FY20 Budget Request: National Institute of Standards and Technology
APR 03, 2019
The National Institute of Standards and Technology would lose a third of its current $1 billion budget under the president’s fiscal year 2020 budget request. The cut is spread across most programs, though funding for activities tied to priority areas such as quantum science, artificial intelligence, and microelectronics would be shielded.
Science Policy Analyst
The Trump administration’s latest budget request for the National Institute of Standards and Technology resembles its previous two, again seeking double-digit percentage cuts across all the agency’s major accounts.
Overall funding for the agency would drop 30 percent to $687 million, with the steepest cuts targeting accounts for research facility construction and industry services. The Scientific and Technical Research and Services (STRS) account, which funds NIST’s laboratories and grant programs, would drop 16 percent to $612 million. Details for each program and links to budget documentation are available in FYI’s Federal Science Budget Tracker .
Congress rejected the administration’s previous proposals to cut NIST programs, and it appears willing to do so again this year. At a hearing yesterday, the chair of the Senate appropriations subcommittee responsible for NIST’s budget, Sen. Jerry Moran (R-KS), expressed concern in his opening statement about how decreasing funding could undermine the administration’s priorities.
“While I am encouraged by the department’s efforts to prioritize research and development funding for ‘next-generation’ technologies like quantum science, artificial intelligence, and microelectronics, I am also concerned about what the proposed cuts to the [STRS] programs will mean for long-term U.S leadership in these areas,” Moran said.
Scientific and Technical Research and Services (STRS)
Laboratory Programs. Within STRS, funding for Laboratory Programs would drop 12 percent to $554 million. NIST estimates this cut would entail reducing its science and engineering workforce by about 17 percent, representing 400 employees. In order to support the administration’s priorities with this reduced topline, NIST’s budget justification explains it would have to significantly scale back its work in advanced materials, physical infrastructure resilience, and measurement dissemination, among other areas.
For instance, to accommodate a 28 percent, $38 million cut within its advanced manufacturing program, NIST would “stop work on materials issues relevant to energy and environmental applications,” suspend dissemination of multiple standard reference materials, and shutter its beam-lines at the Brookhaven National Laboratory, “ending a decades-long partnership and investment in leading-edge materials characterization instruments.” At the same time, the agency would prioritize work related to quantum systems, microelectronics, and the application of artificial intelligence to materials science.
Quantum science. NIST requests an additional $10 million over a base amount of $30 million for quantum information science research. NIST would use these funds to build out its newly formed Quantum Economic Development Consortium and expand its existing quantum research institutes at the University of Maryland and the University of Colorado Boulder. Another top priority is the “NIST-on-a-Chip” program, which seeks to transform how the agency disseminates standard reference measurements. To accommodate an 11 percent, $18 million cut to its overall measurement science and dissemination program, NIST would discontinue or pare back various services it performs on behalf of industry, such as radio frequency calibrations and stewardship of an atomic spectra database.
A voltage sensor developed as part of the “NIST-on-a-Chip” program.
(Image credit – NIST)
Microelectronics. NIST also requests $10 million over a base amount of $22.5 million to advance measurement science for microelectronics applications. Noting the increasing importance of compact photonic integrated circuits, NIST states it plans to establish a program that would assess device performance and communicate best practices to industry. It would also host workshops to solicit industry input on microelectronics measurement needs.
User facilities. The budget for NIST’s Center for Neutron Research and Center for Nanoscale Science and Technology would drop 10 percent to $46 million under the request. NIST would suspend operations of two neutron scattering instruments and pare back reactor maintenance at the neutron research center. It estimates these changes would reduce the number of facility users by 200 for the year and lead to a “potential increase in unscheduled reactor shutdowns which cost on average a $140,000 a day.” NIST would also halt planning for a replacement reactor.
Standards Coordination and Special Programs. Funding for the Standards Coordination and Special Programs account within STRS would be nearly halved to $46 million. This cut would “largely eliminate external R&D partnerships,” such as the Urban Dome program that is developing methods for measuring greenhouse gas emissions from cities. NIST would also end its $15 million Centers of Excellence program, which currently supports three centers dedicated respectively to advanced materials, community resilience, and forensic science. It would also end central management of its forensic science program and reduce support for developing standards that increase the robustness of forensic methods.
Research Facility Construction
NIST’s budget for research facility construction would drop to $60 million under the budget request, about half its current level and down from a peak of $319 million two years ago when Congress provided a large one-time boost to the account. Of the requested amount, $41 million would go toward general maintenance of current facilities through the Safety, Capacity, Maintenance and Major Repairs (SCMMR) account.
In the face of this belt-tightening, the budget document describes at length how conditions have deteriorated at NIST’s facilities, many of which date back to the 1950s and 1960s. After stating that NIST currently faces a repair backlog of over $300 million due to persistent underinvestment in SCMMR, the budget document provides examples of how facilities problems increasingly threaten to upend research:
Numerous major utility infrastructure systems are currently in critical condition, creating risks of catastrophic failure of entire laboratory buildings. The Gaithersburg campus is currently losing over 50,000 gallons of water per day in the steam system due primarily to degrading pipes. A large portion of the water being lost is potentially undermining the electrical distribution system to the south campus creating a potential for loss for steam and power to this end of campus which houses some of the most sensitive research at NIST. A recent water main failure in Gaithersburg led to the closure of laboratories in four buildings for five days due to the loss of water.
NIST also proposes to create a Federal Capital Revolving Fund that would support “large-dollar Federally-owned, civilian real property capital projects,” modeled on analogous programs used by state and local governments. Under the proposal, the fund would be housed outside of NIST at the General Services Administration and receive an initial appropriation of $19 million to support renovations of the main building on NIST’s campus in Boulder, Colorado. The renovation project is currently estimated to cost $288 million.
NIST Director Walter Copan referenced this proposal at the Senate appropriations subcommittee hearing yesterday, remarking, “The budget does provide for some creative financing solutions for the challenges of maintenance and facilities construction, but we do appreciate the opportunity to work with this committee in this important element of the U.S. research infrastructure and our future competitiveness in a much different, competitive global environment than this nation has ever faced.”
Industrial Technology Services
For the third year in a row, the administration proposes to end federal funding for the Manufacturing Extension Partnership program, which provides technical assistance to the domestic manufacturing industry. This proposed elimination comprises the entirety of the $140 million cut to the Industrial Technology Services account. The $15 million that remains in the account would maintain NIST’s participation in the Manufacturing USA program, a national network of advanced manufacturing institutes.
