WHAT'S NEW, Friday, 6 October 1989 Washington, DC
1.
THE NATION WILL OPERATE ON A CONTINUING RESOLUTION TILL 29 OCT
--then Congress will pass another continuing resolution. They do
this every year. The current resolution calls for spending at the
FY 89 level, with no new programs. While both appropriations and
deficit-reduction reconciliation are stalled on the tracks by the
capital gains debate, the sequestration locomotive will arrive on
15 Oct. A collision would produce a 5% across-the-board cut for
non-exempt non-defense programs and 4% for defense; all science
programs would be affected. Even if Congress ducks sequestration,
there may be an across-the-board cut to pay for the war on drugs.
2
. THREE DAYS OF HEARINGS ON MAGNETIC FUSION ENDED IN CHAOS.
The FY 90 Energy and Water Appropriations Bill left it to the Energy
Secretary to spend fusion energy funds at his discretion
(WN 22 Sep 89). In an
attempt to find out what that discretion would be,
the House Committee on Science, Space and Technology, chaired by
Robert Roe (D-NJ), called a dozen witnesses, winding up Thursday
with DOE's Director of Energy Research, Robert Hunter. The issue
was whether to proceed with the Compact Ignition Tokamak. Hunter
was harder to confine than a hot plasma. A committee, selected
in part by Hunter, concluded that the empirical scaling laws, on
which the CIT is based, do not justify extrapolation to the level
of performance required for ignition (in plain English, they said
the CIT might not work). Hunter, who wants to defer the CIT until
the physics of the scaling laws is understood, said his policy
would be given "high level" DOE review, but he couldn't be pinned
down on when. In the meantime, Princeton must meet payrolls. The
11 witnesses that testified before Hunter thought the CIT should
proceed now--but of course, they were picked by Roe. To add to
their frustration, classification prevented the lawmaker's from
questioning Hunter about his preference for inertial fusion.
3. THE "NATIONAL COLD FUSION INSTITUTE" HAS FOUND NO COLD FUSION
according to a story in the Washington Post. Hugo Rossi, director
of the University of Utah facility, acknowledged that experiments
done recently have shown no sign of fusion. The NCFI was created
with $4.3M in state funds remaining after lawyers and promotional
expenses were paid out of the $5M total. "We have a conference
coming up here next February," Rossi said, "if we don't have any
papers to present, then this place will be closing up shop." And
return the unspent funds? I think they will present some papers.
4. THE DRAPER PRIZE WAS AWARDED TO THE INVENTORS OF THE MICROCHIP
by the National Academy of Engineering. Jack S. Kilby and Robert
N. Noyce will share the Charles Stark Draper Prize of $350,000
for the invention of the monolithic integrated circuit. The prize
is given for engineering and technology achievements contributing
to the advancement of human welfare and freedom and has been
called the "Nobel Prize in engineering." This is the first award
of the biennial prize, which is endowed by Draper Laboratory.
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