[House Hearing, 118 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]



                       ENERGY AND WATER DEVELOPMENT
                         APPROPRIATIONS FOR 2024
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------                            
                         
                                 HEARINGS

                                 BEFORE A

                           SUBCOMMITTEE OF THE

                       COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS

                         HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                     ONE HUNDRED EIGHTEENTH CONGRESS

                              FIRST SESSION
                              
                               __________
                              

              SUBCOMMITTEE ON ENERGY AND WATER DEVELOPMENT,
                          AND RELATED AGENCIES

          CHARLES J. ``CHUCK'' FLEISCHMANN, Tennessee, Chairman

  MICHAEL K. SIMPSON, Idaho		MARCY KAPTUR, Ohio	
  KEN CALVERT, California		DEBBIE WASSERMAN SCHULTZ, Florida
  DAN NEWHOUSE, Washington		SUSIE LEE, Nevada		
  GUY RESCHENTHALER, Pennsylvania	MIKE QUIGLEY, Illinois
  MIKE GARCIA, California		JOSEPH D. MORELLE, New York
  JULIA LETLOW, Louisiana		DEREK KILMER, Washington
  MICHAEL GUEST, Mississippi
  STEPHANIE I. BICE, Oklahoma

  NOTE: Under committee rules, Ms. Granger, as chairwoman of the full 
committee, and Ms. DeLauro, as ranking minority member of the full 
committee, are authorized to sit as members of all subcommittees.

                Angie Giancarlo, Perry Yates, Nora Khalil
                   Richie O'Connell and Scott Prutting
                            Subcommittee Staff
                            
                             __________
                            

                                  PART 1

                                                                   Page
U.S. Department of Energy.............
                                                                     1
Members' Day..........................
                                                                     93
Fiscal Year 2024 Request for the Army 
Corps of Engineers and Bureau of 
Reclamation.............................			    103
Outside Witness Testimony.............
                                                                    173


                    
                    
                    
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                    U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE                    
54-204                       WASHINGTON : 2023                    
          






                      COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS

                                ----------                              
                     KAY GRANGER, Texas, Chairwoman


  HAROLD ROGERS, Kentucky
  ROBERT B. ADERHOLT, Alabama
  MICHAEL K. SIMPSON, Idaho
  JOHN R. CARTER, Texas
  KEN CALVERT, California
  TOM COLE, Oklahoma
  MARIO DIAZ-BALART, Florida
  STEVE WOMACK, Arkansas
  CHARLES J. ``CHUCK'' FLEISCHMANN, Tennessee
  DAVID P. JOYCE, Ohio
  ANDY HARRIS, Maryland
  MARK E. AMODEI, Nevada
  CHRIS STEWART, Utah
  DAVID G. VALADAO, California
  DAN NEWHOUSE, Washington
  JOHN R. MOOLENAAR, Michigan
  JOHN H. RUTHERFORD, Florida
  BEN CLINE, Virginia
  GUY RESCHENTHALER, Pennsylvania
  MIKE GARCIA, California
  ASHLEY HINSON, Iowa
  TONY GONZALES, Texas
  JULIA LETLOW, Louisiana
  MICHAEL CLOUD, Texas
  MICHAEL GUEST, Mississippi
  RYAN K. ZINKE, Montana
  ANDREW S. CLYDE, Georgia
  JAKE LaTURNER, Kansas
  JERRY L. CARL, Alabama
  STEPHANIE I. BICE, Oklahoma
  C. SCOTT FRANKLIN, Florida
  JAKE ELLZEY, Texas
  JUAN CISCOMANI, Arizona

  ROSA L. DeLAURO, Connecticut
  STENY H. HOYER, Maryland
  MARCY KAPTUR, Ohio
  SANFORD D. BISHOP, Jr., Georgia
  BARBARA LEE, California
  BETTY McCOLLUM, Minnesota
  C. A. DUTCH RUPPERSBERGER, Maryland
  DEBBIE WASSERMAN SCHULTZ, Florida
  HENRY CUELLAR, Texas
  CHELLIE PINGREE, Maine
  MIKE QUIGLEY, Illinois
  DEREK KILMER, Washington
  MATT CARTWRIGHT, Pennsylvania
  GRACE MENG, New York
  MARK POCAN, Wisconsin
  PETE AGUILAR, California
  LOIS FRANKEL, Florida
  BONNIE WATSON COLEMAN, New Jersey
  NORMA J. TORRES, California
  ED CASE, Hawaii
  ADRIANO ESPAILLAT, New York
  JOSH HARDER, California
  JENNIFER WEXTON, Virginia
  DAVID J. TRONE, Maryland
  LAUREN UNDERWOOD, Illinois
  SUSIE LEE, Nevada
  JOSEPH D. MORELLE, New York

              Anne Marie Chotvacs, Clerk and Staff Director

                                   (ii)
                                   
                                   
                                   

 
 ENERGY AND WATER DEVELOPMENT, AND RELATED AGENCIES APPROPRIATIONS FOR 
                                  2024

                              ----------                              

                                          Thursday, March 23, 2023.

