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| FYI: Science Policy News from AIP |
| THIS WEEK |
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| This Week |
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| Dan Reed, pictured chairing his last meeting of the National Science Board early this month, is testifying before Congress this week. (NSB) |
NSF Leaders to Testify
The House Science Committee will examine the National Science Foundation’s priorities for 2025 and beyond at a hearing on Thursday, featuring testimony from NSF Director Sethuraman Panchanathan and former NSF board chair Dan Reed. NSF is facing tough decisions on what to prioritize given that Congress cut its budget by 8% to just over $9 billion for the current fiscal year. NSF is also struggling to decide which of the numerous proposals for new large research facilities it will support. Among them are the Thirty Meter Telescope and the Giant Magellan Telescope, for which Panchanathan announced earlier this month he will convene an external panel of experts to help aid his decision on whether either telescope should progress to the final design stage. Mounting infrastructure modernization backlogs in Antarctica are also throwing a wrench into plans for new research projects on the continent.
Reed, who stepped down as NSB chair this month after his six-year term on the board expired, may use his remarks to call for Congress to develop a follow-on to the National Defense Education Act of 1958, which focused on improving STEM education in the wake of the Soviet Union’s launch of the Sputnik satellite the year prior. Previewing his thoughts at a board meeting earlier this month, Reed said it is time for the U.S. to embrace a 21st-century version of the legislation, noting the original act “galvanized” the entire country to think about the importance of STEM-based education. “Yes, some of those things were artifacts of the Cold War, but you could argue, in a very reasonable sense, that we are in a geopolitical competition. It’s different from the previous one, but just as real,” Reed said. “We have to re-inspire people.”
Spectrum Bills Advancing in Senate and House
Legislation that proposes using spectrum auctions to raise billions of dollars for CHIPS and Science Act initiatives is scheduled for a vote by the Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committee on Thursday. The Spectrum and National Security Act is authored by Committee Chair Maria Cantwell (D-WA) but does not have Republican cosponsors, which suggests the legislation may face obstacles. Among its other provisions, the bill would restore the Federal Communication Commission’s spectrum auction authority, which expired in March 2023, and would provide policy guidance to the National Telecommunications and Information Administration. Meanwhile, the House plans to vote Tuesday on its own bill to update NTIA. That legislation does not include provisions to restore FCC’s auction authority or to use auction proceeds for R&D programs.
AI-Enhanced Forecasting to be Focus of AMS Policy Forum
The American Meteorological Society’s annual Washington Forum runs this Tuesday through Thursday, with the subject of artificial intelligence featuring heavily at the event. The entire Wednesday itinerary is dedicated to the topic, with sessions exploring how AI can be incorporated into weather and climate forecasting, the data needs of AI-enhanced models, and efforts to incorporate AI into the education of student and early-career researchers. AI will also be a focus of a keynote on Tuesday by Michael Morgan, the top official for environmental observation and prediction programs at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. Beyond AI, NOAA staff will discuss the role of the Weather Modification Reporting Act in regulating geoengineering efforts. The 1972 act has traditionally been used to monitor cloud seeding, but NOAA recently determined that it also applies to solar radiation modification experiments aimed at altering the climate. Other sessions will focus on the future of NOAA’s satellite data acquisition methods, next-generation radar, and the agency’s new action plan for equitably delivering climate information to decision-makers. (AMS is an AIP Member Society.)
Bills We’re Watching
- The BIOSECURE Act, a bipartisan bill to prohibit federal agencies from procuring biotechnology equipment or services from China and other “countries of concern,” is scheduled for a vote by the House Oversight Committee. (Wednesday)
- The Invent Here, Make Here Act, a bipartisan bill to create a domestic manufacturing preference for certain federally funded inventions, is scheduled for a vote by the Senate Commerce Committee. The act would also prohibit waivers to the requirement in cases where the invention would be substantially manufactured in a country of concern. (Thursday)
- A slate of bills relating to sanctioning the Russian nuclear corporation Rosatom and strengthening export controls are scheduled for votes by the House Foreign Affairs Committee. (Thursday)
Also on Our Radar
- The Senate will set up a final vote on the nomination of Courtney Diesel O’Donnell as the U.S. representative to the U.N. Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization. (Tuesday)
- The Senate Foreign Relations Committee will hold a hearing on the future of arms control and deterrence. (Wednesday)
- The Society for Science at User Research Facilities will hold its annual meeting. (Wednesday)
- As part of Republicans’ ongoing probe into the origins of COVID-19, the deputy director of the National Institutes of Health, Lawrence Tabak, will testify before the House Oversight Committee on NIH’s procedures for “funding and overseeing scientific research.” (Thursday)
- As part of NSF’s Spectrum Week, a workshop is being held to inform the National Spectrum R&D Plan. (Friday)
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| In Case You Missed It |
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| A telescope at the Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station near where the proposed CMB-S4 telescopes would be placed. (Alexander Pollak / University of Chicago) |
NSF Puts CMB-S4 Plans on Ice
The Cosmic Microwave Background Stage 4 experiment — a project that would construct multiple small and large telescopes in Chile and at the South Pole — will not progress to the design stage “in its current form,” the National Science Foundation announced last week. Chris Smith, interim director of the Astronomical Sciences Division at NSF, explained at a May 7 meeting that aging infrastructure at the South Pole has created major challenges for the CMB-S4 project, despite strong scientific support for the experiment. In a statement shared during the meeting, NSF said the agency “must prioritize the recapitalization of critical infrastructure at the South Pole so that the groundbreaking research it enables can continue to thrive.” NSF added that the forthcoming South Pole Master Plan will outline proposed infrastructure investments and will be open to public comment later this month.
