Karen Frantz
GHG Monitor
1/17/14
The FY 2014 omnibus appropriations bill approved by Congress this week largely supports coal interests and boosts Department of Energy funding for carbon capture and storage and power research and development, but at the same time cuts funding for clean air and climate regulation at the Environmental Protection Agency. The spending package rejected President Obama’s requested cuts to the Department of Energy’s CCS and power systems research budget, instead providing $392.34 million, about 40 percent higher than the requested amount of $276.63 million.
“Funds recommended for CCS and Power Systems shall be available to continue to advance the full scope of technologies for the reduction of carbon emissions conducted at the Department of Energy’s National Carbon Capture Center, including direct carbon capture and technologies or methods to reduce the cost of or advance the efficiency or reliability of post-combustion capture technologies, pre-combustion capture technologies, and oxy-combustion systems,” the energy and water report issued alongside the omnibus package said. The report also said that “The Department is further directed to use funds from CCS and Power Systems for both coal and natural gas research and development as it determines to be merited, as long as such research does not occur at the expense of coal research and development.”
But not all elements of carbon capture and storage received a boost in the omnibus. Although Congress decided to increase by 78 percent funding for carbon storage to $108.9 million compared to the President’s request, it also decreased by nearly 20 percent funding for carbon capture to $92 million compared to Obama’s request. The funding package also does not include funding for a Natural Gas Capture Prize, a White House proposal that would award an inducement prize for the first entity to integrate large-scale carbon capture and storage technology into a natural gas combined cycle plant, for which Obama had requested $25 million. However, the omnibus does include $10 million for additional support of enhanced oil recovery technologies and $57 million for Regional Carbon Sequestration Partnerships. And Congress also approximately doubled the President’s requests for advanced energy systems to $99.5 million and for cross cutting research to $41.93, and raised the funding for NETL coal research and development to $50 million from the requested $35 million.
Export-Import Bank
Although the omnibus did not include a previously discussed rider to Interior-Environment that would have rolled back the Environmental Protection Agency’s ability to set limits for carbon emissions from new and existing coal-fired power plants, it did include a provision from Republicans that would prohibit the Export-Import Bank of the United States and the Overseas Private Investment Corporation from “blocking coal and other power-generation projects, which will increase exports of U.S. goods or services," according to House Appropriations Committee Republicans.
The Export-Import Bank announced last month that it will no longer provide financing for coal-fired power plants unless they use carbon capture and storage technology, aligning itself with the carbon reduction goals in President Obama’s Climate Action Plan and following a similar shift from the U.S. Treasury Department to end public financing for coal power plants without CCS.
Clean Air and Climate Takes Hit
The omnibus package also takes aim at the Environmental Protection Agency’s Clean Air and Climate program, providing $120.43 million under Science and Technology programs, $5.54 million less than President Obama’s request, and providing $277.5 million under environmental programs and management, $30.78 million less than requested. The EPA’s Science and Technology programs in general also took a hit, with the omnibus allocating $759.16 million, $24.77 million less than the President’s request. Research into air, climate and energy was also slashed by $10.75 million, to $94.97 million.
