Most research finance departments are absolutely horrified at OpEx because any strange non-capital expenditure makes them look less efficient than the next research institute. This comes in handy when two labs are up for a grant, and they are equally qualified. The more efficient institute gets the grant. You can imagine asking for the lab credit card for EC2 time is not met with enthusiasm.
Exactly. I haven't worked at my old lab for more than 5 years, but they are still advertising on their web page the systems I built when employed there. Woo! 2010-era blade servers!