                       U.S. DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY

                                WITNESS

HON. JENNIFER GRANHOLM, SECRETARY, U.S. DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY
    Mr. Fleischmann. Good morning, everyone. I am Chuck 
Fleischmann, and I am the new chair of the Energy and Water 
Subcommittee of Appropriations.
    It is a tremendous privilege and honor to have Jennifer 
Granholm, our Secretary of Energy, before us today.
    Madam Secretary, it is a pleasure to see you. Today, I look 
forward to discussing the Energy and Water Subcommittee's 
fiscal year 2024 budget with you on behalf of the Department of 
Energy.
    Madam Secretary, you well know I strongly support the 
primary missions of your department.
    Specifically, the Department of Energy, through the 
National Nuclear Security Administration, supports our Nation's 
defense through the maintenance of the nuclear weapons 
stockpile and through the support of the nuclear Navy.
    Department of Energy, through the Office of Science, 
remains the Nation's largest supporter of basic research in the 
physical sciences.
    Numerous offices are tasked with working to develop new and 
improve the existing technology in the energy sector in support 
of an all-of-the-above energy independence strategy.
    The Department is responsible for the cleanup of the 
Nation's environmental legacy resulting from decades of nuclear 
weapons production and government-sponsored nuclear energy 
research.
    So I was pleased to see strong funding for some of these 
missions in the fiscal 2024 budget request.
    For example, the Weapons Activities account is increased, 
including an increase for the Uranium Processing Facility, 
which is located in my district in Oak Ridge, critical for 
enriched uranium operations needed to support the Nation's 
nuclear weapons stockpile.
    Unfortunately, I am concerned about some of the priorities 
expressed in the budget request.
    For instance, the administration has highlighted clean 
energy and climate change goals as key drivers of the budget 
request. Yet the nuclear energy program is cut by 12 percent 
below enacted. Nuclear energy, a baseload carbon-free source of 
electricity, will be essential in achieving any climate change 
goals, so it is difficult to understand such a large cut, 
especially as other programs see double- and triple-digit 
increases.
    A revitalized American nuclear industry also provides an 
additional energy export of geopolitical consequence, 
especially for countries seeking alternatives to Russian and 
Chinese entanglements. As such, I am particularly concerned 
that the nuclear energy budget includes only a modest increase 
for the Advanced Nuclear Fuel Availability Program, which is 
working to advance the availability of high-assay low-enriched 
uranium, or, as we all know it, HALEU, necessary for fueling 
the next generation of advanced reactors.
    For the Office of Science, a program near and dear to my 
heart, the budget request proposes an increase of $700 million, 
or almost 9 percent. Yet that support pales in comparison to 
the $1.3 billion, or almost 40 percent, increase for energy 
efficiency and renewable energy activities. While I agree that 
both programs focus on important issues, I don't agree with the 
significant difference in relative priority found in the budget 
request.
    In addition, I wanted to touch on the idea of nuclear waste 
recycling. This is an issue that has bipartisan supporters and 
detractors on both sides, and I would like to get the Secretary 
and the Department's thoughts on where you think we are going 
as a department and as a Nation in terms of reprocessing or 
recycling.
    Secretary Granholm, I appreciate your being here today to 
explain your budget request. I look forward to working together 
with you and my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to move 
forward a budget that will strengthen our national security and 
advance our energy independence.
    Please ensure that, for the hearing record today, questions 
for the record and any supporting information requested by the 
subcommittee are delivered in final form, please, to us no 
later than 4 weeks from the time that you receive them.
    Members who have additional questions for the record will 
have until the close of business Monday to provide them to the 
subcommittee office.
    With that point of privilege, Madam Secretary, I have had 
the privilege of being an appropriator for now over a decade, 
and I have served on this wonderful subcommittee for quite some 
time. I have had the privilege of working with my dear friend 
and colleague from Ohio in capacity as ranking member and as 
chair of this committee, and, as we all well know, Ms. Kaptur, 
Congresswoman Kaptur, has the great distinction of being the 
longest-serving woman in congressional history.
    So, with that, I yield to my friend and colleague, the 
ranking member.
    Ms. Kaptur. Thank you, Chairman Fleischmann. Let's just 
hope that with the tenure has come some good for the country. 
And thank you very much. I love this subcommittee.
    I am looking forward to working with you, Chairman 
Fleischmann, in your new role as chairman of this distinguished 
subcommittee, and particularly not just because of your 
intelligence but because you support Minor League Baseball. And 
even you and your staff, your lead staff, know where the 
Detroit Tigers play and the minor league, the Mud Hens from 
Toledo, Ohio. So we have to put in a plug for them. I know that 
this highly capable subcommittee under your leadership will 
provide great progress for America.
    Thank you, Secretary Granholm, for joining us today. I am 
so grateful. You not only distinguish yourself as a 
transformational Secretary of Energy, but your presence at the 
Department of Energy provides real knowledge of the Great Lakes 
region so vital to America's future.
    And during this Women's History Month, I have to 
acknowledge you are the second woman in the history of our 
country to be Secretary of Energy. That is quite an 
achievement. And we thank you for giving your years to public 
service.
    The Department of Energy's budget request is paramount to 
ensure America's energy independence, because energy security 
is national security. And the United States of America has 
learned that the hard way.
    Putin's war of aggression against Ukraine crystalizes how 
essential a comprehensive energy strategy is to our Nation, to 
our economy, to our national security, and to global stability. 
With Russia weaponizing energy to destabilize global markets 
such as Europe's, it is clear that America needs to innovate. 
We even have to be stronger than we are today, not allowing 
foreign adversaries to disrupt our way of life.
    Over the last 40 years, every time we went into a 
recession, gas prices rose over $4 a gallon. That tells us 
something. But America has made remarkable progress on energy 
independence. We have continually strengthened our net energy 
position and have achieved real results in pulling out of the 
nosedive of foreign dependency.
    Over the last few years, our Nation has produced record 
amounts of oil and gas, and we are indeed now a net energy 
exporter. But in this 21st century, America needs to continue 
harnessing new sustainable energy sources that weren't a focus 
of previous eras or previous administrations. We have to make 
more progress.
    I am so privileged to witness how Americans in every corner 
of our country are inventing our way forward, one energy patent 
at a time. And I am proud to represent the finest domestic 
solar manufacturers in our country, not importing components 
from Asia but making them right here at home--First Solar and 
Toledo Solar in my region.
    The Department of Energy is responsible for addressing the 
