GOVERNMENT & POLICY CONCENTRATES
SENATE PANEL APPROVES OPEN ACCESS PLAN A Senate committee has unanimously passed a bill that would require open access within a year for most federally funded research. The Senate Homeland Security & Government Affairs Committee last week approved the proposed Fair Access to Science & Technology Research Act (S. 779). Under the bill, all agencies that fund more than $100 million a year in research would be required to make related articles publicly available within 12 months of publication. That matches NIH’s long-standing requirement for open access and a 2013 Office of Science & Technology Policy directive. However, those policies could be overturned by future administrations unless Congress codifies these policies into law. The bill’s passage “will ensure a stable path for greater innovation and economic growth by opening up access to publicly funded research regardless of the position of any given administration,” says Heather Joseph, executive director of the Scholarly Publishing & Academic Resources Coalition, an open access advocacy group. The measure now goes to the full Senate for a vote, which has not yet been scheduled.—AW
NATURAL GAS GETS BOOST FROM INDUSTRY
SHUTTERSTOCK
Industrial users of natural gas, which include manufacturers of methanol and ammonia- or urea-based fertilizer, will continue to drive growth in natural gas demand through the end of 2016, says the U.S. En-
ergy Information Administration. EIA, the independent agency that provides statistics and analysis for the federal government, estimates that industrial natural gas consumption is expected to reach an annual average of 21.7 billion
Use of natural gas as a feedstock to manufacture methanol and some fertilizers is rising in the U.S.
EPA SUED OVER APPROVAL OF NANOSILVER PESTICIDE A coalition of environmental and public health groups filed a lawsuit against EPA last week, claiming that the agency failed to assess the risks to humans and the environment when it approved a nanosilver-based pesticide called NSPW-L30SS, or Nanosilva, for use in textiles and plastics. “Novel nanomaterials like this need comprehensive and rigorous analysis. Instead EPA has allowed this product on the market while acknowledging it is missing safety data,” says George Kimbrell, senior attorney for the Center for Food Safety, one of the plaintiffs in the suit. EPA admits that it does not have the data to determine whether antimicrobial nanosilver products pose a risk to workers, consumers, or wildlife. But the agency gave Nanosilva the green light in May under a “conditional” approval process that gives the product’s manufacturer four years to generate the safety data to determine the product’s effects on human health and the environment.—BEE cubic feet (bcf) per day by the end of 2015. This is expected to increase by another 3.9% in 2016. Industrial users of natural gas consumed an average of 21.0 bcf/day in 2014, an increase of 24% from 2009. “Reversing a decline that lasted more than a decade, industrial natural gas consumption has grown steadily since 2009 as relatively low natural gas prices have supported use of natural gas as a feedstock for the production of bulk chemicals,” EIA says. Several U.S. industrial facilities that depend on natural gas came on-line this year, and more are expected through 2018, the agency says.—JM
SENATE VOTES TO REVIVE EXPORT AGENCY The Senate voted to resurrect the U.S. Export-Import Bank (Ex-Im Bank) last week, setting up a collision with conservative opponents in the House of Representatives later this year. Lawmakers voted 64-29 to attach a reauthorization of the bank’s charter, which expired on June 30, to a long-term highway bill. The amendment, from Sen. Mark Kirk (R-Ill.), reauthorizes the bank’s charter through the fall of 2019. The 81-year-old bank was created during the Great Depression to lend money to U.S. exporters and their foreign customers. Most nations that compete economically with the U.S., including China, Japan, and Germany, have similar government-backed export credit agencies. Business officials worry that U.S. companies will be less competitive globally unless Congress renews the institution. “I suspect our competitors abroad are cheering because they understand U.S. CEN.ACS.ORG
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companies and our country’s economy is at a competitive disadvantage without ExIm,” says Kevin M. Kolevar, vice president of government affairs at Dow Chemical. The bank is opposed by many conservative House Republicans, who view it as corporate welfare.—GH
NIH SETS AMBITIOUS BUDGET GOALS FOR DEMENTIA RESEARCH For the first time, the National Institutes of Health has created an aspirational budget that outlines what it would take to support a full research push into Alzheimer’s disease and other dementia disorders. This so-called bypass budget—also known as a professional judgment budget—asks for $323 million above what the government is already funding each year on Alzheimer’s disease research. NIH spent $562 million in fiscal 2014. The fiscal 2017 proposal, which was requested by Congress, “outlines the optimal approach NIH would take in an ideal world unconstrained by fiscal limitations to make real and lasting progress against this devastating group of disorders,” says NIH Director Francis S. Collins. Much of this additional money would go toward development of clinical interventions and transforming basic science discoveries into treatments for patients. NIH would also use the extra funds to better understand the underlying molecular pathology of dementia. While bypass budgets overall are rare, the National Cancer Institute produces a bypass budget every year. It has never been funded at its requested level.—AW
