By December 31, 2025, researchers who receive funds from U.S. federal funding agencies will be required to comply with updated public access policies—and this impact stretches to authors worldwide who collaborate with federally funded researchers. Are you ready for the change? Our guide can help.
All U.S. federal funders will have updated public access policies in place by December 31, 2025. These policies will apply to all researchers that receive any kind of funding from a U.S. federal agency—no matter the size of their contribution to a research project.
In other words, if you or one of your co-authors receives funding from a U.S. government agency for any part of their work, then you’ll be required to deposit a copy of your next research article in that funder’s repository as soon as it’s published in a journal.
If you’re an author on one of the thousands of articles published in ACS journals each year that acknowledge federal funding, but which aren’t currently available in that funder’s nominated repository, here’s what you need to do.
Jump to Section:
Step 1: Check all applicable funders' policies
Step 2: Check if you have an OA agreement with ACS
Step 3: Choose a journal
Step 4: Archive your accepted manuscript
Step 5: Check for other requirements
Plan ahead for success
Step 1: Check all applicable funders' policies
As we’ve noted, these new policies apply to all types of federal funding received throughout the research process. They also apply to all authors for an article, no matter the level of their involvement.
As a corresponding author, it’s your responsibility to check in with each of your co-authors and confirm which agency—or agencies—they received funding from. You'll then need to review each agency's public and open access policies and confirm their requirements.
It’s very likely that if your project is funded by multiple agencies, there will be significant overlap between their policies. Whatever route to publication you must choose, it has to comply with all funders’ requirements—so if you note any conflicting language in the policies, talk to the relevant grant officers to identify a route forward.
Step 2: Check if you have an OA agreement with ACS
More than 1,700 institutions worldwide, including hundreds across the U.S., have an OA agreement with ACS Publications. These provide submitting corresponding authors with support from their institution that enables them to use green and/or gold open access routes when publishing in ACS journals.
In practice, your institution’s agreement should provide all the support you need to publish your article and remain compliant with funder policies. You can use our lookup tool to find out if you're covered. (Note that agreements are only applied if the submitting corresponding author is affiliated by a participating institution.)
If you don’t see your employer on the list of participating institutions, ask your librarian—they may already be in active discussions with ACS about an institutional open access agreement.
Step 3: Choose a journal
If you’re covered by an institutional open access agreement, the information page for your institution on ACSOpenScience.org will detail which journals are included in the program.
If you don't have access to an institutional agreement, you'll need to confirm which publishing expenses your research grant will reimburse. This will be included in the terms of your grant, or within the text of your funder’s public access policy.
- If your grant funder supports ‘gold’ open access through payment of article publishing charges (APCs), you can choose immediate open access in any ACS journal. This makes the version of record—the article as it appears in the journal—immediately available to the public.
- Your grant funder may also cover payment of ACS’ article development charge. This reduced-cost option means that you can publish in any of ACS’ hybrid journals (which publish a mix of open access and subscription access articles). The version of record is published as subscription access, but you and your co-authors will be able to immediately deposit your accepted manuscript when the article is accepted for publication.
If your funder doesn’t reimburse publishing expenses, and you don’t have access to an institutional OA agreement, then you can choose to pay the applicable publishing charge using personal funding. You’ll find more information about the process here.
Step 4: Archive your accepted manuscript
A core part of federal funders’ new public access policies is the immediate deposition of the accepted manuscript to a designated repository. Your funder's policy will specify which repository to use.
If you’re publishing the version of record as gold OA with ACS, we’ll automatically send a copy to PubMed Central, which is also mirrored on EuropePMC. That means if your funder specifies PubMed Central or EuropePMC as its designated repository, no further action will be needed from you.
If your funder has designated a different repository, you'll need to self-archive your accepted manuscript. You’ll find more information in your funder’s public access policy.
If you have signed a Journal Publishing Agreement where you have declined gold open access and transferred copyright of the article to ACS, then a 12-month embargo period applies before your accepted manuscript can be made available in a repository. (Your funder may offer an exception in these cases—please contact your grant officer for more information.)
Step 5: Check for other requirements
Providing immediate public access to your accepted manuscript is likely to only be one part of complying with your funder’s public access policy.
In many cases, your funder may also require you to provide public access to some, or all, of the research data associated with your article.
Your research funders’ public access policy should be considered the definitive source of information about what’s required of grantees. If you have any questions, your grant officer should be able to provide more information.
Plan ahead for success
The evolution of funders’ public access policies has taken place over a number of years, but it’s important to know exactly what your whole research team’s requirements are. Potential consequences for non-compliance may include ineligibility for further funding, so if you’re the submitting corresponding author then it’s your responsibility to ensure the article is published in a way that meets all your co-authors’ needs.
ACS Publications is dedicated to ensuring you can publish your work in trusted journals and meet all research funders' policies, and we’ll keep working with funders and institutions to make compliant routes to publication as widely available as possible.
For more information on U.S. funder's public access policies, see our range of other articles below.