most pressing energy, environmental, and nuclear security 
issues of our time. The Department's pioneering investments in 
science, technology, and applied systems are unparalleled. 
Science and political commitment have led to breakthroughs that 
were never even thought possible.
    Funding for the Department of Energy is crucial to 
supporting initiatives that enhance energy security and energy 
independence by reducing American dependence on foreign 
adversaries; to develop cutting-edge technologies to save 
Americans money and expand our global competitiveness in 
energy; to tackle the climate crisis while growing the economy 
and supporting good-paying jobs; and responsibly stewarding the 
Nation's nuclear deterrent while assuring nuclear 
nonproliferation.
    Significant Federal investments included in the bipartisan 
Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act and the Inflation 
Reduction Act are helping us make real progress, but now is not 
the time to take our foot off the pedal. We need to make more 
progress for America by sustaining investment in new energy 
technologies and advancing world-class research, such as 
hydrogen and fusion and advanced nuclear, that unlock our full 
scientific potential.
    And, frankly, personally, I am interested in the 
agricultural miracle that will provide the least BTU input for 
the maximum BTU output on agricultural fields across this 
country. We still don't have that.
    This budget request proposes necessary investments to 
continue innovations that will further push the energy 
revolution the American people need. The United States, as a 
global energy leader, must not rely on foreign energy sources; 
we must stand on our own two feet.
    Progress requires attention across the board, from basic 
research to energy efficiency and better using our resources to 
develop new clean-energy technologies, including thermal 
recapture in places we haven't even recognized before, and to 
harden the electric grid against disasters and cyber threats.
    This budget request makes a serious investment in the 
Department of Energy's growing efforts to ``meet the streets,'' 
especially through its State and community energy programs.
    And, Madam Secretary, I thank you for that. We have a long 
way to go, but the Department has begun under your leadership.
    I know what a challenge this will be, but achieving 
progress depends on engaging people and communities in new 
opportunities for energy breakthroughs. The tools that DOE can 
provide will not only help us lower our energy costs but create 
thousands of new good-paying jobs, cut pollution, and make us 
more energy-secure.
    America has always been a frontier Nation. We have ventured 
where others dared not imagined nor had the will to pursue or 
persevere. Meeting America's new energy future is embedded in 
our Nation's DNA. Our generation must advance America's full 
potential to meet the challenge of a new day.
    With that, I close my remarks, and I look forward to 
discussing this request. Thank you all very much.
    I yield back.
    Mr. Fleischmann. Thank you, Ranking Member Kaptur.
    Good morning again, Madam Secretary. I am going to ask 
questions--oh, I am sorry. Madam Secretary, it is your turn. A 
little faux pas on my part. I would ask you to please make your 
opening statement. And I welcome you again.
    Secretary Granholm. Thank you so much. Delighted to be 
here. Chairman Fleischmann, Ranking Member Kaptur, and members 
of the subcommittee, honored to be able to discuss with you 
today the President's latest budget request for the Department 
of Energy.
    Over the past 2 years, it has really been my privilege to 
lead the Department in many of our Nation's biggest needs, from 
deepening our energy security and reshoring supply chains and 
manufacturing, to strengthening our innovative capacity through 
cutting-edge research and development, to maintaining that 
strong nuclear deterrent. We have taken critical steps to 
ensure that the United States can outmaneuver aggressors, 
outcompete our rivals, and create new jobs and opportunities 
for our people.
    The President's budget request for 2024 will empower us to 
drive these efforts forward even in the face of emerging 
challenges. Russia's barbaric war on Ukraine has triggered a 
reckoning over energy security risks inherent in overreliance 
on any one source of energy. Vladimir Putin's weaponization of 
fossil fuel supplies has injected extreme volatility into 
global markets, and this vulnerability has burdened working 
people in the United States with higher energy costs.
    So, in response, we are pursuing a strategy of energy 
diversity. In addition to our fossil energy, we now have the 
means to tap an assortment of abundant new clean-energy 
sources, many of which already boast affordability advantages 
over fossil fuels.
    Congress's efforts have made the United States the world's 
most attractive destination for investment in new energy, and 
this Department is working to help American businesses 
capitalize on this moment. We are backing large-scale 
deployment of cost-competitive clean technologies--solar, wind, 
electric vehicle, storage--and we are moving to fund 
demonstration of next-generation sources like clean hydrogen, 
advanced nuclear, carbon capture. And, at the same time, we are 
engaging in a long-overdue effort to establish supply chains 
for these technologies here at home so that no adversaries will 
be able to threaten our access to energy.
    This is all to the great benefit of the American worker. In 
the last 2 years, government and private sector have announced 
plans to invest nearly $100 billion in our domestic battery, 
solar, and wind supply chains. These investments will support 
thousands and thousands of new jobs.
    Still, we know that this strategy of energy diversity 
depends on continuous innovation. The more we can improve 
performance and reduce the cost of these technologies, the 
faster we can deploy them, the lower the bills will be for 
American families.
    And that is why this budget calls for significant 
investment in programs within our Office of Energy Efficiency 
and Renewable Energy, which oversees applied research and 
development for the widest range of energy sources of all of 
our program offices.
    It also expands funding for our Office of Science. Among 
other things, it would allow us to ramp up our isotope 
production, which is critical to both economic competitiveness 
and defense and health. It also includes over a billion dollars 
for fusion research, which would further our work to harness 
fusion's tremendous potential.
    Along with energy security, this budget prioritizes DOE's 
national security responsibilities with a record appropriation 
for our NNSA, our National Nuclear Security Administration. 
Today's changing international environment makes our nuclear 
deterrent paramount to our national defense and to the security 
of our allies.
    The President's request would give the NNSA the means to 
modernize the infrastructure for our nuclear program, and it 
would advance NNSA's wider priorities around arms control and 
nuclear nonproliferation, counterterrorism, and the safe use of 
civil nuclear power.
    The Department has been able to make real progress in these 
matters, thanks to the bipartisan assistance we have received 
from Congress, but there is more work ahead. Our ability to 
tackle it depends on your continued support.
    I believe the President's budget for fiscal year 2024 will 
allow us to shore up our energy security and our national 
security while reinforcing efforts to implement Congress' 
legislative actions as quickly and effectively as possible. I 
am eager to shed light on the prudent reasoning behind this 
proposal.
    So thank you for the opportunity to address you, and I look 
forward to your questions.
    [The information follows:]
    
