Skip to main content

Republican Energy Approps Bill Slashes 4/5 of ARPA-E Budget, Garamendi Amendment to Restore Funding to Game-changing Energy Research Fails

July 12, 2011

Image removed.

Congressman Garamendi on importance of ARPA-E
in preparing America for future energy needs.

WASHINGTON, DC – Congressman John Garamendi (D-Walnut Creek, CA), a Member of the House Natural Resources Committee, today introduced an amendment to H.R. 2354, the radical Republican Energy and Water appropriations bill. House Republicans propose slashing more than 80 percent from President Obama’s Advanced Research Projects Agency – Energy (ARPA-E) appropriations request, endangering invaluable game-changing energy research. Garamendi’s revenue-neutral amendment would have taken money out of a fossil fuel research account instead, but it was defeated by a 145-276 vote.

"Ostriches are supposed to stick their heads in the sand; responsible lawmakers are supposed to help their country compete in a tough global economy. Vital game-changing energy research should be above politics, but today, the Republican majority’s pattern of actively dismantling anything that hints at American-made clean technology continued," said Garamendi, who as a state legislator in the 1970s authored the first alternative energy state tax credit in America. "We need to Make It In America, especially advanced clean energy, but we won’t get there without basic building block research first. Today, a majority of Members in Congress failed the American people."

Proposed by the National Academies in 2006, ARPA-E, modeled after the acclaimed Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) program that created the Internet, focuses “on creative ‘out-of-the-box’ transformational energy research that industry by itself cannot or will not support due to its high risk but where success would provide dramatic benefits for the nation.”

Garamendi added, "Because of DARPA, we have the Internet and the millions of jobs it supports. ARPA-E is modeled after DARPA and is working to revolutionize energy production, but they can’t power the world, clean our air, create good jobs, and direct our country away from foreign oil when their budget is practically zeroed out. While America dawdles, our competitors in Asia and Europe continue to invest billions in energy research."

ARPA-E focuses exclusively on high risk, high payoff concepts – technologies promising genuine transformation in the ways we generate, store and utilize energy. While the Department of Energy invests in conventional energy research, ARPA-E is not intended to augment these efforts. If just a fraction of the projects funded by ARPA-E are successful in reaching the marketplace, the U.S. will benefit greatly by creating new industries and jobs, making energy technologies substantially more cost-saving and profitable, and accelerating the timeframe for achieving energy and climate goals.

Six ARPA-E projects, amounting to $26 million in federal investment, have already attracted over $100 million in private investment. With its small non-bureaucratic structure, and its high-caliber personnel hired for limited terms from the private sector, ARPA-E is a model of efficiency, speed, and innovation within government. They have reduced standard contracting time by roughly 75 percent. The President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology has highlighted ARPA-E as the new gold standard for hiring talent, reviewing proposals, and contracting.