A tortured history of cost overruns and shoddy management made the SSC a fat target. The Department of Energy (DOE) followed the classic Washington bait-and-switch strategy for funding–come in low and pump up the price after winning approval. Introduced in 1982 at $4.4 billion, its projected cost grew to $5.9 billion in 1989 and $11 billion earlier this year. Foreign contributions that were expected to defray the expense never materialized. Universities Research Associates, the consortium of scientists hired by DOE to design and build the project, couldn’t account for what it had spent. A DOE inspector general’s report earlier this year cataloged millions in questionable charges, including $56,000 for potted plants in project offices.
The House had tried twice in the last 16 months to kill the SSC. Both times the Senate delivered a reprieve, led by powerful patrons like Phil Gramm of Texas and Bennett Johnston of Louisiana, whose state was home to a major project contractor. After a third swing of the ax this summer, the Senate–aided by the Clinton administration–restored the complete 1994 appropriation of $600 million. House leaders angered many members by signing off on the deal in conference committee.
Tuesday’s uprising–backed by so of 114 freshmen–was an unusual display of backbone for the House. The SSC funding was lodged in a $22.2 billion appropriations bill filled with local water and energy projects. Members voted 282-143 to send the bill back to conference with instructions to strip it of the super collider, not knowing whether leadership would retaliate by knocking out their cherished district programs. But SSC supporters gave up. On Thursday the conference cut off all funding but termination costs.
The SSC is part of a recent mini-revolt in the House against deficit-fattening domestic spending, Subsidies for honey, wool, mohair and a $158 million appropriation for NASNs Advanced Solid Rocket Motor have also gotten the hook. A bipartisan working group is developing a new package of cuts that will exceed the $10 billion in reductions President Clinton will soon propose–part of the deal he cut with moderate Democrats to pass his budget last August.
The defeat of the SSC dismayed leading physicists. “The country has lost a tremendous opportunity to participate in the future of scientific discovery,” says Nobel laureate Steven Weinberg of the University of Texas. Researchers say its esoteric mission–producing high-speed collisions of protons to probe the fundamental nature of matter and, ultimately the origins of the universe–made it more vulnerable than less scientifically valuable programs with better political connections, like the space station. “This became a symbol of budgetcutting,” says MIT professor Jerome Friedman. “Nobody ever knew what it was about, our constituency isn’t very big and we don’t give away PAC money.” Some hope that a different political climate will one day help revive the SSC. For now, it is a tunnel to nowhere.