    
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    Mr. Fleischmann. Thank you, Madam Secretary.
    I am going to begin with asking 5 minutes' worth of 
questions, and then, of course, I will yield to the ranking 
member, and then we will proceed across the dais.
    Madam Secretary, as you know, I represent the Oak Ridge 
Reservation in my district. It is about $7.4 billion worth of 
annual Federal investment. My highest priority there right now 
is the Uranium Processing Facility, the UPF, which will replace 
enriched-uranium facilities dating back to the Manhattan 
Project at Y-12, which actually still continues to operate.
    Several NNSA Administrators have testified under oath prior 
to you that the Uranium Processing Facility would be 
constructed for about $6.5 billion. And now it appears that the 
budget request--that the UPF will be rebaselined between $8 
billion and $8.5 billion due to schedule slippages. And I saw 
the mark of, I believe, $760 million in the budget, in the 
President's budget.
    My question is, will a new baseline be established? And is 
there any scope being taken out of the UPF project as a result 
of the rebaselining?
    And the fiscal year 2024 budget does include the 
significant increases I have alluded to. Is the budget request 
adequate to ensure the project gets on track? In short, do we 
need more on money?
    And what measures is the Department implementing to manage 
costs and schedule?
    Secretary Granholm. Yeah. Thank you for this question. UPF 
is extremely important, and it was recently rebaselined. So, 
the last year, as you noted, it was $6.5 billion. This is 
projecting out over 10 years. It is now $8.6 billion to $8.9 
billion. That is the rebaselining. And there is an estimated 
delay associated with that.
    Part of the challenge, as every business in the country has 
experienced, is a labor challenge. And so, for example, we have 
approximately 3,000 people on site every day. We need 3,500. 
And that has caused delays, and, of course, delays also 
contribute to supply-chain crunches as well.
    So the new estimates contain significant margin and 
contingency allowances, and they are based on labor 
productivity that has now been measured at UPF.
    So procurements are complete, so we are past the initial 
supply-chain crunches that were plaguing us before, so this 
meets the requirements. And we have an excellent oversight 
initiative at, as you know, the--our efforts to be able to 
manage things under our defense spending has been very, very 
aggressive, but some of these contingencies are outside of our 
control.
    Mr. Fleischmann. Thank you.
    My next question deals with the Lithium Processing 
Facility, which will be, of course, at Oak Ridge.
    Secretary Granholm. Uh-huh.
    Mr. Fleischmann. Madam Secretary, the NNSA has reportedly 
adopted a strategy of focusing resources on a reduced number of 
high-priority projects within its production modernization 
portfolio while decreasing the resources allocated to other 
projects.
    How did the NNSA prioritize the selection of production 
modernization projects over others? I am particularly 
interested in understanding why the lithium production facility 
at Y-12 was cut below not only the 2023 fiscal level but 
significantly below the 2024 need.
    Secretary Granholm. Right. So the 2023 enacted was $216 
million, and then the request here is $210 million, so it was 
cut about $10 million.
    Part of this is the effort to prioritize the areas of 
greatest need right now, and the UPF was seen as an important 
priority in that. However, we will be back to you in 2025, 
where we are projected to be requesting about $280 million.
    So there is a--part of the decision here was, because of 
these workforce issues, to prioritize workforce on UPF. And we 
will be back to the--obviously, there is still a significant 
amount of work that is going to be done, but we have decided to 
prioritize UPF.
    Mr. Fleischmann. Thank you.
    My last question in this round will focus on isotopes, 
reliance on foreign suppliers for isotopes.
    So that everyone understands, at ORNL, critical isotopes--
medical, defense, for science--we produce some of the only 
critical isotopes in the world outside of Russia. With the 
Russian invasion of Ukraine, that has exposed numerous supply-
chain disruptions across many industrial sectors. Isotopes are 
critically important to the United States of America and to the 
West, and we do not want to be dependent on Russia for 
anything.
    How will the Department address the reliance on foreign 
suppliers, especially Russia, in the meantime?
    And, obviously, the HFIR facility at Oak Ridge is stellar--
the hot cells research. That is where we make the isotopes.
    Madam Secretary, how do you plan to address this?
    Secretary Granholm. Yeah, it is a really important 
question. This is an issue that we are experiencing in supply 
chains all across when Russia has a monopoly on a particular 
supply.
    So this budget represents a 58-percent increase in the 
isotope budget, because we want to be able to build out these 
facilities. The stable isotope production and cancer research 
line sees that 58-percent increase, and that goes to the 
Radioisotope Processing Facility at ORNL, as you said, the 
critical alpha radiopharmaceutical facility at Brookhaven 
National Lab, and SIPRC as well. So all of those will see an 
increase.
    The issue is, we have to move quickly, because there are 
not other alternatives. And this is why it is so important that 
we continue our effort to build supply chains for everything 
that we need, you know, both in our national defense as well as 
in energy in the United States. And this is going to--this is a 
priority.
    Mr. Fleischmann. Thank you, Madam Secretary.
    At this point in time, I would like to recognize the 
distinguished ranking member, Ms. Kaptur, for 5 minutes of 
questions.
    Ms. Kaptur. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Madam Secretary, in the past, sometimes Federal incentives 
for American progress fail to reach communities where 
deindustrialization has hit hard, especially in manufacturing 
America.
    My question is, I have read about your ``meet the streets'' 
approach. In view of the passage of the historic Infrastructure 
Act and the Inflation Reduction Act, can you give us some sense 
of how you are thinking of working cross-agency to engage 
places that truly have been left behind?
    All the economic statistics show it. You represented one of 
those places yourself, as Governor of the State of Michigan, so 
you have seen close up what many that serve here have never had 
to deal with.
    So I am just wondering how the administration is thinking 
about working with the private sector with places that have 
been left behind, that have been left diminished in some ways, 
because they don't have the ability of other regions to 
compete. Could you discuss that?
    Secretary Granholm. Yeah. That ability to be compete is 
very important, and it means that we have to be providing 
technical assistance to these communities and making our own 
processes easier to navigate so that communities can apply.
    So there are several things that are happening. With both 
the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law and the Inflation Reduction 
Act, there has been a significant number of legislative efforts 
to try to steer funding to areas that have been left behind, 
whether they are former fossil communities, whether they are 
disadvantaged communities, whether they are former 
manufacturing communities.
    And so, in order to be able to focus our efforts, we have 
created an Office, under our new Under Secretary for 
Infrastructure, of State and Community Energy Programs. And 
that particular office is going to be focused on offering 
technical assistance.
    It is a $16 billion initiative that Congress has given us 
to be able to focus on communities that have been struggling. 
They may be rural communities. They may be small communities 
that don't have the ability. They may be Tribal communities. 
But the bottom line is, the benefits of this clean-energy 
economy, the goal is that it is able to be distributed to all 
communities, in every pocket of the country.
    There are a couple of things that are relevant to this: the 
increase in the Energy Efficiency Conservation Block Grant 
Program. That is run through our State and Community Energy 
Programs. Obviously, you and I have talked about meeting the 
street on weatherization. That increase will be run through the 
State and Community Energy Office. The Local Government Energy 
Program. The Interagency Working Group on Coal and Power Plant 
Communities, which really focuses a lot on communities, not 
necessarily Toledo but in, like, Appalachia, and regional 
efforts.
    And one of the things that I am most enthusiastic about is 
something that we call Clean Energy to Communities, which is an 
effort to try to give communities the ability to roadmap their 
future if they decide they want to be energy powerhouses 
themselves.
    So, for example, a couple of years ago, Los Angeles engaged 
NREL to do something called LA100. It was a technical roadmap 
to see how Los Angeles--big city, obviously--but how Los 
Angeles could get to their goal of getting to 100 percent clean 
electricity by their goal, which I think was 2035. And you have 
to look at their assets, you have to look at their uniqueness.
    They are taking that tool that they created for Los Angeles 
