The Senate Committee on Appropriations has completed action on the Fiscal Year 2000 Energy and Water Development Appropriations bill. According to Subcommittee Chairman Domenici (R-NM), the bill's allocation reflected a $608 million reduction from the Administration's requested levels in the non-defense accounts and a $220 million increase in the defense accounts. Despite being in the aggregate substantially below this year's funding level for non-defense programs, the bill allocates $220.614 million for fusion energy research. According to the Committee's figures, this is $2 million less than the Administration's requested level and $2.7 million below this year's funding level.

Importantly, the Committee's report language (see below) specifies that $19 million of the total for fusion energy sciences in FY 2000 be spent on inertial fusion energy research.

For the Inertial Confinement Fusion (ICF) program, in DOE's Defense account, the Committee provided $475.7 million (a $10 million increase over the Administration's requested level) of which $248.1 million is allocated for construction of the National Ignition Facility (NIF).

Action in the House Subcommittee on Energy and Water Development Appropriations seems likely to be delayed as the House leadership wrestles with the strategic issues involved in successfully passing the 13 regular appropriations bills (of which Energy and Water is just one) at a time when the overall budgetary caps dictate substantial reductions in overall spending. At present for example, it appears that the allocation for the House Energy and Water Subcommittee is approximately $1 billion less than the allocation in the Senate appropriations bill.

Reproduced below is the relevant language from the Senate Committee's report:

"FUSION ENERGY SCIENCES

Appropriations, 1999:           $223,300,000

President's Request 2000:       $222,614,000

Committee Recommendation:       $220,614,000

"The Committee recommendation includes $19,000,000 for inertial fusion energy research to improve heavy ion accelerator efficiency, heavy ion and laser chamber designs, and the design of fusion energy target pellets."

"INERTIAL CONFINEMENT FUSION (ICF) - An appropriation of $475,700,000 is recommended for the Inertial Confinement Fusion Program. The ICF Program continues to be a major contributor to the science and technology base supporting the nuclear deterrent through improved understanding of the underlying physics of nuclear weapons and computational modeling that will provide the future basis for ensuring safety, reliability, and performance on nuclear components.

"The Committee recommendation includes $248,100,000 to continue construction of the National Ignition Facility and $15,900,000 for operating expenses to support research activities related to NIF. The President's fiscal year 2000 budget request significantly underfunded several areas of NIF research which would place at risk the success of scientific and stewardship objectives of the National Ignition Facility. With capital investment of over $1,000,000,000, the Committee believes the Department's budget request is unwise and jeopardizes a key element of the Stockpile Stewardship effort and, therefore, our national security, and the safety and reliability of the nuclear weapons stockpile. The additional $10,000,000 recommended by the Committee provides an additional $3,600,000 for core NIF diagnostics, $1,000,000 for direct drive laser beam smoothing development, and $5,400,000 to initiate critical cryogenic activities. Without this additional funding, the operational schedule, established by the Department of Energy, would be delayed by 1 year at a minimum."

"NATIONAL IGNITION FACILITY (NIF) - The NIF is a key facility in maintaining nuclear weapons science expertise required for the stockpile stewardship program, and in supporting weapons effects testing. An appropriation of $248,100,000, the full amount needed in fiscal year 2000 to keep this important project on schedule, is recommended for the NIF project. Fiscal year 1999 was the peak year for construction funding, and with the appropriation recommended for fiscal year 2000, the project will be 75 percent complete on an appropriations basis. The project remains on schedule and within the projected construction cost of $1,046,000,000. The Committee is pleased with the management and oversight attention provided by LLNL on the project."

The House Science Committee completed action on two bills (H.R. 1655 and H.R. 1656 which authorize FY 2000 and FY 2001 funding levels for DOE programs. The bills contain the following authorization for fusion energy sciences: $250 million in FY 2000 and $275 million in FY 2001. Of these amounts, $13.6 million and $19.4 million are provided for TFTR D&D in FY 2000 and FY 2001 respectively. The Science Committe bill also directs that no further funds are to expended in support of the ITER project.