itif.org
Energizing Innovation in Fiscal Year 2024
HOYU CHONG | MAY 2023
The FY 2024 budget request, if met, could maintain bipartisan momentum for clean energy
innovation. Congress should support that innovation to foster domestic clean energy industries
that can compete globally, minimize foreign dependencies, and address climate change.
KEY TAKEAWAYS
President Biden’s FY 2024 budget request (PBR) calls for $11 billion in clean energy
RD&D investment for the Department of Energy (DOE), an 18 percent increase over FY
2023-enacted levels.
Combined with funding increases from the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA)
and Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), clean energy RD&D investment for FY 2024
potentially could be $17 billion.
The PBR pares back on clean energy manufacturing innovation and competitiveness, a
direct contrast to its overall message of outcompeting China, as well as last year’s PBR
focus on manufacturing and competitiveness for DOE.
Several programs, mostly applied energy programs, are still falling behind the levels ITIF
recommended in its
Energizing America
report for buildings, bioenergy, geothermal,
manufacturing, nuclear energy, and ARPA-E.
The budget leans more toward basic energy than applied energy. While maintaining
investments in cutting-edge research is important, the current budget proposal risks
undercutting DOE’s goal of advancing clean energy to reduce emissions.
The CHIPS and Science Act authorized billions of funding in early-stage R&D and applied
innovation investments for existing DOE energy RD&D offices plus more for new programs
such as technology transfer and commercialization reforms.
Congress should appropriate these funds to continue energizing innovation that will drive
costs down and spur innovation.