and opening it up to small communities across the country, so 
that if a community chooses to go in this direction, the 
technical assistance from our labs will be there to be able to 
offer to those communities.
    So these are the kinds of things we are thinking about. We 
have done some smaller programs, we have done some larger 
programs, but we all want to get especially to the communities 
that have been left behind.
    Ms. Kaptur. Thank you very much. I didn't know about that.
    Secretary Granholm. Well, I can provide you with more 
information, too, after, if you are interested in more detail.
    Ms. Kaptur. We sure are. Thank you so much.
    And my second question--and then I will wait for the second 
round. Can you give two concrete examples of how cutting the 
Department of Energy's budget back to last year's levels will 
impact working-class Americans and national security?
    Secretary Granholm. Do you want me to answer this, or did 
you want me to wait? You said--you were--I have time? All 
right.
    Mr. Fleischmann. I would be glad to yield.
    Secretary Granholm. Okay.
    So, I mean, obviously, this will cut across the board, if 
we ended up capping at last year's levels.
    But, for example, research at the Office of Science and the 
National Labs would be reduced about $700 million, leading to a 
cut of about 5,200 scientists.
    It would delay all NNSA major construction projects by at 
least a year, increasing, obviously, operational risks and the 
likelihood of cost increases if we stop.
    The W93 and the W87-1 warhead modernization programs would 
be delayed 1 to 2 years, with significant risks for the aging 
U.S. stockpile.
    Ms. Kaptur. Thank you very much for that.
    We stayed within the time, Mr. Chairman, I think.
    Mr. Fleischmann. Thank you.
    And I thank the ranking member.
    At this time, I would like to recognize Mr. Dan Newhouse 
from the great Washington State, who represents the Hanford DOE 
Reservation.
    Mr. Newhouse, you are recognized to ask questions for 5 
minutes, sir.
    Mr. Newhouse. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you very much.
    Thank you, Secretary Granholm, for being here to discuss 
your agency's 2024 proposed budget. It is very important. And 
thank you for coming out to the State of Washington last fall.
    Secretary Granholm. You bet.
    Mr. Newhouse. Appreciate your interest in learning more 
about the important things we are doing out there.
    Lots of things to ask you about and limited time, but a 
couple rounds, I am guessing, hoping, we will have.
    But let me ask you something that I have been getting a 
tremendous amount of calls from constituents on, if I could, 
first. And it is something I have been concerned with, and it 
has to do with--you know, you can probably anticipate--gas 
stovetops.
    Secretary Granholm. Hmm.
    Mr. Newhouse. Certainly, I am concerned with DOE's recent 
action regarding the conservation standards for gas stovetops, 
to see that the proposed rule would require performance 
standards.
    Literally, 96 percent of tested residential gas stovetops 
would be out of compliance with the new proposed draft rules, 
effectively, I think, making utilization of gas out of the 
question for most consumers. In fact, the switching, having to 
make changes in households to go to another source of power 
would be tremendously expensive.
    And, also, to mention that I think, if I understand right--
maybe you know this better than I do--over 90 percent of 
commercial restaurants utilize gas in their preparation for 
food.
    So just a question and an opportunity for you to enlighten 
us and clarify the agency's position on this. Why has DOE 
initiated this energy performance standard rulemaking for 
residential gas stoves at this point? How can the agency 
justify a standard that essentially would drastically limit 
consumers' choices as it relates to gas? And do you intend to 
engage with manufacturers, with retailers to understand the 
impacts that this will have on consumers?
    Secretary Granholm. Yeah.
    Mr. Newhouse. I would just love some enlightenment on that.
    Secretary Granholm. Great. Thanks so much for the 
opportunity to respond, because there has been an awful lot of 
misinformation that has been floating around about this.
    First of all, the Department of Energy conducts energy-
efficiency requirements, regulations on about----
    Mr. Newhouse. Sure.
    Secretary Granholm [continuing]. 60 different programs. 
Stovetops are one of them, not just gas but electric stovetops. 
We do so because Congress has required us to do this. The gas 
stovetop was--particularly the timeframe on it was due to a 
consent decree. So we are just following the schedule that we 
have been asked to follow, number one.
    Number two, the 96 percent number that you cited is wrong 
in the way that you cited it. The Department of Energy, when 
they are testing a particular appliance for compliance with a 
new regulation, in this case, they picked the gas stoves that 
were most likely to be affected. So the gas stoves that were 
most likely to not comply are the ones they tested to see what 
the impact would be.
    So the full range of gas stoves absolutely is not affected. 
In fact, half of the gas stoves that are on the market right 
now wouldn't even be impacted. The gas stoves that would be 
impacted are high-end gas stoves, you know, the most expensive 
gas stoves.
    And the reason why they were found to be inadequate is 
because, in many cases, they have very heavy grates and the 
burners can be an oval shape, which causes an excess amount of 
natural gas to be emitted relative to the pot that is on there. 
So it is just--it is a wasteful use of natural gas.
    This does not impact the majority. And it certainly doesn't 
say that anybody who has a gas stove would have their gas stove 
taken away. There is no ban on gas stoves. I have a gas stove. 
It is just about making the existing electric and gas stoves 
and all the other appliances more efficient.
    It is a proposed rule. We absolutely consult with industry 
on it.
    The increased cost for a high-end gas stove to replace this 
particular mechanism would be about $12.
    Mr. Newhouse. Well, thank you very much for that 
clarification. I know a lot of people around the country will 
be happy to hear the things you are saying.
    I truly believe that gas has been one of those resources 
that has allowed us to reduce our carbon footprint as much as 
we have as a country. And I certainly would not want to see 
limiting the option available to consumers, increasing cost to 
consumers, lowering the standard of living by having to make 
additional investments.
    So I appreciate very much your answer and have lots of 
other questions and look forward to round two. But thank you 
very much for being here.
    Secretary Granholm. You bet.
    Mr. Fleischmann. Thank you, Mr. Newhouse.
    At this time, I would like to recognize the gentleman from 
Washington State, Mr. Kilmer, for 5 minutes of questions.
    Mr. Kilmer. Thank you, Chairman.
    And thank you, Madam Secretary, for being here. I also want 
to thank you for visiting my district, coming out to Sequim, 
Washington, and the Pacific Northwest National Lab out there. 
And thanks to Under Secretary Richmond for joining as well.
    We have the only marine and coastal research lab in the DOE 
system in my district. Really important to our economy, to our 
community, and doing some really cutting-edge research looking 
at marine energy technologies, supporting the DOE's water power 
priorities for a decarbonized energy system.
    As we discussed, we are hoping to modernize and build out 
some of the lab space, and look forward to working with the 
Water Power Technologies Office to prioritize that effort. You 
will recall from a business and Tribal roundtable that we had 
as well, our community is really supportive of that.
    And I just was hoping you could share a few thoughts about 
the importance of the Pacific Northwest in marine energy 
research and development and what role you see for that unique 
lab in addressing some of the Department's priorities.
    Secretary Granholm. Yeah. I think this area of marine 
research, which will lead, we hope, to deployment of devices 
that will capture tidal and wave water technologies, is a huge 
potential for the United States to lead in and, therefore, for 
your region to be leading in.
    You should--I am sure you are aware, but yesterday was--was 
whatever--was Water Day--I want to make sure I get the word 
right. It was--it was----
    Mr. Kilmer. I would like to wish you a happy Water Day.
    Secretary Granholm. I know, right? It was yesterday. It was 
a--we are, I think--it was a focus, anyway, on water as a 
resource, and the Department of Energy announced a couple of 
efforts to advance hydropower and marine energy technologies. 
There is an Innovating Distributed Embedded Energy Prize that 
is $2.3 million for usable types of tidal energy. And then 
there were two interesting pieces that I thought you would be 
interested in: the Hydropower Collegiate Competition and the 
Marine Energy Collegiate Competition, which are prizes for that 
upcoming workforce to be excited about engaging in tidal, wave, 
and marine power.
    This area, as I say, is a huge upcoming area, and it will 
be an upcoming area of focus for us, and we are excited about 
the investments.
    World Water Day. Thank you.
    Mr. Kilmer. There we go.
    Secretary Granholm. World Water Day.
