The House Armed Services Committee’s version of the National Defense Authorization Act for fiscal 2022 would authorize the full $6.84 billion sought by the Joe Biden administration for Defense Environmental Cleanup at Department of Energy nuclear sites, according to the chairman’s mark.
The House Armed Services Committee early Thursday approved its version of the 2022 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) by a vote of 57-to-two.
Defense cleanup of 16 Cold War and Manhattan Project sites accounts for most of the spending for the DOE’s Office of Environmental Management, and the draft National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) from the House panel would exceed the $6.57 billion approved in the Senate Armed Services Committee’s bill in July.
The full House of Representatives voted in July to approve an Office of Environmental Management budget of about $7.8 billion, which includes $6.6 billion for defense cleanup in the fiscal year starting Oct. 1. The Senate Appropriations Committee has called for $6.5 billion in Defense Environmental Cleanup, which would still be more than the fiscal 2021 level of $6.4 billion.
One of the non-controversial amendments passed during a marathon markup session Wednesday night includes restoration of payments in lieu of taxes for the Savannah River Site in Aiken, S.C., something the Biden administration did not request for fiscal year 2022. The appropriations bills for fiscal 2022 also restored these payments, which are a way of compensating local municipalities near DOE host sites for having a large neighbor that can’t be taxed.
The House panel’s NDAA proposal mirrors the DOE’s quest to provide the two offices at the Hanford Site in Washington state, the agency’s largest and more complex cleanup property, with a combined $2.47 billion. House and Senate appropriations measures would up Hanford spending to about $2.6 billion
Whenever the full Senate and House of Representatives pass their NDAA bills, a conference committee drawn from the two chambers will be organized to smooth out the differences between the two versions. Eventually, the defense authorization bill would go to the president for his signature.
Last year the final NDAA bills passed both the House and Senate by wide margins on Dec. 11, 2020. Although then-President Donald Trump vetoed the legislation on Dec. 23, the two chambers voted within the following days to override the veto.
