March 17, 2014

HOUSE APPROPRIATORS LOOK TO CUT EM FUNDING BELOW FY 2013 REQUEST

By ExchangeMonitor

House appropriators aren’t supporting the Department of Energy’s FY 2013 budget request for its Office of Environmental Management, instead proposing a small funding cut in their version of the FY 2013 Energy and Water Appropriations bill scheduled to be marked up in subcommittee today. Under the bill, the text of which was released yesterday, EM would be funded at a total of approximately $5.55 billion, down approximately $106 million from DOE’s request. The bill includes proposed funding cuts for defense environmental cleanup activities, which covers most major EM sites, along with uranium enrichment D&D efforts. For defense environmental cleanup work, the bill would provide approximately $4.92 billion, a cut of approximately $100 million from the request. House appropriators also appear to have again rejected a DOE proposal to reauthorize contributions to the federal uranium enrichment D&D fund, along with a proposed fund payment of approximately $463 million. For uranium enrichment D&D work, the bill would provide approximately $431 million, a cut of $11 million from DOE’s request. Details of site-by-site funding levels in the House spending bill were not available yesterday. To view the bill, please click here.

In a statement yesterday, House Energy and Water Appropriations Subcommittee Chairman Rodney Frelinghuysen said, “The nation faces challenging fiscal realities, yet this is a fair bill that recognizes our highest responsibilities—the defense of our country and support for American innovation and competitiveness. To protect the interests of the taxpayer, our legislation enhances Congressional oversight of the agencies under our jurisdiction and cuts spending on lower priority programs, ensuring that every hard-earned taxpayer dollar will be well spent.” DOE cleanup chief David Huizenga, though, has sought to warn lawmakers against providing less funding than DOE requested for its cleanup program. “This year we requested a little bit lower and more in line with where [lawmakers] have been able to appropriate the last few years,” Huizenga said at a House Cleanup Caucus briefing in February, adding, “We really need to emphasize that it’s important that we stay there. We didn’t have much give before, but it’s pretty much gone now. So in order to meet compliance agreements, this is … a responsible, relative to everything that’s going on, request and we’re going to need it.”

When it comes to Yucca Mountain, the bill provides $35 million for the repository project, which the administration shuttered two years ago. The bill prohibits any appropriated funds from being used “to conduct closure of adjudicatory functions, technical review, or support activities associated with the Yucca Mountain geologic repository license application, or for actions that irrevocably remove the possibility that Yucca Mountain may be a repository option in the future.”

Comments are closed.