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What’s Ahead
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| National Climate Advisor Gina McCarthy, left, and White House Office of Science and Technology Policy Acting Director Alondra Nelson examine the National Spherical Torus Experiment-Upgrade facility during a tour of the Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory by White House and DOE officials in February. (Image credit – Kiran Sudarsanan / PPPL Office of Communications) |
White House Hosts Fusion Energy Summit
On Thursday, the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy is hosting a summit dedicated to the prospect of a “bold decadal vision for commercial fusion energy,” featuring experts from government, academia, and industry. Small-scale fusion ventures have been gaining significant private backing, with two U.S. startups, Helion Energy and Commonwealth Fusion Systems, recently garnering promises of investment in the range of $2 billion each. Fusion advocates have also been pushing Congress to provide additional backing for fusion technology development, with some fusion companies claiming energy generation could be achieved as early as the 2030s. Currently, the Department of Energy’s fusion program is pivoting toward supporting the construction of a U.S.-based pilot fusion power plant by about 2040, in line with the recommendations of a recent National Academies report and a long-range plan prepared by the government’s Fusion Energy Sciences Advisory Committee. The Biden administration’s budget request for the current fiscal year did not take major steps in that direction, but this week’s event suggests the initiative has gained significant support from the administration. Participants in the event include acting OSTP Director Alondra Nelson, National Climate Advisor Gina McCarthy, Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm, and DOE Under Secretary for Science and Innovation Geri Richmond.
Science Committee Examines U.S. Influence in Technical Standards
The House Science Committee is holding a hearing on Thursday on U.S. influence in setting international technical standards. Congress has become increasingly concerned about Chinese government efforts to sway standards in order to advance its global interests, as articulated in its new strategy for standards development. In the U.S., standards development is primarily undertaken by industry groups and coordinated through the American National Standards Institute (ANSI), a private nonprofit organization. However, lawmakers have begun to consider ways the federal government can strengthen the U.S. position, and a year ago directed the National Institute of Standards and Technology, which develops certain standards and conducts standards-related research, to commission a study of China’s growing influence and steps the U.S. can take to mitigate it. The witnesses at this week’s hearing will be acting NIST Director James Olthoff, ANSI Vice President of Government Relations and Public Policy Mary Saunders, Cisco Systems Chief Technology Officer Alissa Cooper, and intellectual property attorney Andrew Updegrove.
Bills on Biosecurity, ARPA-H Gain Momentum
On Tuesday, the Senate Health Committee is holding a meeting to advance the PREVENT Pandemics Act introduced last week by Committee Chair Patty Murray (D-WA) and Ranking Member Richard Burr (R-NC). The bill includes provisions aimed at strengthening medical product supply chains, expanding biosurveillance and data collection capabilities, improving biosafety practices, and mitigating “undue foreign influence in biomedical research.” In addition, it would establish an independent task force to review the U.S. response to the COVID-19 pandemic and potential origins of the SARS-CoV-2 virus. The bill’s sponsors also introduced a separate bill last week that would establish President Biden’s proposed Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health within the National Institutes of Health, which they have indicated they plan to advance in tandem with the pandemic preparedness bill. On Thursday, the House Energy and Commerce Committee is holding a hearing on a corresponding ARPA–H bill that would establish the agency outside NIH. Congress’ finalized spending bill for fiscal year 2022 includes $1 billion for ARPA–H that is allocated outside NIH’s budget, though it authorizes the Department of Health and Human Services to transfer the funds into NIH if it chooses.
DOE Nuclear Energy Nominee to Testify
The Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee is holding a hearing on Thursday to consider President Biden’s nomination of Katy Huff to lead the Department of Energy’s Office of Nuclear Energy. Whereas many nomination hearings cover multiple nominees, Huff will be the only witness at this one, leaving time for ample discussion of committee members’ priorities in nuclear energy. Until her nomination in January, Huff had been serving as the office’s acting head since joining DOE as a political appointee last May. She has been on leave from her job as a professor in the Department of Nuclear, Plasma, and Radiological Engineering at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, where she specializes in reactor physics and advanced reactor designs. She received her doctorate in nuclear engineering from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 2013.
Sen. Young Talks Prospects for Compromise on COMPETES Act
The Information Technology and Innovation Foundation is holding a webinar on Thursday to discuss the outlook for reconciling the Senate’s U.S. Innovation and Competition Act (USICA) with the House’s America COMPETES Act of 2022. Sen. Todd Young (R-IN), the lead Republican sponsor of USICA, will deliver opening remarks, followed by a panel discussion between leaders from Intel, Rockwell Automation, and ITIF. Young has broadly argued the COMPETES Act is not sufficiently focused on “confronting China,” but has not yet publicly offered details concerning what aspects of the bill he would oppose in the House-Senate conference that is expected to be convened to negotiate a compromise. ITIF, a think tank that embraces industrial policy, has argued that the National Science Foundation technology directorate proposed in USICA is superior to the “science and engineering solutions” directorate proposed in the COMPETES Act, characterizing the latter as offering “more money for basic research spent on whatever areas scientists want.”
