On January 17, more than three months into fiscal year 2014 (FY14), President Obama signed the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2014. The omnibus bill will fund the federal government at a level of $1.1 trillion and will be effective through September 30. It restores support for many science programs to levels before the FY13 budget sequester, when all nondefense program budgets were cut by 5% (see IBO 3/15/13, 4/15/13).

Agencies funding science fared well compared to other areas of the government overall, but support for R&D in the biomedical sciences failed to fully make up for losses from FY12 levels. Although the NIH’s $29.9 billion budget gained approximately 3.5% compared to FY13, its funding decreased by $800 million, or 2.3%, from FY12. In fact, after adjusting for inflation, the NIH budget has declined consistently since 2004. Nonetheless, according to the Detailed Omnibus Summary, the $1 billion gain for FY14 will support 385 new research studies and trials.

According to the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), the institutes and centers (ICs) within the NIH experiencing the most growth in FY14 funding include the National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences (NCATS), whose $633 million budget increased 17% over FY13 and 10.3% over FY12 levels. This gain stems from the transfer of programs to NCATS from the NIH’s Common Fund and from consolidating funds from other ICs for the Clinical and Translational Science Awards. Increased amounts were allotted to the National Institute on Aging to support the Alzheimer’s disease research initiative announced by the Obama Administration. Likewise, multiple ICs, including the National Institute of Mental Health and the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke, have received additional funding for the Brain Research through Application of Innovative Neurotechnologies (BRAIN) initiative (see IBO 4/15/13, 9/30/13), also promoted by the Administration. No specific amount was designated for either initiative. Among other ICs, funding for the National Cancer Institute and Human Genome Institute each grew 3% compared to FY13 to $5 million each.

Appropriations for agencies funding R&D in the physical sciences, including the NSF and NIST, were among those whose budgets increased over FY12 levels. The $850 million appropriation to the NIST is a 10.4% increase over its FY13 budget. Of this amount, $651 million is for scientific and technical research and services. In the spending bill, Congress designates $15 million to develop and maintain Centers of Excellence, “encourag[ing]” the NIST to establish one in forensic measurement science, technology and standards, and one in advanced manufacturing competitiveness and commercialization technology for carbon nanomanufacturing. In addition, $56 million of the NIST’s total budget is for constructing research facilities.

The NSF’s $7.17 billion for FY14 is less than a 1% increase over its FY12 budget but is 4.2% more than FY13. According to the Detailed Omnibus Summary, the growth in the NSF’s budget will allow it to fund approximately 780 more competitive grants. The budget includes almost $6 billion in Research and Related Activities (R&RA) for the agency. While the bill does not specify amounts for R&RA in individual directorates, the House Appropriations Committee’s summary emphasizes programs geared toward strengthening the nation’s innovation and economic competitiveness. However, the NSF is mentioned as an agency participating in the BRAIN initiative, and, according to the AAAS, the Directorate of Biological Sciences was among the directorates experiencing the largest increases in the NSF’s requested budget.

The DOE’s Office of Science (OS) is the largest funder of basic research in the physical sciences, and its $5.07 billion budget marks a 9.7% increase over that of FY13. According to the AAAS, within the OS, funding for Fusion Energy ($506 million) and Nuclear Physics ($570 million) programs exceeds that in FY12. The DOE’s Advanced Research Projects Agency–Energy’s funding also experienced growth, with an increase of 11.2%. Its $280 million budget is designated to carry out the America COMPETES Act (see IBO 8/15/07, 12/31/10).

The budget for the EPA also fell short of its FY12 funding. However, according to the Royal Society of Chemistry, its budget increased 3.0% over FY13 to $8.2 billion. Programs mentioned in the House Appropriations Committee’s summary of the budget bill include water quality and nanomaterial research. The Clean Water State Revolving Fund will increase by 5% to almost $1.5 billion. The Drinking Water State Revolving Fund will increase by the same percentage to $900 million. One billion dollars of the EPA’s budget will be distributed to the states for their environmental programs, and $416 million is for Geographic Programs.

The FDA fared similarly, with an increase over FY13 but not over FY12, with a budget of $2.56 billion. Of that, $500 million is for continued implementation of the Food Safety Modernization Act (see IBO 12/31/10). Within the FDA, the Center for Food Safety and Nutrition, which regulates food, food additives and dietary supplements, is slated to receive $900 million.

A related agency, the USDA’s Food Safety and Inspection Service, will use its over $1 billion in funding to conduct mandatory inspections of the meat and poultry industry. The AAAS calculates that the FY14 R&D budget for the USDA overall is approximately $2.3 billion. The Agricultural Research Service’s $1.1 billion is an increase of over 10% from its FY13 budget. However, according to the AAAS, Congress failed to approve funding for the Biocontainment Laboratory and Consolidated Poultry Research Facility, proposed for construction in Athens, Georgia. The current facilities, at which research on food safety and emerging diseases is conducted, have been determined to need upgrading.

For research and education, the USDA’s National Institute of Food and Agriculture will receive over $770 million. Of that, $316 million is designated for the growing Agriculture and Food Research Initiative (AFRI), a competitive grants program to promote science to support agriculture. The funding for AFRI is an approximately 20% increase over that in FY12.

The AAAS estimates the Department of Homeland Security’s R&D budget to be $1.1 billion. Approximately $19 million is for Research, Development, Test and Evaluation, which funds applied scientific research, as well as for activities related to facilities and equipment maintenance. The department’s Science and Technology’s budget is over $1.2 billion, with approximately $400 million of it supporting construction of the National Bio- and Agro-Defense Facility, a biosafety level 4 biocontainment facility to study emerging, zoonotic and foreign animal diseases, to be constructed in Manhattan, Kansas.

The reversal of sequester budget cuts is welcome news for science R&D. Unfortunately, some agencies will not fully recover to pre-sequester levels and have expressed concern about consistent funding for research in the future.