Federal Energy Bill: The president signed into law a comprehensive $14.5 billion federal energy bill on August 8, 2005, at the Sandia National Labs in New Mexico. This 1,725 page bill contains new standards for reliability on national electric transmission grid to prevent future blackouts, new energy efficiency standards (Energy Star) for 15 products including dishwashers that will reduce natural gas use and peak electric demand. Energy tax incentives included measures for oil and gas production and enhanced refining, transmission property, nuclear decommissioning, clean coal facilities, energy efficiency including hybrid vehicle tax credits, and renewable energy including an electricity production credit for qualifying wind, biomass, geothermal, landfill gas and solar facilities.
View a summary (PDF) of the Federal tax incentives or visit the Tax Incentives Assistance Project web site and the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) web site.
The bill did not address improving our CAFE (corporate average fuel economy) standards that would have required auto companies to improve the average fuel efficiency of their fleets in an effort to reduce our heavy dependence on foreign oil. The conference bill removed language requiring a national renewable portfolio standard ( RPS), a tire fuel efficiency requirement, and a combined heat and power tax credit.| < Prev |
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