Managers of the fusion program at the Department of Energy (DOE) say they are just looking for a practical way to salvage a program whose budget fell 32% this year, to 244 dollar million, and could well drop further next year. But to U.S. fusion advocates, the department is running up a white flag. So last week, when DOE asked members of its Fusion Energy Advisory Committee to help design a program acceptable to Congress that would cost between 200 dollar million and 275 dollar million a year, several panelists argued that the department instead should be fighting for a bigger slice of the federal pie.
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