Obama FY 2014 Budget: Energy

Highlights:

In total, the President’s 2014 Budget provides $28.4 billion in discretionary funds for DOE to support its mission, an eight percent increase over the 2012 enacted level. It includes $11.7 billion for nuclear security, a six percent increase over the 2012 enacted level.

The Budget provides $2.8 billion for the Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE) to accelerate research and development, to build on ongoing successes, and to further reduce the costs and increase the use of critical clean energy technologies. Within EERE, the Budget increases funding by 75 percent above 2012 levels for development and demonstration of the next generation of advanced vehicles and by 42 percent for the next generation of advanced biofuels and biorefineries. It increases  funding by 29 percent for innovative projects to make clean, renewable power, such as solar energy and off-shore wind, more easily integrated onto the electric grid and as affordable as electricity from conventional sources, without subsidies.

The Budget provides $735 million for the Office of Nuclear Energy, which includes funding for advanced small modular reactors R&D. The Budget also includes $379 million for the Advanced Research Projects Agency–Energy, a program that seeks to fund transformative energy research.

The Budget includes $200 million in one-time funding for Race to the Top performance based awards to support State governments that implement effective policies to cut energy waste and modernize the grid.

The Budget provides DOE with $365 million to expand important efforts on innovative manufacturing processes and advanced industrial materials.  These innovations will enable U.S. companies to cut manufacturing costs and reduce the life cycle energy consumption of technologies, while improving product quality and accelerating product development.

The Budget advances innovative technologies through $575 million in discretionary funding for vehicle technology activities—an increase of 75 percent over the 2012 enacted level. The Budget continues to promote fuel supply diversification by providing $282 million at DOE to develop and demonstrate conversion technologies to produce cellulosic ethanol and other advanced biofuels, such as algae-derived biofuels and “drop-in” replacements for diesel and jet fuel, for civilian and military uses.

The Budget provides over $5 billion to the Office of Science, which funds research grants and unique scientific facilities in several areas of science, including physics, biology, climate and environmental sciences, fusion sciences, computational sciences, materials science, and chemistry. This ia a 5.7 percent increase over the 2012 enacted level for the Office of Science.

The Budget provides $421 million for the Fossil Energy Research and Development program, including an investment of $266 million in fossil energy R&D primarily dedicated to developing cost-effective carbon capture and storage and advanced power systems. 

The Budget includes a one-time, $25 million inducement prize for the first natural gas combined cycle power plant to integrate large-scale carbon capture and storage. The Budget also includes $12 million to fund DOE’s participation in a multi-agency research initiative aimed at advancing technology and methods to safely and responsibly develop America’s natural gas resources.

Within the Office of Electricity Delivery and Energy Reliability, the Budget invests $153 million in R&D and other activities that will further transition to a Smart Grid. The Budget proposes $7.87 billion for Weapons Activities, an increase of $654 million, or nine percent above the 2012 enacted level, to maintain a safe, secure, and effective nuclear deterrent as described in the Administration’s Nuclear Posture Review (NPR) of 2010.

The Budget also proposes $1.25 billion for work on naval reactors, an increase of $166 million, or 15 percent above the 2012 enacted level. The Budget proposes $2.14 billion to prevent the proliferation of nuclear weapons. The plutonium disposition program has been building the Mixed Oxide (MOX) Fuel Fabrication Facility in South Carolina to enable DOE to dispose of plutonium by converting it to MOX fuel and burning it in commercial nuclear reactors.

The Budget includes $5.6 billion for Environmental Management (EM) to ensure that nuclear wastes from the production of weapons during the Cold War are safely processed, secured, and disposed of in a timely manner. The EM program continues to clean up waste and contamination, focusing on its legally enforceable regulatory commitments. (DOE)