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SCHUMER: JUST-ANNOUNCED FEDERAL FUNDING BILL INCLUDES MILLIONS MORE FOR LABS AND SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH, INCLUDING BROOKHAVEN NATIONAL LAB; SENATOR SPECIFICALLY FOUGHT FOR SCIENCE FUNDING AMIDST BUDGET THREATS TO THE PROGRAMS BNL & ITS WORKFORCE RELIES UPON


Just-Revealed Federal Spending Agreement Provides $5.3 Billion for Office of Science, An Increase of $42 Million From Last Year; Specifically, Bill Provides $1.8 Million for BNL Revitalization Project

Last Year Alone, BNL Received Critical $500-Plus Million In Fed Funds From These Same Offices To Carry Out Critical Projects That Keep LI On the Cutting-Edge Of Research and Innovation

Schumer: This Is A Win For Science, For BNL & For Long Island’s Economy

U.S. Senator Charles E. Schumer today announced that the federal spending agreement provides $5.392 billion for the Office of Science, an increase of $42 million from last year, which helps fund universities and national laboratories like Long Island’s Brookhaven National Lab. Earlier this year, Schumer vowed to fight for federal funding to help protect BNL, a world-renowned lab responsible for innovation, research and nearly 3,000 LI jobs. Schumer vowed to continue fighting for the funding that BNL needs next year, too.

"Brookhaven National Lab is home to some of the world's brightest minds and most cutting-edge innovations, which both advance human knowledge and spur our economy, and this increase in federal Office of Science funding will help BNL carry out critical projects that help put Long Island on the map as global leader in research. I have always been a fierce advocate for BNL — and technology and research in general – because it creates jobs, spurs innovation and is essential to keeping Long Island and America number one,” said Senator Schumer.

Overall, the agreement provides $5.392 billion for the Office of Science, which is an increase of $42 million from FY 16.

  • Basic Energy Sciences: $1.871 billion, compared to $1.849 billion in FY 16.
    • This funding includes $494 million for optimal operations of the five BES light sources, of which NSLS-II at BNL is one.
  • Nuclear Physics: $622 million, compared to $617 million in FY 16
  • Science Laboratories Infrastructure: $130 million, compared to $114 million in FY 16
    • The Science Laboratories Infrastructure funding includes $1.8 million for the core facility revitalization at BNL. This is a multi-year, $63.4 million project.

Schumer said, in recent years, BNL has received an annual $537.347 million in federal funds from the DOE's Office of Science budget. BNL also received $5.16 million in federal funds from the Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE) and $3.138 million from the Nuclear Energy Office.

The DOE Office of Science is the nation’s lead federal agency supporting scientific research and basic research in the physical sciences. The office supports 10 of the 17 DOE laboratories, including Brookhaven National Laboratory on Long Island. With the funding it receives from the DOE Office of Science, Brookhaven National Laboratory conducts cutting-edge research that helps improve our nation’s energy security, address environmental challenges, and produce innovative technological breakthroughs that help fuel our economy and create jobs.  Overall, BNL has 2,989 full time employees, 399 students and 1,348 visiting scientists. Brookhaven also operates and maintains a number of scientific facilities on which approximately 2500 university, industry, and government-sponsored scientists from across the country and around the world rely to conduct research.

BNL is operated and managed by Brookhaven Science Associates, a limited-liability company founded by the Research Foundation for the State University of New York on behalf of Stony Brook University, and Battelle, a nonprofit applied science and technology organization. BNL is home to world-class facilities like the Center for Functional Nanomaterials; the NASA Space Radiation Facility; the Accelerator Test Facility; the Computational Science Center; the Brookhaven Linac Isotope Producer; the National Synchroton Light Source-II and the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider.

The Basic Energy Science program within the DOE Office of Science supports BNL's National Synchrotron Light Source-II, a next-generation X-ray light source scientific user facility that is poised to foster breakthroughs in fields like energy security, environment, and human health. According to BNL, it will enable the study of material properties and functions with nanoscale resolution and exquisite sensitivity by providing world-leading capabilities for X-ray imaging and high-resolution energy analysis.

The Brookhaven National Lab’s Relativistic Ion Collider (RHIC) is a scientific user facility that allows over 1000 scientists and 200 students from around the world to study what the universe may have looked like in the first few moments after its creation. Schumer has said that RHIC has fueled work with industry, the Department of Defense, and other DOE programs on next-generation hadron radiotherapy facilities for cancer treatment, superconducting magnet energy storage systems, high-current energy recovery linacs for potential defense applications, and advanced medical imaging techniques and detectors.

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