The full House Appropriations Committee on Tuesday voted 32 to 24 in favor of a fiscal year 2023 spending bill with almost $7.9 billion for nuclear weapons cleanup at the Department of Energy.
That’s about even with the 2022 appropriation, and with the Joe Biden administration’s ask, taking into account the roughly $190 million the White House in June added to its spending request for DOE’s Office of Environmental Management (EM). Initially, in the budget request rolled out in March, Biden sought $7.64 billion for EM.
The extra spending the White House proposed in June was mostly for liquid-waste cleanup at Hanford, funding for which the administration wanted to increase at the expense of solid-waste cleanup at the former plutonium production complex in eastern Washington state. The House Appropriations Committee declined to go along with that request.
The DOE’s initial budget request for the Richland Operations Office was about $926 million or $24 million less than the 2022 level of $950 million. The request also sought about $1.69 billion, $42 million more than the fiscal 2022 level of $1.65 billion for the Office of River Protection, which oversees the 56 million gallons of chemical and radioactive waste stored in underground tanks at Hanford.
Meanwhile, Tuesday’s vote clears the way for the full U.S. House of Representatives to take action on the bill, which would set EM’s budget for the fiscal year that starts Oct. 1. House leadership had not scheduled debate as of Friday.
The final committee vote was largely among party lines with GOP “no” votes including Rep. Mike Simpson (R-Idaho), whose district includes the Idaho National Laboratory, Rep. Chuck Fleischmann (R-Tenn.), whose district includes much of the Oak Ridge Site, and Rep. Dan Newhouse (R-Wash.) whose district includes the Hanford Site.
“There are many things in the majority’s mark that if considered individually, House Republicans could support,” Simpson said. But Simpson said the overall bill is based on a funding level passed without GOP support.
Likewise, Newhouse lauded many aspects of the bill that keeps Hanford funding at the same $2.6 billion funding level from fiscal 2022.
Defense environmental cleanup spending, the largest tranche of money for EM, would be relatively flat with fiscal 2022 levels, growing slightly to $6.72 billion in fiscal 2023 up from $6.71 billion. The proposal is less than the $7.1-billion budget request sought by the Department of Energy in the initial fiscal 2023 request.
The panel also recommends almost $334 million in non-defense environmental spending, more than $10 million above what was requested.
The Uranium Enrichment Decontamination and Decommissioning (UED&D) Fund, set up for remediation of the gaseous diffusion plants in Kentucky, Ohio and Tennessee, would be funded at $823 million, which is less than the $860 million level during fiscal 2022 but more than the $822 million sought in the DOE request.
The Paducah Site in Kentucky would receive $199 million from the UED&D fund in fiscal 2023, down $41 million from the Congress-approved $240 million in fiscal 2022. The Oak Ridge Site in Tennessee is slated for $93 million in fiscal 2023 uranium decommissioning money during the new fiscal year, down $12 million from fiscal 2022. Finally, UED&D funds for the Portsmouth Site is slated for $480 million in the new fiscal year, up $13 million from fiscal 2022.
The Savannah River Site in South Carolina would receive almost $1.6 billion, up $24 million from the DOE request and up more than $3 million from 2022’s $1.592 million enacted level, according to the charts included in the subcommittee report. It should be noted that unlike DOE’s request, the report does not provide each site’s budget for safeguards and security – essentially, spending for guards, gates and guns.
The Energy and Water spending bill would fund construction of a new emergency operations center at Savannah River at $26 million in the new fiscal year, about $17 million more than the total provided for the project in fiscal 2022.
Environmental cleanup at Idaho National Laboratory would stay at the 2022 level of $443 million, greater than the $391 million sought by the DOE request. Likewise, the Oak Ridge Site in Tennessee would see its fiscal 2023 environmental fundings stay flat at $486 million. The Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in Tennessee would receive $456 million in fiscal 2023, up from its 2022 level of $443 million.
The Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico is slated for $286 million in environmental cleanup money in the fiscal 2023 bill, up from $275 million in fiscal 2022.
Environmental remediation funds for the Nevada National Security Site is set for about $63 million in fiscal 2023, less than the $76 million approved by Congress for the current fiscal year.
The West Valley Demonstration Project in New York state would receive about $90 million in fiscal 2023, roughly $2 million more than what’s budgeted for the current fiscal year.
The Committee provides $115 million for small sites, down from $119 million from fiscal 2022.
