On 8 February the White House released its budget proposal for the financial year 2006. The science and technology budget of the US Department of Energy has been reduced overall by about 3.8% compared with 2005, whereas the budget for high-energy physics (HEP) is reduced by about 3%. The proposal is pending approval by Congress.
The HEP programme for 2006 has been structured in such a way “not only to maximize the scientific returns on our investment in these facilities, but also to invest in R&D now for the most promising new facilities that will come online in the next decade”. This has necessitated some prioritization.
The planned operations, upgrade and infrastructure for the Tevatron at Fermilab are cited as the highest priority, with a high priority also given to operations, upgrades and infrastructure of the B-factory at SLAC. However, B-factory operations will be terminated by 2008 at the latest. Support for a leadership role for US research groups in the physics programme for the Large Hadron Collider at CERN will also continue to be a high priority, and the preconceptual R&D needed to explore the nature of dark energy will continue in 2006.
A major casualty is the engineering design of the B Physics at the Tevatron (BTeV) experiment, which was scheduled to begin in 2005 as a new “major item of equipment” and will instead be terminated by the end of 2005. The reasons given are the timescale and the “lesser scientific potential” compared with other projects, although it is “still important scientifically”. Support was strong only if the project could be completed by 2010, which is “not feasible given schedule and funding constraints”.
Support for a future electron-positron linear collider, however, has increased relative to 2005 for “the continued international participation and leadership in linear collider R&D and planning by US scientists”. R&D for other new accelerator and detector technologies, particularly in the emerging area of neutrino physics, will also increase.
