Highlighting the renewable energy components of the economic stimulus package, President Barack Obama said in Denver on Tuesday that the $787 billion American Recovery and Reinvestment Act was not the end of the economic downturn, but rather the beginning of the end.
Obama signed the bill into law at the Denver Museum of Nature & Science where he later toured the museum’s solar-panel installation. Major energy portions of the stimulus include:
- A three-year extension to the tax credit for wind, which would have expired at the end of this year, and an extension until the end of 2013 for geothermal and biomass renewable-energy projects. The credit has been increased to 30 percent of the investment.
- $4.5 billion in direct spending to modernize the electricity grid with smart-grid technologies.
- $6.3 billion in state energy-efficient and clean-energy grants and $4.5 billion to make federal buildings more energy efficient.
- $6 billion in loan guarantees for renewable energy systems, biofuel projects, and electric-power transmission facilities.
- $2 billion in loans to manufacture advanced batteries and components for applications such as plug-in electric cars.
- $5 billion to weatherize homes of up to 1 million low-income people.
- $3.4 billion appropriated to the Department of Energy for fossil energy research and development, such as storing carbon dioxide underground at coal power plants.
- A tax credit of between $2,500 and $5,000 for purchase of plug-in electric vehicles, available for the first 200,000 placed into service.
Concomitant with the signing of the stimulus bill, Mr. Obama also announced the launch of Recovery.gov which will be the online portal for these efforts. According to the President, the new website will be “publishing information about how the funding will be spent in a timely, targeted, and transparent manner.” Watch Mr. Obama’s Recovery.gov announcement:
About Timothy B. Hurst
I will be bookmarking the recovery.gov site, it should be interesting to see how frequently it is updated. I am glad that the bill is signed but I think that we need to see a more positve president. I understand that he wants to express the gravity of the situation but if he can address the downturn in a more upbeat tone people will feel better about it and the economy will turn around quicker.
Ryan
I think the bill his hideous overall but Ryan makes a great point about having a more positive message. It’s probably a part of the lowering of expectations game but people are looking for a leader now and that’s hard to do if everything coming from the White House is doom and gloom. Even though I disagree with President Obama on this issue I think he has the potential to be a good president but he needs to get out of this campaign mode.