GOVERNMENT CONCENTRATES 1 fi Republican contract' could adversely affect R&D funds Total federal R&D funding would decline 50% or more by 2000 if the terms of the House Republicans' "Contract With America" are carried out, concludes an analysis prepared by the Democratic staff of the House Science Committee and the Joint Economic Committee. The contract calls for balancing the federal budget by 2002 and a number of business and personal tax cuts, among other things. The analysis shows that the total cumulative reduction in federal spending required to implement the contract exceeds $1.7 trillion. The analysis found that—assuming constant real defense spending, no action to curb the cost of entitlements, and across-the-board cuts in nondefense discretionary programs—federal support for R&D would have to decline within five years to an annual rate of about $35 billion from its current level of $72.7 billion. Adjusted for inflation, real federal R&D investment would be even lower. Rep. George E. Brown Jr. (D-Calif.), ranking minority member of the Science Committee, comments this "pillaging of R&D programs comes at a time when foreign competition is severely impeding the ability of the private sector to make the R&D investment necessary to remain competitive in domestic and global markets."
• NIST protests House-planned cuts in its '95 R&D budget The House Appropriations Subcommittee on Commerce, Justice, State, the Judiciary & Related Agencies has voted to rescind, or take back, $46.6 million from the National Institute of Standards & Technology's $854 million fiscal 1995 budget. The subcommittee would cut $19.5 million from MST's laboratory work, $25.6 million from the Manufacturing Extension Partnership, and $600,000 from the Baldrige National Quality Program. This action is in addition to the $107 million the House has already voted to cut from NIST's Advanced Technology Program (C&EN, Feb. 27, page 9). The proposed rescissions would cause "a substantial setback in the nation's efforts to invest in technology for economic growth/ , NIST officials say in a statement. And they echo Rep. George E. Brown Jr. (D-Calif.) in saying: "These actions would be shortsighted in today's climate where rapid technological change and global competitiveness are challenging many U.S. companies' very survival." The full House Appropriations Committee was scheduled to take up the rescission proposal at press time.
• Cost of destroying U.S. chemical arms now pegged at $11 billion The Army's current estimate for destroying the U.S. stockpile of chemical weapons is understated—by as much as $38 million, Congress' General Accounting Office concludes in a report to the Army. In 1985, the Army originally estimated that its incineration-based destruction program would cost $1.7 billion. Today, it says the cost will be $11 billion, more than $2 billion greater even than its December 1993 estimate of $8.6 billion. GAO says: "Current schedule and cost estimates are understated because they are based on (1) 24hour-per-day operations that have not yet been demonstrat20
MARCH 6, 1995 C&EN
ed and (2) insufficient operational testing data from the prototype [destruction] facility on Johnston Island" in the Pacific Ocean. GAO recommends that the Army revise its cost estimates and schedules to reflect actual experience at its Pacific island facility. The report was made public by the Chemical Weapons Working Group, an alliance of groups seeking alternative destruction methods. Group spokesman Craig Williams also tells C&EN that the Army has indefinitely postponed a request for a proposal for construction of an incinerator at the Umatilla Chemical Agent Disposal Facility in Oregon. Umatilla is one of seven sites in the US. where the Army plans to destroy chemical arms. "I believe their [destruction] program is unraveling before our eyes," Williams says.
• EPA proposes new restrictions on land disposal of hazardous waste In compliance with a consent decree entered in 1992, EPA has proposed new concentration-based treatment standards for hazardous wastes in the so-called characteristic waste category. These include wastes that are toxic, corrosive, highly reactive, or ignitable. Wastes managed under the Clean Water Act and those disposed of via underground injection also would have to follow the new standard. EPA also has proposed new treatment standards for aluminum potliner, organobrornine, and carbamate wastes. The agency has proposed, too, that hazardous wastes be prohibited from use in fill material. In addition, the new standard will prohibit the common practice in the foundry industry of adding iron filings to contaminated sand as a treatment for lead contamination. EPA published this complicated proposal in the March 2 Federal Register, page 11702.
• Government Roundup • The Methyl Bromide Working Group, which represents producers and users of the ozone-depleting pesticide, is rallying its members to try to prevent further restrictions on use of the chemical. A United Nations study recently concluded it is technically and economically feasible to reduce methyl bromide use even before it is completely banned in 2001. • Funds for science research facilities at historically black colleges and universities have dropped sharply, according to an NSF survey. Such schools depend mainly on federal funds for construction and renovation, which decreased 83% between the mid-1980s and the early 1990s. • Responses are needed at both state and national levels to unresolved ethical issues such as implications of the Human Genome Project and research on fetuses and embryos, according to "Society's Choices: Social and Ethical Decision Making in Biomedicine," a new Institute of Medicine report. • OSHA is giving firms until July 10 to comply with provisions of its new asbestos exposure standard covering medical surveillance, respiratory protection, employee training, and engineering control requirements. The exposure limit of 0.1 fibers per cu cm, which became effective Oct. 11,1994, remains in effect.
