Policy Program
1200 New York Ave, NW
Washington, DC 20005
(202) 326-6607; -6600
www.aaas.org/spp/rd
