Senate subcommittee passes $37.5B energy, water funding bill

A Senate subcommittee Wednesday approved a bipartisan funding bill for the federal government’s energy and water development programs.

The senators decided to avoid hot-button issues in writing the $37.5 billion bill, which has no controversial policy provisions, unlike the House version of the legislation that passed earlier in the day.

{mosads}“The bill has no controversial riders, the bill is bipartisan, and it’s the kind of bill that ought to be able to go to committee tomorrow and go to the majority leader and let him put it on the floor,” Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.), chairman of the Appropriations subcommittee that wrote the bill, said at the meeting where it was approved.

The bill would increase funding $355 million over the 2016 levels, with a $1.163 billion increase for the Department of Energy’s defense-related programs and an $808 million decrease for the non-defense portions of the bill, which include DOE and the Army Corps of Engineers.

“The bill that Sen. [Dianne] Feinstein and I have negotiated has focused on discretionary funding; it invests in our waterways; it puts us one step closer to doubling basic energy research; it helps to resolve the nuclear waste stalemate that both she and I are determined, one way or another, to resolve,” Alexander said.

Following the tradition of the Senate Appropriations Committee, the panel did not release the full bill Wednesday when the subcommittee approved it.

But Alexander highlighted certain aspects of the legislation, like the fact that it puts the country on a path toward doubling basic energy research, through major increases to funding for programs like the DOE’s science office and the Advanced Research Projects Agency – Energy.

He also emphasized how much the bill does for nuclear power, a top priority for Alexander.

“Our legislation sends a strong signal about our support for developing new technologies that will support the next generation of nuclear plants,” he said, pointing to nearly $100 million in funding for advanced nuclear reactor research and another nearly $100 million for small modular reactors, along with a pilot project for consolidated nuclear waste storage that would be separate from the proposed Yucca Mountain site.

Feinstein said the bill represents a number of compromises on the part of Democrats, but she is happy with it nonetheless.

“For most of the non-defense accounts, the bill essentially provides flat funding compared to fiscal year 2016,” she said “Given the budget climate, this is good news.”

While the senators considered making changes to the costly Mixed-Oxide Fuel Fabrication Facility under construction in South Carolina, they decided not to make changes. Instead, they asked the Senate Armed Services Committee to hold a hearing on the project and consider options to defund it.