Useful Stats: 2001 Federal Extramural R&D by State

The National Science Foundation has released a new statistical report entitled Federal Funds for Research and Development: Fiscal Years 2001, 2002, and 2003. Included among the 112 tables are 10 presenting the 2001 data by geographic distribution, performer and federal agency.

Federal obligations for research and development in 2001 totaled $78.078 billion. One-fourth of the total was for intramural R&D -- research activities taking place within many federal labs, research centers and military installations. With $5.435 billion, Maryland captures the greatest share of federal intramural research. California, the District of Columbia and Virginia make up distant second, third and fourth place finishes, respectively.

The extramural, or external, portion of federal R&D expenditures is performed by industry, academia, federally funded R&D centers (FFRDCs), other nonprofit institutions and state and local governments. These funds, in excess of $58.5 billion in 2001, are awarded through a variety of competitive and noncompetitive methods. It is important to note, the FFRDCs include R&D activities that many would consider deep within the federal system and, perhaps, more appropriately classified as intramural. Examples of FFRDCs include the Department of Energy's labs (for example, Oak Ridge, INEEL, PNNL and Ames). A complete list of FFRDCs is available at: http://www.nsf.gov/sbe/srs/nsf04310/sectb.htm

SSTI has prepared a table presenting the 2001 federal extramural R&D budget by state, ranked on a per capita basis for the purpose of standardization. The results are available at: http://www.ssti.org/Digest/Tables/042604t.htm

On a per capita basis, the top five states were the District of Columbia ($1,375), New Mexico ($1,141), Maryland ($716.14), Massachusetts ($618) and Virginia ($455). Four of the top five rankings are held by states with significant federal presence, the only anomaly being Massachusetts. (Note: New Mexico benefits from the two large DOE labs, Los Alamos and Sandia.)

The order of the second five states is more interesting and perhaps less easy to generalize regarding an explanation: Connecticut ($374), Georgia ($368), Maine ($344), Alabama ($328), and California ($301).

Surprisingly, three of the top 10 states for extramural R&D obligations on a per capita basis meet the requirements for inclusion in the Experimental Program to Stimulate Competitive Research (EPSCoR) administered by several federal agencies to increase R&D activity within "underperforming" states. Conversely, and more consistent with the intent of the EPSCoR program, 13 of the bottom 16 positions in SSTI's table are held by EPSCoR states.

The full NSF report is available at: http://www.nsf.gov/sbe/srs/nsf04310/start.htm