The CMB-S4 project was identified as a top priority in recent major planning exercises by U.S. astronomy and particle physics communities. It was also marked as “absolutely central” and “ready for construction” in the High Energy Physics Advisory Panel’s facilities prioritization report, published the day after the decision to put the project on hold was announced. Smith emphasized that the decision not to move the project from the development to the design phase is specific to its current form, leaving the door open to pursuing an alternative approach. Smith added that NSF is committed to cosmic microwave background science and will continue to support current CMB activities at the South Pole and in Chile. “This is very fresh news. We are in active discussions with our DOE colleagues and the project to understand what this means in terms of moving forward with the community on the support of CMB science,” Smith said.
DOE Announces $160 Million for New Microelectronics Research Centers
The Department of Energy opened applications last week for up to $160 million in funding to create Microelectronics Science Research Centers. DOE plans to issue clusters of awards that will collectively form centers focused on increasing the energy efficiency of microelectronics technologies or their ability to function in extreme environments, such as under high radiation, cold temperatures, or high magnetic fields. Each proposal is encouraged to relate to at least two of the following topics: “new or improved materials, surface processing and control, chemistry, synthesis, and fabrication; advanced computing paradigms and architectures; integrated sensing, edge computing, and communication; or processing in extreme environments, radiation, radiation transport, and materials interaction.” The department anticipates that each award will last four years and provide $750,000 to $3 million annually, with the total funding for each overarching center capped at $25 million per year. Awardees are set to be announced in August, with $40 million being delivered by the end of fiscal year 2024. Congress directed DOE to launch these centers through the CHIPS and Science Act of 2022, though the act did not provide any dedicated funds for that purpose, in contrast to the other semiconductor programs it created. Therefore, DOE is funding the centers out of its base budget.
White House Report Paints Dire Picture of U.S. Research Infrastructure
An interagency assessment released this month by the White House stresses that many federal research facilities are now well beyond their 40-50-year estimated lifespan, with about half rated to be in poor or critical condition. “U.S. scientists and engineers are now faced with conducting 21st century R&D in many facilities designed in the 1950s that cannot support modern research and current laboratory practices in health and safety,” the report states. The report flags numerous negative statistics, including that nearly 40% of Department of Energy facilities are rated as substandard or inadequate, more than 60% of the square footage at the National Institute of Standards and Technology is classified as being in poor or critical condition, and about 75% of NASA facilities are beyond their designed lifespan. It attributes the situation to decades of inadequate funding and deprioritization of maintenance. It also warns that remediating aging facilities instead of replacing them still incurs significant costs while missing out on the benefits of properly upgrading those facilities.
The report points out cases where other countries’ research infrastructure has passed that of the U.S. For example, it states that China has overtaken the U.S. in number of supercomputers and that the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts has pulled ahead of NOAA’s Global Forecast System. However, the issues driving this divide are not limited to advanced equipment, with the report citing widespread problems with basic infrastructure such as insufficient power, unreliable HVAC systems, and failing plumbing systems at U.S. facilities. Among its recommendations, the report proposes that U.S. research agencies increase their benchmarking against facilities abroad and promptly identify places where a gap may be forming, noting such an effort could also be used as a basis for increasing international cooperation.
Aviation Bill Passed Without Amendments Onboard
The Senate opted to not allow any amendments to legislation it passed last week to extend key aviation authorities, dashing the hopes of proponents of various unrelated initiatives that were hoping to hitch a ride. Among the amendments were proposals to speed the development of fission and fusion reactors, expedite environmental reviews for certain semiconductor projects, and expand compensation criteria for persons affected by radioactive waste associated with the Manhattan Project. The aviation legislation is considered to be one of the few major bills that Congress will pass before the election this fall, which is what attracted broad interest in using it as a vehicle for other pending measures.
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