For Oak Ridge National Laboratory, a continuing future of budget cuts may be inevitable.
In 2011, the lab announced the first of three voluntary separations linked to decreased federal funding resulting in hundreds of employees leaving the lab.
While the exact long-term result is still unknown, a lack of funds poses is a potential obstacle to scientific research.
Conducting research in several different fields for the Department of Energy, Oak Ridge works to create more energy efficient products, to investigate renewable energy resources and to explore additive manufacturing, better known as 3D printing, among other projects, said Suresh Babu, governor’s chair for advanced manufacturing and UT professor of mechanical, aerospace and biomedical engineering.
After the sequester, an across the board series of budget cuts and tax increases, Oak Ridge lost 7 percent of its budget, or about $100 million, between fiscal year 2012 and fiscal year 2014.
Editor and science writer for Oak Ridge National Laboratory Communications Bill Cabage said that between April 2011 and December 2013 the lab lost 570 employees in both research and support staff from voluntary separations.
However, the loss is not contained to jobs. When funding is in question, Cabage said, research is in jeopardy.
With fewer funds allocated to research, the inevitable result is a slowdown in technological and economic development.
Comparing science funding to basic infrastructure, Cabage noted how short-term decisions have considerable long-term consequences.
“It’s kind of like funding roads,” Cabage said. “If you cut back on highway funding now, the roads for a few years will be okay, but 10 years from now you’ll be running into potholes and bridges are falling down; you wonder why this is happening, and it’s because of decisions made 10 years ago.”
Institutions such as UT that benefit from research conducted at Oak Ridge may also be affected.
Last February, Thompson-Boling Arena installed new, cost-saving, high-efficiency lights that use carbon graphite foam, a material on license from Oak Ridge National Laboratory by LED North America. The foam absorbs heat, allowing the lights to burn brighter and longer than previous halide bulbs.
Oak Ridge National Laboratory’s benefit to UT is not limited to technology. Even undergraduates such as Judd Cowan, senior in mechanical engineering, have learned much from working with the lab.
Working alongside top researchers for his senior design project has been an invaluable experience, providing “a more full education” in addition to first-hand experience, Cowan said.
“When you enter the industry you don’t know anything,” Cowan said. “When you walk over there you have no idea what they’re talking about, and you have to pick it up quick or you’ll fall on your butt.”
While budget reductions are not ideal, Babu said the adjustments will not change the goal for researchers. It is passion, not money that will provide valuable scientific research, he said.
“The funding is a means to get to the end,” Babu said. “A scientist will always provide value, because he is always passionate about making a difference.”
