It directs all federal agencies with R&D expenditures to develop (or update) public access policies to ensure that research publications and supporting data created with federal funds be made publicly accessible without an embargo.
Some key features:
Overall
The
previous policy (2013) covered only federal agencies with more than $100 million in annual research & development expenditures.
The new policy appears to cover all federal agencies with R&D expenditures.
Research publications
Federal agencies should update or develop new public access plans for ensuring, as appropriate and consistent with applicable law, that all peer-reviewed scholarly publications authored or coauthored by individuals or institutions resulting from federally funded research are made freely available and publicly accessible by default in agency-designated repositories without any embargo or delay after publication.
- the 2013 policy allowed covered agencies to permit up to a 12-month embargo on making federally-funded research articles publicly available
Scientific data
Scientific data underlying peer-reviewed scholarly publications resulting from federally funded research should be made freely available and publicly accessible by default at the time of publication...
- the 2013 policy did not cover research data
- "scientific data include the recorded factual material commonly accepted
in the scientific community as of sufficient quality to validate and replicate research findings"
- "federal agencies should allow researchers to include reasonable publication costs and costs associated with submission, curation, management of data, and special handling instructions as allowable expenses in all research budgets."