    Mr. Kilmer. Let me ask you, in the omnibus, the committee 
provided to the Department direction on developing a cross-
cutting program for aquatic decarbonization and requested a 
detailed spending plan to identify which offices would be 
aligned in that effort and how investments in RD&D and 
infrastructure needs will be addressed. Any update on how that 
is going?
    Secretary Granholm. Yeah. I know this was the omnibus that 
was passed in December. I know they are organizing around it. 
They are excited to be able to provide an update. They are not 
quite ready to release it yet, but it will be coming, and I am 
excited to be able to brief you on that.
    Mr. Kilmer. Great. Terrific.
    Secretary Granholm. Yeah.
    Mr. Kilmer. With the time I have left--and appreciate that 
offer of an update. We are particularly interested, in our 
region, on some of the blue energy economy work.
    As the DOE rolls out the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs 
Act and the Inflation Reduction Act, I also just wanted to 
extend an invitation to any of your team or to you, if you want 
to come back--we would love to have you--but a bit more inland 
to see some of the exciting work we are hoping to implement 
with some of the funds.
    For example, there was a pulp mill in Grays Harbor County 
that was on the verge of shutdown, but with the provisions in 
the IRA, folks in my district actually have the opportunity to 
transform it into a 21st-century biorefinery. They are planning 
to hire hundreds of people in good-paying jobs; are partnering 
with other Washington State companies for cutting-edge 
technologies like capturing CO2 from their 
powerhouse emissions and converting them to formic acid.
    I would love to show you some of the exciting stuff that we 
are hoping to accomplish with the legislation and just want to 
extend an invitation to you or to any member of your team.
    Secretary Granholm. I would be delighted to come and see 
that.
    Mr. Kilmer. It looks like I have a few seconds left, so, in 
closing, I would be remiss not to mention the serious budget 
needs out at Hanford. I imagine my colleague Mr. Newhouse 
mentioned that as well. Obviously, a huge priority for the 
entire State of Washington.
    Would look forward to working with you and this committee 
just to make sure we don't leave out our region in addressing 
what is really aging and, in some instances, failing 
infrastructure that could put families and fish and farms and 
others at risk.
    Secretary Granholm. Yep. They were good milestones, but 
they--and, of course, the budget represents an increase as a 
recognition about the importance of the site.
    Mr. Kilmer. Thank you.
    Chairman, I yield back.
    Thank you, Madam Secretary.
    Mr. Fleischmann. Thank you, Mr. Kilmer. I appreciate your 
comments about Hanford and Mr. Newhouse as well. I recommend 
that perhaps you all would work with Congresswoman Susie Lee 
and I. We have co-chaired the Nuclear Cleanup Caucus and worked 
in a very strong, bipartisan fashion to make sure that Oak 
Ridge and Hanford and all the legacy sites will get cleaned up. 
And I thank you.
    Mr. Kilmer. Thank you, Chairman.
    Mr. Fleischmann. At this time, I would like to recognize 
the gentlelady from Louisiana, Congresswoman Letlow. Thank you.
    Ms. Letlow. Thank you, Chairman Fleischmann.
    And, Madam Secretary, thank you for your testimony and for 
being here today.
    You know, as mentioned by several of my colleagues, there 
is a crisis with American energy independence, and our country 
must cut back on its reliance on foreign oil. The United States 
has the world's largest oil and gas reserves, and we can 
produce these resources more cleanly and efficiency than 
anywhere else in the world. Oil, natural gas, or clean coal--
the method is flexible, but the reason isn't: We must increase 
the domestic production of energy.
    While I advocate firmly for the increase in domestic energy 
production, I also believe we must make it more easily 
accessible for the export of liquefied natural gas. My home 
State of Louisiana is responsible for over 60 percent of LNG 
produced and exported from the United States, and we have 
several proposed projects that will help bolster our leading 
role in the world as a major energy exporter.
    Last year, President Biden made an agreement with the 
European Commission seeking to send more volumes of U.S. LNG to 
Europe. The United States has the opportunity and the 
responsibility to enact policies that could support the export 
of American LNG to our partners. This could also result in 
reaffirmation of the vital role the United States plays in the 
worldwide energy sector.
    My question is this: What is the Department of Energy doing 
to facilitate the export of American LNG to our allies, and how 
can the subcommittee help the DOE expedite this process?
    Secretary Granholm. Great. Thank you so much for that, as 
well.
    Ms. Letlow. Yes.
    Secretary Granholm. You are probably aware, I am sure, that 
we have, in fact, permitted a number of LNG expansions over the 
past couple of years, especially as we know that we need to 
help and be part of the solution with our allies.
    In fact, as we sit today, we export about 12 BCFs of LNG, 
which is a record amount for us. We are becoming the world's 
largest exporter of LNG. As of right now, there are 20 BCFs of 
LNG that have been permitted and that are under construction. 
And there are 49 BCFs of LNG that have been permitted. The 
balance of that is not under construction. So there is a 
plethora of opportunity for the liquefiers to be able to 
export.
    We also want--and having worked with a number of the gas 
companies who are very interested in our LNG being the cleanest 
so that they can have great demand.
    Ms. Letlow. Uh-huh.
    Secretary Granholm. And so our Fossil Energy and Carbon 
Management Office is working on a methane strategy to be able 
to reduce and eliminate, in many cases, methane upstream, to be 
able to make sure that we can detect, we can monitor, and 
mitigate. And there is great excitement about being able to 
have a, sort of, objective certification process on our LNG so 
that we are the LNG providers of choice.
    At the same time, of course, we want to continue to 
accelerate our efforts on clean energy and zero-carbon energy. 
And so the technologies associated with cleaning up the natural 
gas supply are a priority.
    Ms. Letlow. Thank you. I look forward to us capitalizing on 
those opportunities.
    So physical threats to the electric grid rose by an 
alarming rate last year. On top of this concerning increase, 
ongoing threats of severe weather events and cyber attacks add 
up to an electric grid that is increasingly at risk.
    New technology advancements, especially at the distributed 
energy scale, are going to increase the susceptibility of the 
grid, as these devices interact with and rely upon the electric 
grid infrastructure.
    Can you update us on the Department's effort to mitigate 
and respond to physical threats to the electric grid?
    Secretary Granholm. Yeah. Thank you for asking that.
    CESER, of course, inside of our department is in charge of 
making sure that the cyber component of the grid is protected, 
at least that we share best practices with utilities and others 
who care deeply about this. CESER is the energy-sector 
coordinator for the electricity sector.
    We are very concerned about the increase in particularly 
physical attacks on the grid, in addition to the cyber attacks 
that we are seeing. And we are concerned, as well, about 
extreme weather events affecting the grid. All of those are 
bundled into our concern about investment in the grid in the 
right way.
    Ms. Letlow. Uh-huh.
    Secretary Granholm. So we want to make sure that we are 
working with our industry and utility partners, rural electric 
co-ops, all of them, to ensure they have best practices in 
terms of cyber, that we are not creating threats 
unintentionally, that we have a supply chain for the grid that 
is built in the United States, which includes transformers. We 
have work to do on that.
    But our work with the private sector and with utilities and 
with the co-ops and the munis is very, very solid, and I am 
really proud of the work that CESER is doing.
    Ms. Letlow. Thank you, Madam Secretary.
    I have run out of time. I yield back.
    Mr. Fleischmann. Thank you, Congresswoman Letlow.
    At this time, I would like to recognize, from the great 
State of Florida, Ms. Wasserman Schultz for 5 minutes.
    Ms. Wasserman Schultz. Thank you so much, Mr. Chairman.
    I appreciate the opportunity to say hello, Madam Secretary. 
Good to see you.
    Secretary Granholm. Good to see you too.
    Ms. Wasserman Schultz. And I am just an example of, you 
know, you can stop being a staffer but you can never really 
take the staffer out of the girl. So----
    Secretary Granholm. I appreciate it, though.
    Ms. Wasserman Schultz. No problem. I consulted Professor 
Google. It is not like I knew off the top of my head either. So 
no worries.
    Okay. It really is great to have you here.
    And I usually like to have our witnesses, obviously, just 
have your work speak for itself and get a sense of what you are 
doing and what your priorities are, and I appreciate the 
opportunity to see that. But this year really is very 
different. We have a menacing cloud that is hanging over the 
appropriations process this year: The debt limit is fast 
approaching.
