The Omnibus Appropriations bill that passed yesterday in the House and is expected next week in the Senate includes $47 billion for the Department of Energy Loan Guarantee Program. This is an $8.5 billion increase over the 2008 Omnibus which provided the program $38.5 billion in authority. The increase goes to “renewable and/or energy efficient systems and manufacturing and distributed energy generation, transmission and distribution.”
One significant departure from last year's omnibus was the omission of time deadlines on the budget authority. In 2008, the $38.5 billion in budget authority expired at the end of the fiscal year. The lack of any expiration for the new $47 billion budget cap is a major concern for taxpayers because it allows the funds to remain on the books indefinitely, regardless of other circumstances that could impact the program.
The Omnibus language is very similar to the House and Senate Energy and Water bills proposed last summer. Since neither bill was enacted into law a compilation of their proposals was lumped into the giant omnibus. Notably the Senate Energy and Water bill did not include the increase for the renewable loan guarantees but it did eliminate time expirations that were included in the House bill. The House had originally proposed the authority expire in 2012 for nuclear projects and 2010 for other eligible projects.
The 2009 Omnibus also distributes the $47 billion in the same manner as the FY08 bill with the exception of the $8.5 billion additional authorization for the renewable section. The breakdown is as follows: $18.5 billion for nuclear power facilities
- $18.5 billion for renewable energy, transmission, energy efficiency
- $2 billion for front-end nuclear fuel cycle (uranium enrichment)
- $6 billion for coal based power generation and industrial gasification
- $2 billion for advanced coal gasification
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