WASHINGTON - Under the 2012 budget proposal offered today by House Republicans, the energy and environment programs in the Department of Energy would be cut by 91 percent, while preserving tax breaks for oil companies.
The Republican budget proposal would cut funding for energy and environment programs at the Department of Energy from $11 billion in 2011 down to $1 billion--of which about $700 million would have to be used for environmental programs, leaving only about $300 million for wind, solar, and other renewable energy programs, an outcome that will harm American competitiveness. The bill leaves largely intact the funding for nuclear weapons programs, nuclear waste management, and other non-energy functions of the department.
"The Republicans' shocking solution to our energy challenges is to take the energy out of the Department of Energy," said Rep. Edward J. Markey (D-Mass.), the top Democrat on the Natural Resources Committee and a senior member on the Energy and Commerce Committee. "Under the Republican Big Oil Budget, I guess we'd have to rename the Department of Energy the Department of Nuclear Weapons, Waste and Anything but Energy."
The Republicans' Big Oil Budget proposal also contains the surprising finding that oil companies are not energy corporations. In the budget proposal, an entire section is devoted to "Eliminating welfare for energy companies," yet the section makes clear that the only cuts would go to renewable energy and advanced research and development at the Department of Energy.
"If the Republicans are saying they will cut corporate welfare for energy, but plan to continue billions of dollars in tax breaks to oil companies, I guess the only logical conclusion we can reach is that the GOP thinks the most profitable companies in the history of the world aren't really corporations," said Rep. Markey. "In our multi-generational efforts to get off foreign oil, the Republicans are handing over our energy policy to, you guessed it, the oil companies."
"This budget proposal shows that Republicans aren't for an ‘All of the Above' energy strategy, they just want ‘Oil Above All'," said Rep. Markey. "Republicans claim they want to end corporate welfare for energy companies and not pick winners and losers, yet they protect government subsidies for oil and cut support for renewable energy."
