Washington (Platts)--23May2007
The US House Appropriations Energy and Water Development Subcommittee Wednesday approved a $31.6-billion fiscal 2008 spending measure that would direct large spending increases to energy efficiency, renewable energy and science. The bill allocates a little over $25 billion to Department of Energy, up from the fiscal 2007 allocation of $24.1 billion. Subcommittee Chairman Peter Visclosky, Democrat-Indiana, said the bill addresses the nation's energy crisis, which has been highlighted this week by record-breaking gasoline prices, while promoting climate change policy and protecting national security. "We have a responsibility to do everything we can to address the energy crisis," said Visclosky, who acknowledged there was nothing the Congress could do to lower prices in the near term. "I feel our bill provides significant funding increases for research, development and demonstration on renewable energy, conservation, carbon sequestration, and nuclear energy." The bill slashes DOE's $405 million request for the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership to $120 million, raises to $1.9 billion from $1.5 billion in fiscal 2007 spending for energy efficiency and renewable energy and devotes $4.5 billion to science, up from $3.8 billion this year. The bill sets aside $4.3 billion for earmarks, most of which would go to Army Corps of Engineers' water projects. It does not specify how the earmarked money would be spent. That raised the ire of the Appropriations Committee's ranking Republican Jerry Lewis, of California, who said it put the earmarking process further into the shadows, rather than making it more transparent as Democrats have promised to do. The bill includes also language chastising DOE for failing to properly manage large projects. Visclosky expressed concern about DOE management failures earlier in the year and put language in the bill requiring the agency to work with the Government Accountability Office to improve project management. --Daniel Whitten, daniel_whitten@platts.com
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