    The Republican House Freedom Caucus just made their 
priorities very clear in terms of, you know, their upcoming 
budget. Their intent is clearly to impose devastating cuts to 
public safety, increase costs for working- and middle-class 
families.
    The impact of rolling back to fiscal year 2022 levels, I 
know, would be devastating if you think about them generally, 
but I do want to try to drill down and get a sense from you 
specifically what it would mean for the Department of Energy.
    If there were across-the-board cuts just, for example, to 
discretionary spending at fiscal year 2022 levels, it would hit 
communities all across the country, according to figures from 
CBO, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office.
    Can you--you mentioned an overview of impact, but, 
specifically, how, for example, would going back to fiscal year 
2022 levels affect the Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy 
research projects?
    Secretary Granholm. Yeah. Thank you for asking that. I 
mean, I appreciate you talking about that particular office, 
because I am not sure that people, in general, understand how 
broad the EERE is----
    Ms. Wasserman Schultz. Absolutely. That is why I am asking.
    Secretary Granholm [continuing]. That it is not just wind 
and solar, it is not just renewable energy, but it is energy 
reduction from industrial uses, so industrial decarbonization; 
it is bioenergy, sustainable aviation fuels and biofuels; you 
know, it is transportation, it is batteries for electric 
vehicles, et cetera; it is hydrogen. I mean, it is all of that. 
It is heat pumps. It is all--it just runs the gamut.
    So each individual office within EERE--could be the Water 
Technologies Office, it could be the Geothermal Technologies 
Office--each one of these offices is actually underfunded now, 
with respect to the need that is out there. And many of these 
offices, the technology areas, received very little support in 
the IIJA and the IRA. You know, there wasn't a Bipartisan 
Infrastructure Law chunk that went to solar, for example, or 
wind.
    So, if we don't increase funding in the budget, then we 
miss out on major opportunities for this broad suite of 
technologies.
    Ms. Wasserman Schultz. And, Madam Secretary, let's be 
clear: It is not just that we are not going to increase 
funding. They are proposing to roll it back to fiscal year 
2022----
    Secretary Granholm. So cutting it. Yes----
    Ms. Wasserman Schultz. They want to cut it.
    Secretary Granholm [continuing]. Cutting it would be 
disastrous for innovation efforts. And that would slow, you 
know, progress on industrial decarbonization--I mean, things 
that I think have bipartisan support, like the industrial 
decarbonization, sustainable aviation fuels, hydrogen----
    Ms. Wasserman Schultz. If you don't mind, I have some other 
facets----
    Secretary Granholm. Yeah.
    Ms. Wasserman Schultz [continuing]. To this question too.
    Secretary Granholm. Go.
    Ms. Wasserman Schultz. So, I mean, our friends on the other 
side of the aisle are always, you know, talking about how they 
really support blue-collar workers, for lack of a better term. 
But, I mean, their proposals clearly, and just in some of the 
things that you have described, would lay off thousands of 
construction workers nationwide.
    And negative impacts seem to not be limited to job losses. 
Our national security and defense capabilities would also be 
hampered. How would this, for example, affect our nuclear 
warhead modernization program, including the DOE nuclear labs, 
if we roll back--cut back--to fiscal year 2022 levels?
    Secretary Granholm. Right. I was somewhat alluding to this 
before, but there would be over 5,000 people cut from our labs 
who do this work every day, you know. And the warhead 
modernization program would be significantly hampered, delayed 
1 to 2 years, which would, you know, pose major impacts on 
costs eventually. Because if you delay it, you are going to be 
delaying the impacts, you are going to have to raise prices.
    It is just a huge problem from both the warhead point of 
view as well as the labs themselves and the employees of those 
labs who are doing that work.
    Ms. Wasserman Schultz. Thanks. I appreciate it.
    I will save my other question for the second round. I yield 
back, Mr. Chairman. Thank you.
    Mr. Fleischmann. Thank you, Ms. Wasserman Schultz.
    At this time, I would like to recognize the gentleman from 
Pennsylvania, Mr. Reschenthaler, for 5 minutes.
    Mr. Reschenthaler. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate 
it.
    Madam Secretary, on 10 March of 2023, you said, and I 
quote, ``We can all learn from what China is doing,'' end 
quote, obviously a--about the environment.
    At the time you made that comment, are you aware that 30 
percent of the world's CO2 emissions came from 
China?
    Secretary Granholm. Oh, yes.
    Mr. Reschenthaler. Are you aware at the time you made that 
comment also that more than--that China emits more than the 
U.S., the entire EU, and Japan combined?
    Secretary Granholm. Oh, yes.
    Mr. Reschenthaler. Were you aware when you made that 
comment that China brings on line two coal-fired power plants a 
week?
    Secretary Granholm. Absolutely.
    Mr. Reschenthaler. Were you aware that China's coal-fired 
plants generate over 23 percent of all the energy of the U.S. 
production combined?
    Secretary Granholm. Yes.
    Mr. Reschenthaler. I assume you were also aware that China 
in the Paris Climate Agreement is allowed to increase their 
emissions through 2030?
    Secretary Granholm. Yes.
    Mr. Reschenthaler. Knowing that you knew all that when you 
made the comment, would you like to retract your praise for 
China?
    Secretary Granholm. No. My praise for China was on what 
they are doing to invest in clean energy even as they are the 
world's largest emitter. They are the world's largest----
    Mr. Reschenthaler. So they----
    Secretary Granholm. Wait a minute.
    Mr. Reschenthaler. So they are the largest emitter----
    Secretary Granholm. They are the----
    Mr. Reschenthaler [continuing]. And we should be studying--
    Secretary Granholm. But they are also----
    Mr. Reschenthaler [continuing]. Studying what they are 
doing?
    Secretary Granholm. They are also the largest investor in 
clean-energy technologies. They invest four times more than the 
United States----
    Mr. Reschenthaler. All right. Reclaiming my time. 
Reclaiming my time.
    Secretary Granholm [continuing]. And the----
    Mr. Reschenthaler. So they are bringing two coal-fired 
power plants on line each week, and you are praising that, 
while you are trying to shut down----
    Secretary Granholm. No, I am not praising that.
    Mr. Reschenthaler. Plants here.
    Secretary Granholm. I am not praising that, sir.
    Mr. Reschenthaler. I can read the----
    Secretary Granholm. I was praising----
    Mr. Reschenthaler. I can read the quote.
    Secretary Granholm. Just to be clear----
    Mr. Reschenthaler. I can read the quote back to you.
    Secretary Granholm [continuing]. I was praising their 
investment in clean energy and saying we have to learn----
    Mr. Reschenthaler. Madam Secretary, Madam Secretary, your 
exact quote was, ``So we hopefully can learn''--``we can all 
learn from what China is doing.'' That sounds like----
    Secretary Granholm. On clean energy, sir.
    Mr. Reschenthaler [continuing]. Praise to me.
    Secretary Granholm. On clean energy.
    Mr. Reschenthaler. Let's talk about----
    Secretary Granholm. They invest four times more than the 
United States. The greatest investor in clean energy.
    Mr. Reschenthaler. Despite the fact that they are the 
world's largest emitter and they are increasing their 
emissions?
    Secretary Granholm. They have a terrible record on 
greenhouse gas emissions. They have an----
    Mr. Reschenthaler. Okay.
    Secretary Granholm [continuing]. Investment----
    Mr. Reschenthaler. Okay.
    Secretary Granholm [continuing]. That is significant in----
    Mr. Reschenthaler. I also want to talk about----
    Secretary Granholm [continuing]. Clean energy.
    Mr. Reschenthaler [continuing]. A comment you made on 14 
October 2021. You said, the USA doesn't have, and I quote, 
``doesn't have the moral authority,'' end quote, to criticize 
China.
    When you made that comment, were you aware that in January 
of that year our own State Department determined that the CCP 
is committing genocide and human rights abuses against Muslim 
Uyghurs?
    Secretary Granholm. Yes. But I am not----
    Mr. Reschenthaler. Were you aware of Hong Kong and the fact 
that Hong Kongers lost their liberty and if you are accused of 
crimes you are extradited to mainland China?
    Secretary Granholm. I am aware that China is a----
    Mr. Reschenthaler. Are you aware that----
    Secretary Granholm [continuing]. Huge human-rights abuser.
    Mr. Reschenthaler [continuing]. The PRC is engaged in 
severe repression of Tibet's unique religious, cultural, and 
linguistic heritage, including extrajudicial detentions, 
disappearances, and torture?
    Secretary Granholm. Yes.
    Mr. Reschenthaler. Are you aware the PRC is widely alleged 
to be a major harvester and trafficker of forcibly acquired 
organs?
    Secretary Granholm. Yes.
    Mr. Reschenthaler. Are you aware that those that have their 
organs forcibly removed are typically minorities, including 
Falun Gong, Uyghurs, Tibetans, Muslims, and Christians?
    Secretary Granholm. Yes. I am aware that China----
