Washington. Some of the accelerator improvement projects are completed in phases and spread out over several fiscal years. The improvements include upgrades to existing accelerators, purchase of new instruments and equipment, or the addition of new accelerators to connect to those already in operation. The following examples are given to illustrate some of the improvements being made to the nuclear physics facilities. In fiscal year 1984, Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory completed a project to upgrade the beam transport line connecting the linear accelerator (Superhilac) with a synchrotron (Bevalac). This project included upgrading the beam line and incorporating improved data analysis instrumentation into the beam line. Another upgrade project is scheduled for fiscal year 1986 and involves installation of a new ion source for the linear accelerator and improvements in the hardware associated with the beam transport system. In fiscal year 1982, Argonne National Laboratory began a project to enlarge its linear accelerator and add a new experimental area. This project--to be completed in fiscal year 1985--was undertaken to improve beam quality and experimental flexibility. The Yale University accelerator is being upgraded to increase the maximum power from 13.5 MeV to almost 22.5 MeV. The Yale accelerator improvement project started in fiscal year 1984 and is expected to be completed by the end of fiscal year 1986. FUTURE PHYSICS ACCELERATOR FACILITIES The High Energy Physics Advisory Panel and the Nuclear Science Advisory Committee have recommended, respectively (and DOE has endorsed), the development of one new high-energy physics accelerator facility and one new nuclear physics accelerator facility to pursue the scientific opportunities beyond the reach of existing facilities or facilities under construction. In addition, the Nuclear Science Advisory Committee advised DOE in December 1983, that the United States should proceed with the planning for construction of a heavy-ion colliding-beam accelerator facility. DOE has provided research and design funding for the highenergy physics program's facility--the Superconducting Super Collider (SSC)--and the nuclear physics program's facility--the Continuous Electron Beam Accelerator Facility (CEBAF). To date DOE has not approved funding specifically for the heavy-ion colliding-beam accelerator. The three facilities are further discussed below. In addition to these three facilities, at least two other accelerators are being contemplated by DOE laboratories--a high-energy machine for which some preliminary research is being performed and a nuclear physics accelerator for which a formal proposal has been presented to the Nuclear Science Advisory Committee. Superconducting Super Collider The need to explore physics phenomena at energies higher than achievable on existing high-energy physics accelerators was addressed in 1983 by the High Energy Physics Advisory Panel. That panel concluded, based on the long development of superconducting accelerator technology, that an SSC was technically feasible. According to DOE officials, if it is completed, the SSC would be in the forefront of world high-energy physics accelerator facilities. In addition, the advisory panel stated that the facility is essential for a strong U.S. program into the 21st Century. Sometimes called the "ultimate answer machine," the SSC is expected to have a circumference of 60 to 120 miles and generate energies 20 times greater than Fermilab's accelerator. (See pp. 20 and 21.) According to the advisory panel report, the project's concept is to collide protons traveling in opposite directions at combined energy levels up to 40 TeV. The advisory panel report indicated the project would provide a capability not provided by existing or planned high-energy physics facilities. According to DOE officials, preconstruction research and development for SSC began in fiscal year 1984 and is expected to last 3 years. It is then expected that construction of the project would take 6 additional years and experimental use of the collider facility would begin in 1994. In March 1984 DOE assigned responsibility for the project's preconstruction research and development effort to Universities Research Association, Incorporated. There are four research and development groups involved in various aspects of the accelerator's technology development: Brookhaven National Laboratory, Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory, Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory, and the Houston Area Research Center. A central design group has been established by the Association to coordinate preliminary SSC technology development and identification of technical site requirements. The group is expected to issue a report to DOE by April 15, 1985. While no specific protocol has been established, DOE has contacted the National Academy of Sciences and the National Academy of Engineering about the possibility of those organizations assisting in the site selection process. Continuous Electron Beam Accelerator Facility Interest in a continuous-electron-beam nuclear physics accelerator surfaced in a National Research Council report entitled Future of Nuclear Science. The 1979 Long Range Plan for Nuclear Science prepared by the Nuclear Science Advisory Committee reported a need for a national electron accelerator laboratory. Subsequently, five proposals for a new facility were submitted to and reviewed by a Nuclear Science Advisory Committee Panel on Electron Accelerator Facilities. In 1983 the panel recommended the construction of a 4-GeV continuous-electron-beam accelerator facility (CEBAF) proposed by the Southeastern Universities Research Association. The panel indicated a need for an accelerator with higher energies and higher beam intensities than those currently available in order to better investigate the influence of quarks and gluons on the characteristics and interactions of nuclei. For fiscal year 1985, DOE provided research and development funding to the Association for a CEBAF facility to be built in Newport News, Virginia. In its fiscal year 1986 budget submission, DOE indicates that CEBAF meets the highest priority need for new accelerator construction in the nation's nuclear physics program. DOE plans to obtain funding to start construction in fiscal year 1987 and, after 6 years of construction, to have CEBAF operational in the 1993-94 time frame. Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider The 1983 Long Range Plan for Nuclear Science prepared by the Nuclear Science Advisory Committee recommended a relativistic heavy-ion collider as the highest priority--after CEBAF--for the next major nuclear physics facility to be constructed. This recommendation was made on the basis of "a new scientific opportunity of fundamental importance--the chance to find and to explore an entirely new phase of nuclear matter." The committee recommended an accelerator be built that can provide colliding beams of very heavy ions with energies of about 30 GeV per nucleon in each beam. In August 1984 Brookhaven National Laboratory submitted a proposal to DOE for construction of a Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider (RHIC). The RHIC would provide head-on colliding beams of heavy ions at about 100 GeV per nucleon in each beam. According to DOE, this collision will allow the study of quarks and gluons. According to the proposal, the construction of the facility represents the natural continuation of the laboratory's role as a center for high-energy physics and nuclear physics research and extends the uses of existing laboratory facilities. Although DOE has not formally approved Brookhaven's RHIC proposal, it has authorized funding for major upgrades to the existing Brookhaven facilities (see p. 20) that would enable the facility's accelerator to be used as an injection source for RHIC. Other accelerators Two other accelerators are receiving attention in the science community. The first is a very large linear collider and the second is LAMPF II (see below) proposed by the Los Alamos National Laboratory. DOE is funding long-range research at the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center to develop the technologies that would be necessary for a very large linear collider. This machine would expand the capabilities of the Stanford Linear Collider now under construction. The goal of this new accelerator would be to provide the capability to collide beams of electrons and positrons with an energy range up to several TeV. Before this accelerator can become a reality, however, numerous components must be designed and developed. No formal proposal has been submitted to the High Energy Physics Advisory Panel or to DOE by Stanford to build such an accelerator. In December 1984 the Los Alamos National Laboratory submitted a proposal to DOE to construct and operate LAMPF II. This facility would consist of the current linear accelerator (injector), a 6-GeV booster accelerator, and a 45-GeV synchrotron. The Los Alamos proposal indicated LAMPF II would provide facilities for basic research and education to a generation of scientists in the 1990's and well into the next century. If approved, Los Alamos officials believe that LAMPF II construction could begin in fiscal year 1988. LAMPF II has not been endorsed by DOE or the Nuclear Science Advisory Committee. CHAPTER 3 HOW MUCH DOES IT COST TO BUILD AND OPERATE DOE'S PHYSICS ACCELERATORS? DOE's support of physics research amounts to hundreds of millions of dollars annually. A major portion of these costs is to operate accelerator facilities and to upgrade these facilities to allow scientists to study the frontiers of physics. DOE's total support for the high-energy physics and nuclear physics programs has increased from $558 million in fiscal year 1983 to an estimated $728 million in fiscal year 1985, including construction costs, capital equipment purchases, and annual operating expenses. Also DOE's two, new planned facilities, if approved, are estimated to cost $4.3 billion to build and about $230 million a year to operate when completed. If substantial increases in federal funding to support these new facilities are not forthcoming, DOE's options appear to be quite limited. The options include closing existing facilities, obtaining greater foreign financial participation, and reducing upgrades to existing facilities. BUILDING AND OPERATING Conducting high-energy physics and nuclear physics experiments is based on using complex accelerator facilities. For the large facilities, like Fermilab, an extensive amount of research is necessary to develop the concept and the technology upon which the new accelerators are based. The technology must then be engineered and designed to assure reliability and operational efficiency. Because of the complexity and sophistication of modern accelerators, they are designed by developing separate subsystems (i.e., magnets, detection devices, computer systems, etc.) and then combining the various subsystems into a integrated unit. Depending on the complexity of the machines, prototypes or models of the accelerator subsystems may be constructed to demonstrate the workability of the various subsystems in the overall unit. The cost associated with this effort represents a significant portion of the program's cost. For example, in the high-energy physics program, about $90 million in fiscal year 1985 is for conducting research and development on accelerators under construction, developing new accelerator concepts, and improving existing accelerators. Constructing the high-energy physics accelerators is a major undertaking because of the size and complexity of the facilities involved. To illustrate the magnitude of the effort, DOE constructed the main Fermilab accelerator by digging a 4-mile circular tunnel 30 feet below ground. The 9-foot-wide tunnel was then encased in precast concrete. Inside the tunnel about 1,000 magnets were installed. Subsequently, DOE installed an additional 1,000 specially designed superconducting magnets, which are cooled |