In yet another big legislative victory for algae, the spending bill passed by Congress and signed by the President this month includes strong support for advanced algae research, development and commercialization projects.
The results for algae in the bill include:
- $30 million within the Department of Energy’s Biotechnology Office for algae biofuels, with language that at least 50% is for university or university-led consortia.
- $12 million for carbon use and reuse R&D within the DOE’s Fossil Energy Office, a 20% increase over last year!
Most of these funds had been proposed to be cut altogether, but thanks to a strong push by ABO and other organizations it became clear to elected officials that this kind of research was critical to maintaining American economic and technological competitiveness.
This support in Congress is another signal that algae cultivation is being taken seriously at the highest levels. A bipartisan group of Congressmen recently introduced the Algae Agriculture Act of 2018, and earlier in the year Congress passed a tax credit for carbon capture and reuse projects that use algae or other biologically-related technologies.
Thanks to all that helped get this support included!