Solar and Wind Tax Breaks Removed by Congress - 12/19/07

Cathy Pruitt
Beyond Fossil Fuel Columnist

The night of December 13, 2007 Congress passed a new energy bill removing three very important items to appease the oil companies.  Making Big Oil the winner and the country the loser!  The most important tax incentives for solar and wind energy are gone.   

All federal tax credits on wind, solar, and other alternative energy installations are set to expire in 2008.  These tax credits gave the opportunity to generate electricity using solar on your house cheaper than buying electricity from the local utility, which was great for the American people, but bad for Big Oil and Big Coal.

A another winner for Big Oil was the removal of the $22 billion tax package designed to cut tax breaks for Big Oil and fund the renewable energy industry.  Big Oil has shown record profits this year so why do they need a break!  Bush even threatened to veto the entire bill if this Big Oil tax package was not removed. 

The alternative energy mandate was removed requiring all investor owned utility companies to get at least 15% of their electricity from alternative energy.  The utilities won stating this would increase their cost.  Utilities win the country looses again.

Average miles per gallon standard for automakers were increased to a measly 35 MPG by 2020.  The energy bill made a big push increasing domestic biofuel production by 36 billion gallons by 2022.  Many believe biofuels like ethanol cost more to product than the energy it provides.  Ethanol and the tremendous increase in the production of corn to make ethanol are worse on the environment than gasoline.  Check out how the corn boom could expand the ‘dead zone’ in the Gulf of Mexico.  Click Here

Efficiency standards for consumer products and appliances and government buildings were increased by the bill.  This will help reduce the phantom loads electronics that are responsible for about two thirds of household energy usage.

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