The House of Representatives’ Science, Space, and Technology Committee last week advanced legislation that would assign the Department of Energy’s Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (ARPA-E) to assist in disposal of radioactive waste.
Committee Chair Eddie Bernice Johnson’s (D-Texas) ARPA-E Reauthorization Act of 2019 now awaits action by the full House.
The bill would make a set of changes to the 2007 America Competes Act that established the Energy Department branch. Among those is directing ARPA-E to provide “transformative solutions to improve the management, clean-up, and disposal of radioactive waste and spent nuclear fuel.”
Rep. Frank Lucas (R-Okla.), the committee’s ranking Republican, had introduced a competing bill that would have offered slightly different language on radioactive waste: “provide transformative solutions to improve the management, clean-up, and disposal of (I) low-level radioactive waste; (II) spent nuclear fuel; and (III) high-level radioactive waste.” However, Lucas and Johnson said Thursday they had reached a compromise under which he would support her bill.
Toward that, the committee approved an amendment from Johnson with several changes to her legislation. Most notably, the amendment lowers the amount of funding ARPA-E would be authorized to receive from fiscal years 2021 to 2024. The original bill set the annual numbers at $550 million for 2021, $675 million for 2022, $825 million for 2023, and $1 billion for 2024. The amendment revises those to $497 million for 2021, $567 million for 2022, $651 million for 2023, and $750 million for 2024. Those amounts are closer to the authorization figures in Lucas’ bill, which topped out at $500 million in fiscal 2024.
ARPA-E’s mission is to advance development of energy technologies ahead of commercial investment. The Trump administration Energy Department has sought to fully defund the agency, but Congress continues to provide annual appropriations.
“ARPA-E has already demonstrated incredible success in advancing high-risk, high-reward energy technology solutions that neither the public sector nor the private sector have been willing or able to support in the past,” Johnson said ahead of the unanimous voice vote on her bill.