APS March Meeting Spotlights Ukraine, Human Rights
The American Physical Society’s annual March Meeting is underway this week in Chicago with participants also able to join sessions virtually. A recently announced special session on Monday evening will focus on the war in Ukraine, with a briefing by APS CEO Jonathan Bagger on the society’s actions in support of Ukranian scientists. The event will be livestreamed and participants are invited to “share stories and anecdotes about their colleagues and loved ones who are affected by the violence.” Among its actions, APS has broadly condemned Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, and more recently issued statements condemning Russian attacks on nuclear facilities and physics institutes in the country. APS is also partnering with the U.S. National Academy of Sciences to help Ukrainian scientists fleeing the violence secure funding for short-term visiting scholar positions in countries near Ukraine. Separately on Thursday, a panel session planned before Russia’s invasion will reflect on the legacy of Andrei Sakharov, a Russian physicist who worked on the Soviet Union’s nuclear bomb projects before becoming active in arms control and gaining worldwide recognition as a political dissident and advocate for human rights, for which he received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1975. (APS is an AIP Member Society.)
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In Case You Missed It
FY22 Science Funding Falls Short of Aspirations
Lawmakers finished negotiating appropriations legislation for the current fiscal year last week and the House and Senate both moved ahead quickly, passing it with comfortable bipartisan majorities. President Biden is expected to sign the bill as soon as it arrives at his desk. Science agencies will receive funding increases, though they generally fall well short of earlier proposals and in many cases are less than the currently elevated rate of inflation. Bucking that trend, Defense Department R&D programs and the National Nuclear Security Administration are receiving increases in excess of what had been previously broached. These outcomes stem from concessions Republicans were able to secure during behind-the-scenes negotiations as they sought more money for defense as well as across-the-board reductions in Democrats’ proposed increases for non-defense programs.
Among non-defense programs, the Biden administration’s prioritization of clean energy is reflected in proportionately higher increases the Department of Energy’s applied energy R&D offices are receiving relative to other science agencies, albeit still well less than earlier proposals. The legislation also provides $1 billion to launch Biden’s proposed Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health and endorses the National Science Foundation’s creation of a new directorate for research applications, though NSF will have to fit funding for any new activities within a modest $351 million increase in its budget. Concerning projects that were in danger of termination, the DOE Office of Nuclear Energy’s multibillion-dollar Versatile Test Reactor, still in its early design phase, has in fact been zeroed out, while NASA’s airborne SOFIA telescope will continue to operate for at least the time being. For additional figures across science agencies, consult FYI’s Federal Science Budget Tracker.
CERN Suspends Russia While Allowing Scientists to Remain
In response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, on March 8 the Europe-led particle physics lab CERN suspended Russia’s “observer” status, revoking its ability to attend official deliberations concerning the lab’s governance. CERN also put a moratorium on new collaborations with Russian institutions, while allowing scientists from the country to continue working at CERN. The decision was made by the 23 member states that comprise the CERN Council, which Ukraine joined in 2016. Russia is not a member state but has had formal ties with CERN since 1967, and around 1,000 scientists from Russia are currently affiliated with the lab. The March 8 resolution suspending Russia notes that the war has been condemned by “numerous members of CERN’s Russian scientific community.” It does not explain how the suspension will affect Russian users of CERN, but the New York Times reported that they will not be restricted from entering the lab. Joseph Incandela, a top U.S. physicist affiliated with the lab, is quoted as saying, “Those who are here can continue to come to the lab and do their work … Those who come in from Russia can still get here via somewhat more circuitous flight paths if they are allowed to do so by Russian authorities.”
Acting USGS Director David Applegate Nominated for the Role
President Biden nominated geologist David Applegate last week to direct the U.S. Geological Survey, an agency in the Department of the Interior with an annual budget of about $1.4 billion. Applegate is a career official at USGS, having joined the agency in 2004 as its first senior science adviser for earthquake and geological hazards. He has been the head of its Natural Hazards mission area since 2011 and was named the agency’s interim director at the beginning of the Biden administration. One of his earliest moves in that role was to reverse a Trump administration policy that shortened the time horizon of climate change impacts the agency’s analyses could consider. Currently, he co-chairs the interagency Science for Disaster Reduction coordination group and is overseeing the USGS response to the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, which is providing funds for a new facility, data preservation, and a major expansion of the Earth Mapping Resources Initiative (Earth MRI). Applegate earned his doctorate in geology from MIT in 1994 and moved into policy work as a staff member for the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee. Prior to joining USGS, he was director of government affairs for eight years at what is now called the American Geosciences Institute, a federation of geoscience societies, and was editor and policy columnist for its publication Geotimes.
