Bush budget seeks $459.4M for NIST labs

The Bush administration is seeking $459.4 million for fiscal 2007, an 18.5 percent increase, for national laboratories run by the Commerce Department’s National Institute of Standards and Technology. Congress appropriated $387.4 million to operate NIST’s eight research laboratories in fiscal 2006.

The president's budget request includes $19 million for information technology research, of which $4 million would go toward innovations in measurement science and $2 million would fund cybersecurity research.

NIST’s proposed spending plan budgets $9.5 million for centralized support of scientific computing and $8 million to maintain and upgrade the agency’s financial management systems.

Bush administration officials requested no money for the Advanced Technology Program, which awards grants to industry for high-risk research. The Hollings Manufacturing Extension Partnership, which provides engineering and manufacturing support services to small manufacturers, would receive $46.3 million instead of the $104.6 million that Congress appropriated for the program in fiscal 2006.