--Increase the use of coal, first to supplement and later to replace oil and natural gas.

--Expand the production of nuclear energy as rapidly as possible, first to supplement and later to replace fossil fuel.

--Promote, to the maximum extent feasible, the use of alternative energy sources--hydro, geothermal, and solar.

--Pursue the promise of fusion and central station solar power.

2. A 5-year, $10 billion Federal energy R&D program to supplement R&D expenditures expected from the private sector.

3. The fiscal year 1975 Federal energy R&D budget.

CHAPTER 2

MATTERS RELATED TO THE TREATMENT OF

SOLAR ENERGY R&D IN THE CHAIRMAN'S REPORT

In his April 1, 1974, letter to GAO, Senator James Abourezk said he was concerned about the AEC Chairman's justification for recommending in her December 1, 1973, report that solar energy be funded at one-fifth the level the solar energy review panel recommended. In subsequent meetings with the Senator's office, we agreed to give him information on the following matters.

--The meaning of the various program funding levels
(minimum, accelerated/orderly, and maximum) the
review panels recommended.

--The funding levels for the various energy research
and development areas the 16 review panels recom-
mended and the reductions and/or increases to each
the overview panel and/or the Chairman, AEC, made.
--The reasoning leading from the solar energy review
panel's recommended funding levels to the funding
level the December 1, 1973, report recommended.
--The basis for the December 1, 1973, report's recom-
ended funding level for solar photovoltaic conver-
sion activities and a summary of the content of
proposals relating to solar photovoltaic R&D consi-
dered.

--The basis for AEC's considering solar energy in its
draft liquid metal fast breeder reactor environmental
impact statement and in any other environmental im-
pact statements AEC issued since December 1, 1973,
along with the views of several solar energy review
panel members as to whether the draft environmental
impact statement on the breeder reactor supported or
. contradicted the findings on solar energy in the
solar energy review panel's report.

--The circumstances surrounding the transmittal of the review panels' reports to AEC's public document room and the difficulties Senator Abourezk had in trying to to get copies of such reports from the public document room.

The information we developed on the above areas is presented in the following sections on the (1) development of the Chairman's funding recommendation for solar energy and (2) availability to the public of the solar energy review panel's funding recommendations.

INFORMATION RELATING TO DEVELOPING

AEC CHAIRMAN ́S FUNDING RECOMMENDATIONS

In this section we trace the 16 review panels' initial funding recommendations through the overview panel's review to the AEC Chairman's draft and final reports. We also discuss the overview panel's reasons for reducing the solar energy review panel's accelerated/orderly and minimum funding recommendations from $1 billion and $400 million, respectively, to $200 million. Further, we point out how the funding recommendations for the six areas of solar energy technology were developed and summarize the input to one of those areas, photovoltaic electric power.

Meaning of program levels

recommended by review panels

On September 28, 1973, ERU sent each review panel chairman instructions explaining what each was to do. ERU instructed each review panel chairman to develop a 5-year energy R&D program at three alternative funding levels for their respective energy R&D areas, defined as follows:

Minimum--The minimum level of effort at which a viable
R&D program could be maintained.

Accelerated/orderly--Level of effort designed to
pursue the objectives of the program fairly vigorously
but efficiently, without telescoping steps and extra
parallel efforts characteristic of crash programs.

Maximum/crash--The maximum rate at which an accelerated program could usefully proceed with acceptable costs and schedule, environmental, and technical risks if high-priority funding were available.

Changes made to review panels ́ funding recommendations

The 16 review panels developed the first set of funding recommendations on the basis of their evaluation of the energy R&D proposals submitted for their energy areas. The third, fourth and fifth columns of the table on the next page show the funding recommendations in each panel report.

*This is the total of the accelerated programs of panels 3 and 4 and is not included in column totals, to avoid double counting. bOverview panel did not include funds for these two programs in its $10 billion recommendation to Chairman.

The Chairman, AEC, did not include funds for these programs in her $10 billion program. The Chairman, AEC, recommended a $1 billion program to supplement the $10 61111on program. The supplemental program recommended $650 million for environmental R&D, $300 million for multidirectional research, and $50 million for manpower development. The review panel funding recommendations are compared with the $650 and $300 million.

dFunds for this area, added to the program by the AEC Chairman, were taken from the fission, fusion, and conversion techniques

programs.

ewhere subpanels did not report minimum or maximum programs, funding levels for accelerated/orderly programs were substituted.

Five panels did not recommend the three funding levels ERU requested. Four recommended only an orderly program, and one recommended minimum and orderly programs. The totals for the funding recommendations contained in the 16 review panel reports were:

Minimum (note a)

Accelerated/orderly
Maximum/crash (note a)

$12.0 billion

16.7 billion

28.7 billion

awhere a minimum or maximum was not given for an energy R&D area, the accelerated/orderly funding level was used to compute the total.

The solar energy review panel report recommended only two funding levels, an orderly program totaling over $1 billion and a minimum program totaling over $400 million. The chairman of the solar energy review panel told us that he had not recommended a maximum-crash program because the orderly program contained all the activities which the panel believed could be prudently pursued at the time. However, he said that in 2 or 3 years there may be enough favorable results in solar energy development to justify crash funding in three areas of solar energy technology; namely, wind energy conversion, ocean thermal energy conversion, and

bioconversion.

The overview panel reviewed the 16 review panels' funding recommendations and, with the help of ERU, developed a 5-year, $10 billion energy R&D program which it recommended to the Chairman, AEC. The sixth column of the table on the preceding page shows the overview panel's recommended program.

In

The five overview panel members we spoke with told us how the panel had developed its funding recommendations. summary, the panel relied on the (1) ERU to provide technical and administrative assistance and to prepare R&D funding levels allotting the $10 billion which gave the overview panel a starting point from which to consider individual review panel recommendations, (2) chairmen of the 16 review panels, (3) reports of the 16 review panels, (4) extensive discussions among the overview panel members, and (5) personal background and expertise of the individual members of the overview panel.

To develop the overview panel ́s funding recommendations, each member prepared an overall R&D program allotting the $10 billion to the 16 energy R&D areas the review panels