National Laboratories: Better Performance Reporting Could Aid Oversight of Laboratory-Directed R&D Program

United States. General Accounting Office.

United States. General Accounting Office.

关键词: Government accountability -- United States.;    science and technology;    national laboratories;    letter report;   

RP-ID  :  GAO-01-927
RP-ID  :  232767

美国|英语

来源: UNT Digital Library

【 摘 要 】

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The Department of Energy (DOE) created the Laboratory Directed Research and Development (LDRD) program in fiscal year 1992. This program formalized a long-standing policy of giving its multi-program national laboratories discretion to conduct self-initiated, independent research and development (R&D). Since then, DOE's multi-program national laboratories have spent more than $2 billion on LDRD projects. DOE's three largest multi-program national laboratories account for nearly three-quarters of laboratory-wide LDRD spending. All LDRD projects GAO reviewed at the five laboratories met DOE's guidelines for selection. In addition, each of the five laboratories created the internal controls necessary to reasonably ensure compliance with DOE's guidelines. Each laboratory issues annual LDRD reports that contain performance indicators, such as the numbers of patents obtained, publications, copyrights, awards, and relevance of the research to DOE's missions. The reports present performance information in various formats, making it difficult to focus on the most relevant performance information."