January 2021 NIST Congressional and Legislative Affairs Constituent Newsletter

National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) sent this bulletin at 01/13/2021 12:17 PM EST
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NIST Congressional and
Legislative Affairs

Constituent Newsletter  – January 2021

Legislation

FY21 Appropriations

On December 27th, the President signed the FY21 Omnibus Appropriations bill into law (P.L. 116-260).  This bill provides $1.034B in funding for NIST through September 30, 2021 including $788M in STRS, $166.5M in ITS (with $150M for the Manufacturing Extension Partnership and $16.5M for Manufacturing USA) and $80M in Construction of Research Facilities.  

FY21 National Defense Authorization Act

The National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) of FY21 became public law (P.L. 116-283) on January 1, 2021 when Congress overrode the President's veto.  The NDAA includes NIST provisions related to cybersecurity, artificial intelligence, 5G, international standards, semiconductors, per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) and conducting a manufacturing supply chain study.


Recent News

Manufacturing Extension Partnership Releases Fiscal Year 2020 Impacts

The NIST Manufacturing Extension Partnership (MEP) released FY20 client impacts for the MEP National Network.  In FY 2020, the MEP National Network interacted with more than 27,574 small and medium-sized manufacturers. For every dollar of federal investment in FY 2020, the MEP National Network generated $19.60 in new sales growth and $33.70 in new client investment. This translates into $13 billion in new and retained sales as manufacturers navigated numerous challenges due to the pandemic. During this same time, for every $1,381 of federal investment, the Network created or retained one manufacturing job. Since 1988, MEP has worked with 138,917 manufacturers, leading to $145 billion in new sales and $24.7 billion in cost savings, and it has helped create and retain more than 1,327,744 jobs.

 

Partners Engaged in Extramural Reporting (PEER) Prize Challenge Winners Announced

Last year, NIST announced the Partners Engaged in Extramural Reporting (PEER) Prize Challenge seeking solutions to incentivize the recipients of federal R&D funding to comply with Bayh-Dole reporting requirements.

A panel of judges reviewed the submissions and the three winners have been announced.  The NIST iEdison team plans to use the winning entries to inform improvements of iEdison program management and system development

 

NIST Awards Nearly $4 Million to Support Metals-Based Additive Manufacturing

NIST has awarded nearly $4 million in grants to help accelerate the adoption of new measurement methods and standards to advance U.S. competitiveness in metals-based additive manufacturing (AM). 

  • Georgia Tech Research Corporation ($1 million)
  • University of Texas at El Paso ($1 million)
  • Purdue University ($999,929)
  • Northeastern University ($999,464) 

In addition to these awards, NIST anticipates funding additional projects as part of a second phase of awards in the first half of 2021.  

To read more about each winner, please see press release.