MIT Professor Evelyn Wang Picked to Lead ARPA–E
Last week, President Biden also nominated MIT mechanical engineering professor Evelyn Wang to lead the Advanced Research Projects Agency–Energy within the Department of Energy. An expert on thermal management in energy systems, from 2013 to 2018 Wang was associate director of the Solid State Solar Thermal Energy Conversion Center at MIT, which was supported through the DOE Office of Science’s Energy Frontier Research Center program. She earned her doctorate in mechanical engineering from Stanford University in 2006 and has been the head of MIT’s Department of Mechanical Engineering since 2018. ARPA–E has an annual budget of $450 million and its program managers have wide latitude to support high-risk technology projects that are not yet well-positioned to attract private capital. Unlike most DOE research branches, the agency reports directly to the energy secretary’s office, and for the past year it has been led on an interim basis by its deputy director for technology, Jennifer Gerbi.
OSTP Whistleblower Complaint Details Clashes Over Ethics Rules
The Government Accountability Project, an organization that advocates for whistleblowers, filed a complaint last week on behalf of civil-service lawyer Rachel Wallace and an unspecified number of other, anonymous staff members in the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy. The complaint makes newly detailed allegations against OSTP Director Eric Lander, who resigned last month after his abusive behavior toward staff members surfaced in the press. For instance, the complaint states there were at least 15 victims of Lander’s behavior and that the “vast majority” were women. It further recounts that conflicts between Lander and Wallace were linked to serial disputes over statutory and ethical obligations, starting with Lander’s insistence on making hiring and other management decisions well before his Senate confirmation last May. Other cases involved Lander permitting staff members to accept funding and salaries from outside sources, flouting advice by Wallace and other lawyers. In addition, the complaint offers examples of unnamed senior OSTP officials participating in Lander’s misbehavior, some of whom are still at OSTP, and it chronicles allegedly retaliatory actions taken against Wallace, including Lander demoting her from the role of OSTP general counsel, which she had held since August 2020.
Seeking redress, including Wallace’s reinstatement to her former role, the complaint is directed to four congressional committees and the U.S. Office of Special Counsel, an independent federal agency that handles legal matters relating to federal workers. Speaking to the Washington Post, a lawyer for Lander disputed claims made in the complaint, for instance noting that an internal White House investigation of his conduct concluded Wallace’s demotion was not improper, and a White House official denied Lander had violated ethics rules. Separate from the complaint’s posting, Republican lawmakers continued to press White House Counsel Dana Remus last week for documentation related to the OSTP scandal.
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Events This Week
All times are Eastern Daylight Time, unless otherwise noted. Listings do not imply endorsement.
Monday, March 14
Tuesday, March 15
Wednesday, March 16
Thursday, March 17
Friday, March 18
Saturday, March 19
Sunday, March 20
American Chemical Society: Spring Meeting (continues through Thursday)
Monday, March 21
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Opportunities NIST Seeking Physical Measurement Lab Deputy Director
The National Institute of Standards and Technology is hiring a deputy director for its Physical Measurement Laboratory. Among the role’s responsibilities are to maintain “unified technical programs across the laboratory in areas such as quantum science, measurement services, embedded standards, advanced microelectronics, artificial intelligence hardware, integrated photonics, precision measurements for health care and biology, and climate metrology.” Applications are due April 11.
NIH Accepting Comments on DEIA Strategy
The National Institutes of Health is accepting input on its agency-wide diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility (DEIA) strategic plan. The agency is specifically seeking input on the potential benefits and challenges of the draft strategy’s three key objectives: implementing organizational practices to prioritize DEIA in the workforce, growing DEIA through structural and cultural changes, and advancing DEIA through research. Comments are due April 3.
NASA Seeking Policy Interns
NASA is accepting applications for summer interns in its Office of Technology, Policy, and Strategy at NASA headquarters in Washington, D.C. Interns will support the office’s analyses of the technology and policy challenges faced by the agency and interact with leaders across NASA’s mission directorates. Applicants should have a technical background and interest in policy.
Know of an upcoming science policy event either inside or outside the Beltway? Email us at fyi@aip.org.
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