Outlook on Spallation Neutron Source

Earlier this month, Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) sponsored a two-day symposium in Washington, D.C. on the Spallation Neutron Source (SNS). The conference was held to discuss scientific and industrial opportunities for the SNS, a $1.3 billion facility to be constructed at Oak Ridge National Laboratory that will be completed in 2005.

The mood at this conference was very upbeat; SNS supporters are very enthusiastic about this facility that will, according to ORNL, “produce the highest-flux, pulsed, neutron beams in the world for neutron scattering.” While the scientific and engineering foundations for the SNS are solid, the financing outlook seems less so. Both tobacco settlement money and water project funding could - it is impossible to say with certainty - undermine the Department of Energy’s FY 1999 SNS request of $157 million and its subsequent funding profile.

Office of Energy Research Director Martha Krebs was one of the opening speakers. She explained that the Basic Energy Sciences base program is “protected,” with SNS funding on top of this basic budget. Krebs told the audience that this is an important point to stress in discussing the SNS. She called the $1.3 billion price tag “expensive, but not unthinkable” on both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue. Krebs, and Albert Narath of Lockheed Martin Corporation, in opening remarks, stressed the importance of keeping the project on budget and on schedule. Repeating a point that many science policy leaders are making, Krebs called on the scientific community to “think differently about how we convey what we do,” and by not just talking among ourselves but to the larger community “where real people live.”

Making the case for construction of the SNS, Andrew Taylor of the Rutherford Appleton Laboratory (Great Britain) characterized its ISIS, a pulsed neutron source, as a “big facility for small science.” Researchers from many disciplines use it, many of whom are young. Bill Appleton of ORNL said the SNS would be 6-10 times more powerful than ISIS. SNS has a robust design that can be upgraded. Eighteen independent reviews have been made of SNS, which is a collaborative effort between five DOE national laboratories. Appleton said convincing Congress to provide money for the SNS is the “next big challenge.”

Also addressing the conference was Ernest Moniz, Undersecretary of Energy. Moniz said the department has a “very, very strong commitment to this project,” and said the DOE budget was balanced “with or without the tobacco settlement.” That does not mean that Congress will automatically provide the money, Moniz saying “we won’t get there on cruise control.” Speaking of the overall DOE scientific budget, he said, “frankly, it will be a challenge to defend” (as it always is.)

Krebs offered additional views at a later briefing. She said there were not any strong congressional arguments about the substance of the Energy Research budget request. Of greater concern were spending caps, the short congressional year, and disagreements over how to spend surpluses. There are many imponderables, she said, a major one being how to resolve the $1 billion+ shortfall in Army Corps of Engineers funding for water projects.

Perhaps the best summary of the outlook for the SNS, and the entire Office of Energy Research Budget, was given by Krebs when she said there is “good news for 1999...but don’t relax.”