INDUSTRY

On November 20, the U.S. House of Representatives and Senate presented the appropriations for energy development bill to President Bush. Lawmakers voted to provide more funding than the President requested for key technology efforts at the DOE. Negotiators compromised on funding for Energy's supercomputing research, providing $203 million. The House-passed version had called for $213 million, compared with the Senate's $183 million. The final number exceeded Bush's request by $30 million. As of today, President Bush has not signed it into law. The House on Nov. 18 adopted the compromise version of a Bill H.R.2754 to fund the energy programs in fiscal 2004. The vote was 387-36. The Senate cleared the measure by voice vote the same day. "The conferees provide these additional funds for the department to acquire additional advanced computing capability ... to initiate longer-term research and development on next-generation computer architectures," the conference report on the bill said. "The conferees expect that ... these funds will be awarded among various technologies, laboratories, universities and private-sector suppliers using a merit-based, competitive process." Lawmakers did not specify how the money should be split among Energy's divisions that conduct supercomputing research. But they said that they support the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy task force on high-end computing revitalization "and expect the department to participate fully in this interagency effort." Negotiators accepted the Senate's number of $726 million for the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA), a semi-autonomous agency that uses supercomputing to manage the nation's nuclear weapons. Negotiators on the energy and water spending bill also voted to provide $304 million, a $3.6 million increase over the president's budget, for safeguards and security, including cyber security, at Energy's environmental management office.