Friday, 25 September 1987 Washington, DC

1. THE FY 88 ENERGY AND WATER DEVELOPMENT APPROPRIATIONS BILL
was reported out of the Senate Appropriations Committee last week. It is expected that the bill will pass the full Senate. It must then be compromised with the House version. Among the winners and losers--at this stage of the process:

THE SUPERCONDUCTING SUPER COLLIDER would get $35M to "keep the design team together and support other nonsite activities for one more year while the administration explores other means of funding this project." Ironically, the report encourages DoE to explore international collaboration. Two days later DoE rejected out-of-hand a proposal to build the SSC jointly with Canada astride the New York/Quebec border (WN 18 Sep 87).

THE CONTINUOUS ELECTRON BEAM ACCELERATOR would get $43.5M for construction, which is $10M above the President's request.

THE MAGNETIC FUSION ENERGY RESEARCH PROGRAM would get $345.6M, which equals the request but is $16M below the House allowance.

BASIC ENERGY SCIENCES would get $526.8M, which is $47.7M above the budget request but still $29.6M below the House.

A NATIONAL RESEARCH PROGRAM IN SUPERCONDUCTING TECHNOLOGY would be established with $4M.

SCIENTIFIC PORK AT UNIVERSITIES was not neglected. The Florida State University Computer Center, a legacy from the former chairman of the House Science and Technology Committee, Don Fuqua (D-FL), would get another $11.7M installment. The National Center for Chemical Research at Columbia will at last be paid off with a final $4M. Louisiana State is in for a new $12M Center for Advanced Microstructures and Devices. The University of Alabama in Huntsville gets $5M for a new Center for Applied Optics. None of these projects, or several others at medical schools, underwent the hazards of proposal submission and review.

2 . THE SENATE VOTED TO SPEND $4.5B ON SDI NEXT YEAR,
by the narrowest of margins. Vice President George Bush broke a 50-50 tie vote on a bipartisan proposal to reduce the authorization for SDI to $3.7B. The Armed Services Committee had recommended the $4.5B figure, which is about halfway between the President's request of $5.7B and the House authorization of $3.1B. If they split the difference in Conference, which is the most likely outcome, SDI will be a hair above this year's level of $3.5B.

3. THE SEAMANS COMMITTEE ON THE SPACE STATION
issued its final report. The report urged NASA to scrap its cost estimates--now up to around $30B (WN 7 Aug 87), upgrade the Shuttle for larger payloads and develop a new heavy-lift launch vehicle.

Bob Park can be reached via email at whatsnew@bobpark.org

THE UNIVERSITY OF MARYLAND
Opinions are the author's and are not necessarily shared by the University, but they should be.