The 2018 Trump Administration Science Budget

Scientists don't do universal good.
Take Fritz Haber, for example. He invented the technique for synthesizing ammonia, which has been invaluable to agriculture. The food production for half the world's population depends on his method for producing nitrogen fertilizers.  But he was also the "Father of Chemical Warfare". Hmm...

But it is easy to show that science is what propels technological development and that government-funded science is essential for this, so it is baffling why the administration want to cut the science budget of NIH by 22%, DOE by 15% and NSF by 13%. Yes, I know they want to cut overhead grants, and a sensible discussion about that is always useful, but who would then build the buildings in which science is done?

Are they doing it just to save money? In fact I might consider myself more of a fiscal conservative than most Republican politicians.  Why? Because I would be in favor of keeping both the military and mandatory elements of the federal budget under control, whereas they wish to inflate the former (through blind ideology) and ignore the latter (through fear of losing votes).

Let's hope the Congress does its job and reverses this policy. As President Obama said in 2011, cutting investment in innovation is like lightening an overloaded airplane by removing its engines. It may make you feel like you're flying high at first, but it won't be long before you feel the impact.

Cellulosic Ethanol: $2.35 per gallon

Test plots of switchgrass at Auburn University, taken from ORNL report here.

Well, work on cellulosic ethanol has progressed over the last few years and things look good for large-scale commercial application. A recent report put the production costs at $2.35 per gallon, and ethanol produced from switchgrass yields 540% of the energy used to grow, harvest, and process it into ethanol. Equally important, it appears that switchgrass really is carbon neutral, as it absorbs essentially the same amount of greenhouse gases while it's growing as it emits when burned as fuel.

This kind of progress makes it all the more bewildering to read that budget cuts are planned for DOE, or rather, should I say were planned: these things seem to change direction every week.

Now the economy is just about stabilized we do need to slash government spending, but surely not in an area so critical to national security, energy independence and the environment?