Decision Making in the U.S. Department of Energy's Environmental Management Office of Science and Technology (1999) / Chapter Skim
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4 Decision Making in Research, Development, and Demonstration for the DOE-EM Program
4 Decision Making in Research, Development, and Demonstration for the DOE-EM Program
Pages 38-52
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A decision-making process is presented below in a general form and then discussed in the context of current OST program structures. This chapter describes how the various process steps were conducted within the current DOE institutional structure; evaluative comments are provided in Chapter 5.
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will meet all the functional flowsheet requirements Deciding whether to use these RD&D technology products (i.e., their deployment) aThe baseline functional flowsheet is the presently preferred sequence of process steps that comprise the waste treatment sequence from the initial waste configuration to the final waste end state.
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Functional Steps budget (Box 8~; The boxes on the bottom right-hand side represent functions that must be performed in a decisionmaking approach of the kind OST has adopted, in which the RD&D program is based on site technology needs. The specific functions of this process are depicted as boxes representing the following steps: site technology needs are acquired from the user community (Box 6~; these needs are prioritized (Box 71; a plan is developed for technical activities based on these prioritized needs and the available Projects are solicited, and responses are evaluated to select those to be funded (Box 9~; Me principal investigator (Pl)
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Box 3 shows allocations to another type of program office, a technology provider program such as OST, which funds technology development activities and in so doing must interact with and be supportive of the user programs if it is to be effective and demonstrably beneficial. Boxes 2 and 4 show the role of DOE upper management in deciding what program funding for separate subordinate program units to propose in the budget submitted to Congress.
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, which includes as substeps the identification of technical solutions to these needs statements and recognition of those technologies that may already be available outside DOE so that "make-or-buy" determinations can be performed (it is at this step that care must be taken to avoid unnecessanly duplicative technology development projects) ; · prepare and tender solicitations for technology development proposals and evaluate the responses to select the ones to fund (Box 9~; · initiate technology development projects by providing funds to the PI of each proposal selected (Box 10~; and monitor these technology development projects (Box ~1)
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I, primarily by Boxes 6-9. In this framework, the STCGs at each major DOE-EM site interact with representatives of the user programs to identify and prioritize technology needs at the site level (Box 6~.
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Negotiations with OMB and appropriate congressional committees result in final budget figures in the fall, ideally prior to the October ~ beginning of the fiscal year. In step with this process is the formulation of the two-year-out budget, represented at the level of specificity of the requested budget for each major OST program unit and used for planning purposes by these program units as budget targets.
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selects a suite of technology development projects to fund. This is done by gathering and prioritizing technology needs from the STCGs and sites, usually with the approval of the potential technology users from relevant DOE-EM sites, a process described below in more detail.
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The primary funding decision at the headquarters level is how to divide the proposed total OST budget among Focus Areas, Crosscutting Programs, and other OST program units. Using budget guidance from Congress on a target figure for an overall OST budget, headquarters management proposes a budget for each program unit.
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can also be determined as the sum of the funded work packages under its management. in principle, this prioritization process can therefore be used to set budget targets for OST program units.
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with the development of gate criteria specific to OST and a formal OST gate review process. Once a project is funded, it is tracked in the stage-and-gate system, where gate criteria serve as decision points to promote the technology development project to a higher stage (with a correspondingly higher filming level and higher level of programmatic commitment)
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CHAPTER SUMMARY: MAJOR DECISION PROCESS STEPS AND HOW THEY WERE DONE WITHIN OST DURING FY97-98 An important context for OST decision making is provided by the following features: · the annual federal budget system and other oversight requirements, which drive each EM office to plan for several fiscal years into the future during any one fiscal year; · the nature of funding for the OST program, with the budget not directly connected to immediate DOE-EM activities undertaken in support of compliance and cleanup agreements; and · the fact that other EM offices (shown as user programs in Figure 4.
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From page 52... ...
52 Decision Making in the DOE-OST The history of OST presented in Chapter 2 and the context, function, and process steps discussed in this chapter lead to findings and recommendations in Chapter 6. in developing these, Chapter 2 has looked at the decision-making practices of private industry to gather additional information and insight.
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