Washington (Platts)--17Jul2007

The US House of Representatives on Tuesday passed a $31.6-billion 2008
energy and water spending bill by a 312-112 vote. The bill would provide a
significant increase in funding for solar energy, biofuels and other
clean-energy technologies, as well as $1 billion in funds for members'
priority projects. 

     The vote margin would be sufficient to withstand President Bush's
threatened veto of the measure, and any spending bill that significantly
exceeds his budget request.

     The bill would provide the Department of Energy with $25.2 billion for
fiscal 2008, an increase of $1.1 billion over the current funding level and
$480 million more than DOE requested. Renewable energy programs would receive
$632 million more than the Bush administration request.

     The bill would also increase funding for various clean-coal programs,
providing these initiatives with $709 million, or $142 million more than DOE
requested. 

     DOE science programs would also see increased funding, especially
initiatives that use state-of-the-art "supercomputers" to model the effects of
global warming. 

     The bill funded some of the Bush administration's nuclear energy
priorities, but not others. The Global Nuclear Energy Partnership, which is
designed to spur a renaissance in civilian nuclear energy through the
reprocessing of spent nuclear fuel and other means, would receive only $120
million compared with the administration's $405 million request. 

     The proposed federal nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain in Nevada
would receive all of the administration's requested $494 million, however,
despite the project's low political clout since Nevada Democrat and Yucca
opponent Harry Reid assumed the Senate's top job earlier in 2007. 

     Meanwhile, a group of Republicans failed to eliminate all or part of a $1
billion earmarks package inserted into the bill by unanimous consent after it
was approved by the appropriations committee. 

     Appropriators opted for a post-committee approach to attaching earmarks
to the measure so they can receive extra scrutiny, Appropriations Chairman
David Obey, Democrat-Wisconsin has said. 

     The amendment by Representative John Campbell, Republican-California,
that would have struck the entire earmark package, was defeated on a 39-388
recorded vote.

		--Jean Chemnick, jean_chemnick@platts.com