EPA’s Proposed Reorganization of Its Office of Research and Development

INSIGHTi

EPA’s Proposed Reorganization of Its Office

of Research and Development

August 26, 2025

On May 2, 2025, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator Lee Zeldin announced and

opined on a reorganization effort that would integrate scientific staff from EPA’s Office of Research and

Development (ORD) into existing EPA program offices (e.g., Office of Air and Radiation, Office of

Water). Additionally, Administrator Zeldin announced the establishment of a new Office of Applied

Science and Environmental Solutions (OASES) to “align research and put science at the forefront of the

agency’s rulemakings and technical assistance to states.” Subsequently, on July 18, 2025, EPA announced

a reduction in force (RIF) that “will impact” ORD. According to EPA, the agency expects the RIF and its

ORD reorganization efforts to reduce spending. EPA’s reorganization efforts may be of interest to

Congress in its oversight role as it assesses agency staffing, funding, and activities to implement various

environmental pollution control statutes (e.g., Clean Air Act, Clean Water Act, Solid Waste Disposal Act)

to achieve a range of statutory objectives.

Typical ORD research and development (R&D) activities have included monitoring and modeling of

pollutants and contaminants within the environment, assessing the toxicity of various pollutants and

contaminants on human or ecological health, and developing and evaluating environmental remediation

technologies. These R&D activities, whether they are conducted by ORD or some other entity (e.g.,

federal or state agency, academia, industry, nonprofit), may help EPA program offices assess whether

environmental conditions necessitate a regulatory or response action and whether particular regulatory or

response actions are effective. ORD generally has had discretion in determining which R&D projects to

support with its funding and whether R&D projects would be conducted internally by its own staff or

through external grants or cooperative agreements. ORD’s current organization consists of four

headquarters offices and four research centers, which are further divided into divisions and branches.

While most divisions focus on specific scientific or engineering disciplines, some are regionally focused.

According to EPA’s FY2025 budget justification, the FY2025 funding requested for ORD was expected to

support approximately 1,900 full-time equivalent employees. EPA has not publicly reported actual ORD

staffing for FY2025.

Since its inception in 1970, EPA has maintained an office, led by an Assistant Administrator, dedicated to

R&D activities to complement its program offices, which primarily focus on pollution control. Pursuant

to Reorganization Plan No. 3 of 1970, which established EPA, certain laboratories, facilities, and other

resources from multiple federal departments and agencies (e.g., Department of the Interior, Department of

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Agriculture) were transferred to EPA. Organizationally, most of the laboratories, facilities, and other

resources were transferred to ORD, but certain laboratories were assigned to program offices for specific

purposes (e.g., Office of Air and Radiation’s National Vehicle and Fuel Emissions Laboratory).

In the late 1970s, multiple Environmental Research, Development, and Demonstration Authorization Acts

(ERDDAAs) were enacted to explicitly authorize appropriations for EPA’s various R&D activities and to

provide direction on research planning and priorities within EPA. During this time, Congress directed

EPA to invest in long-term environmental R&D activities to complement existing monitoring and data

collection activities that support potential rulemaking and enforcement. Additionally, some pollution

control statutes enacted during this time period, such as the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) and the

Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA), included specific

R&D authorities (e.g., TSCA §10, CERCLA §311) that complement their regulatory and enforcement

authorities.

In the absence of annual ERDDAAs, Congress has influenced EPA’s R&D activities through

appropriations. Congress appropriates funding for integrated and transdisciplinary research program areas

within the agency’s Science and Technology (S&T) appropriations account. For FY2025, enacted

appropriations for the research program areas within EPA’s S&T account totaled $501.4 million. EPA’s

FY2026 budget request proposes $299.0 million (a 40.3% decrease) for these research program areas. For

FY2026 appropriations, the House and Senate Appropriations Committees have differed on whether to

adopt the Administration’s proposed funding levels for the research program areas and the process for

reorganizing ORD. H.Rept. 119-215 proposes to adopt EPA’s FY2026 budget request funding levels for

the research program areas and expresses support for “the Agency’s proposed Workforce reshaping to

right-size the Agency and effectively carry out the Agency’s statutory authorities.” S.Rept. 119-46

proposes $491.4 million (a 2.0% decrease) for the research program area funding levels and would direct

EPA to “immediately halt all actions related to the closure, reduction, reorganization, or other similar such

changes to ORD and the EPA scientific workforce.” S.Rept. 119-46 also notes that proposed changes to

ORD could be included in EPA’s FY2027 budget request for congressional consideration of FY2027

appropriations.

Different organizational frameworks to plan, manage, and conduct R&D activities at EPA have their

advantages and disadvantages in terms of informing EPA decisionmaking under the statutes that the

agency administers. Whether the proposed reorganization, in which R&D activities would be coordinated

by OASES and managed within program offices rather than largely by one R&D office, would result in

more efficiencies remains to be seen. Even if ORD were no longer to exist as a separate office within

EPA, congressional oversight of EPA’s R&D activities would still involve consideration of perennial

issues, such as

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the appropriate level of funding for specific R&D activities and for R&D activities

overall;

the extent to which funding should be divided among basic research, applied research,

technical assistance, and information dissemination;

whether EPA’s R&D staffing and activities would be more effective if centralized in one

office or decentralized across EPA’s program offices; and

the adoption and implementation of measures (e.g., policies, guidance, programs) to

ensure that the utility and quality of R&D activities within the agency are maximized.

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Author Information

Jerry H. Yen

Analyst in Environmental Policy

Angela C. Jones

Specialist in Environmental Policy

Disclaimer

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