Biden presses Congress on renewable grant program, tax credits

Vice President Joe Biden seems to be running with President Obama’s instantly famous (in energy circles anyway) claim that energy legislation could move forward in “chunks.”

Biden on Tuesday called on Congress to approve several specific items, including the “Home Star” program that would provide rebates for energy efficiency retrofits. It has passed the House but not the Senate.

Biden also called for extension of an expiring grant program for U.S. renewable power projects, and expanded tax credits for domestic manufacturing of “clean” energy equipment.

Those two programs were originally contained in last year’s the big stimulus law, and Biden made their case for their continuation at a meeting of the White House Middle Class Task Force.

The stimulus allowed developers of renewable electricity projects to receive federal grants in lieu of tax credit financing that had become less useful in the economic downturn.

“If a company goes out and builds and operates a wind, solar or other clean energy project, it gets a 30 percent grant, upfront, to make that investment,” Biden noted. “This program was created by the Recovery Act and has been hugely successful, leading to nearly 4,000 new clean energy projects over the past two years here in the United States.”

The stimulus law also provided $2.3 billion worth of tax credits for clean energy equipment manufacturing, but applications quickly outstripped that ceiling and the White House wants to triple it.

“We have to build new industries that build things here in the United States of America,” Biden said. “And so if you build a wind turbine or solar panels or advanced batteries, and manufacture them right here in the United States, you get a 30 percent tax credit.”

“I can understand an argument about tax credits for investment abroad. But it baffles me why we wouldn't want to offer tax credits for people to manufacture things here in the United States of America,” he added.

Biden and other administration officials used the event to launch a program – called Home Energy Score – that provides consumers a ranking of their home’s energy efficiency, and a list of recommended improvement and cost savings.

“The Home Energy Score will help make energy efficiency easy and accessible to America’s families by providing them with straightforward and reliable information about their homes’ energy performance and specific, cost-effective energy efficiency improvements that will save them money on their monthly energy bills,” Energy Secretary Steven Chu said in a prepared statement.