    Mr. Reschenthaler. Would you like to----
    Secretary Granholm [continuing]. Is a horrible, huge----
    Mr. Reschenthaler. Okay.
    Secretary Granholm [continuing]. Human-rights abuser.
    Mr. Reschenthaler. So I find it even more astounding that 
you say that the United States does not have the moral 
authority to criticize China when you are aware of this laundry 
list of human-rights violations I just provided you----
    Secretary Granholm. That was not the subject----
    Mr. Reschenthaler [continuing]. That apparently you were--
--
    Secretary Granholm [continuing]. I was referring to, sir.
    Mr. Reschenthaler. You were still talking about the moral 
authority----
    Secretary Granholm. No, no, no.
    Mr. Reschenthaler [continuing]. With the U.S.----
    Secretary Granholm. I was talking about----
    Mr. Reschenthaler [continuing]. Vis--vis China.
    Secretary Granholm [continuing]. The United States has to 
learn about the--and has been, actually--about the strategy 
that China has engaged in to be able to take supply chains for 
clean energy and corner the market on them.
    And, in passing the Inflation Reduction Act, the response 
to China has been, we are making the United States 
irresistible. We are adopting----
    Mr. Reschenthaler. All right. I am going to reclaim my 
time. I will submit----
    Secretary Granholm. I do not like to be taken out----
    Mr. Reschenthaler [continuing]. The exact quote you had. I 
can----
    Secretary Granholm [continuing]. Of context, though, sir.
    Mr. Reschenthaler. I am not taking you out of context.
    Secretary Granholm. Yes, you are, sir.
    Mr. Reschenthaler. I have two quotes----
    Secretary Granholm. You are absolutely taking me out of 
context.
    Mr. Reschenthaler. I have two quotes with you praising 
China, one saying that we don't have the moral authority to 
criticize China, after I just gave you a litany of human-rights 
violations----
    Secretary Granholm. I was not referring----
    Mr. Reschenthaler. I also have----
    Secretary Granholm [continuing]. To that, sir.
    Mr. Reschenthaler. Madam Secretary, it is my time.
    I also gave you a quote--I gave you the dates of the quote 
in which you were praising China for how they are handling 
energy. And you just admitted they are the largest 
CO2 emitter----
    Secretary Granholm. And I also said----
    Mr. Reschenthaler [continuing]. And they are increasing 
CO2 emissions.
    Secretary Granholm [continuing]. They are the largest 
investor in clean energy, sir.
    Mr. Reschenthaler. Where is your praise for the United 
States and the fact that we are the only Western power----
    Secretary Granholm. I have been praising the United 
States----
    Mr. Reschenthaler [continuing]. We are reducing our 
emissions----
    Secretary Granholm [continuing]. In this role of how 
fantastic it is that we are now in the game.
    Mr. Reschenthaler [continuing]. Through natural gas.
    Secretary Granholm. The largest investment in clean energy 
that was passed----
    Mr. Reschenthaler. Thank you, Madam Secretary. I am----
    Secretary Granholm [continuing]. Last year, thanks to the 
Inflation Reduction Act.
    Mr. Reschenthaler. Madam Secretary, I just find your praise 
for the CCP to be alarming, but I am going to yield the 
remainder of my time to my colleague from Oregon.
    Mr. Newhouse. Thank you very much, Mr. Reschenthaler. That 
doesn't leave me a lot of time, so I will wait until the second 
round. Thank you very much.
    Mr. Fleischmann. Thank you, Mr. Reschenthaler and Mr. 
Newhouse.
    At this time, I would like to recognize Ms. Lee from 
Nevada, my co-chair on the Nuclear Cleanup Caucus, for 5 
minutes.
    Ms. Lee of Nevada. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and hopefully 
we can get back to talking about the budget.
    I want to extend my appreciation for your visits to my 
district, recognizing Nevada's leadership in renewable energy.
    Also pleased that the Department of Energy budget once 
again includes zero dollars for a permanent nuclear repository 
in Nevada. To us, it is zero dollars of delivering waste to 
Nevada without our consent.
    I wanted to ask you two quick questions: Can you please 
confirm that is the case?
    Secretary Granholm. Yes.
    Ms. Lee of Nevada. And, secondly, can you also confirm that 
the Department remains committed to consent-based siting as the 
path forward for nuclear waste management?
    Secretary Granholm. Yes, I can commit to both. And I am 
happy to provide an update on where we are on that, if you 
would like.
    Ms. Lee of Nevada. Great. We will do that offline, but----
    Secretary Granholm. Okay. Very good.
    Ms. Lee of Nevada. I also agree with you that consent-based 
siting is the path forward. We have deep concerns that a major 
roadblock to that is the fact that the Federal law since 1987 
has designated Yucca Mountain as the only allowable site for a 
national permanent nuclear waste repository, against the will 
of Nevadans, I will emphasize.
    Would you agree that Yucca Mountain project is a central 
roadblock to progress in identifying workable long-term storage 
options?
    Secretary Granholm. No, I wouldn't agree with that. I think 
that it has been made clear that Yucca Mountain is not going to 
be the place for long-term storage. And I also know that we 
have been engaged in the conversation with a number of 
communities that have at least raised their hand to be willing 
to have a conversation about that responsibility.
    So I am encouraged that there are a number of communities 
who don't see Yucca Mountain as a barrier.
    Ms. Lee of Nevada. Great. Well, thank you. I appreciate 
that. And we will follow up on the progress.
    I want to turn to another issue. As you know, Nevada just--
or, we just designated Avi Kwa Ame--President Biden--as the 
Nation's newest national monument, in my district. This honors 
our region's Tribal heritage and significantly advances the 
administration's goal of conserving at least 30 percent of U.S. 
lands and waters by 2030.
    At the same time, our State is also ideally positioned to 
help the administration achieve one of its other goals, which 
is transitioning to 100 percent clean electricity by 2035. I am 
just going to make a plug. I love the $35 million for the 
Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy. We do have an 
MSI in Nevada. So just making a plug that we might be a great 
location for that new lab.
    But making this happen, the transition, will require close 
and consistent interagency coordination, especially between the 
Department of Energy and the Department of the Interior.
    As much as our constituents welcome and will honor this new 
national monument, it is also important to consider what 
happened. It was regrettable that this designation curtailed a 
couple renewable energy projects that had years of planning 
behind them, another--you know, a promising solar project as 
well as a promising wind turbine.
    Could you please speak today to what specific things the 
administration is doing to ensure that we achieve this goal but 
also in tandem with the 30 by '30 goal.
    Secretary Granholm. Yeah. Actually, the 30 by '30 goal and 
the 100 percent clean by 2035 means that we have to essentially 
double the amount of transmission and add about 60 gigawatts 
per year of clean energy to our electric grid in order to meet 
that up to 2030 and then 200 gigawatts per year from 2030 on to 
2035. So it is a massive amount.
    So we need to do a number things. Number one is to be 
sensitive first, of course, to the lands that have, you know, 
the Tribal burial grounds, et cetera, that may be extremely--
you know, may have a problem with respect to endangered 
species, et cetera.
    But there are swaths of public land that don't have those 
conditions. And we have a--I know the President has wanted us 
to really accelerate transmission to the extent we can on the 
executive-branch side. And so we have--just yesterday at the 
White House, we have a group working on what that can look 
like, while Congress hopefully gets a bipartisan permitting 
bill through so that we can accelerate clean energy and 
transmission, because both have to happen, on public lands.
    There is one provision under the Federal Power Act that 
allows for an acceleration of transmission on public lands that 
Congress has already passed, and we are seeing what we can do 
to implement that. But there is more work that needs to be done 
for permitting--all consistent with the goals of NEPA.
    We can do this. We can do it quickly, and we can still 
respect the goals of protecting the environment that NEPA 
underlies.
    Ms. Lee of Nevada. Great. Thank you. I just want to offer 
our help in whatever we can do as a committee to help you along 
those lines.
    Secretary Granholm. Thank you.
    Ms. Lee of Nevada. Thank you.
    Mr. Fleischmann. Thank you, Ms. Lee.
    At this time, I would like to recognize a new member to the 
full committee and to this subcommittee, from the great State 
of Mississippi, and the current chair of the House Ethics 
Committee, sir, Mr. Guest, for 5 minutes.
    Mr. Guest. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Madam Secretary, thank you for joining us today.
    In looking at the total overall budget request, is it my 
understanding that the administration is asking for slightly 
over a 13.5-percent increase from last year's budgeted amount?
    Secretary Granholm. Correct.
    Mr. Guest. Is that correct?
    Secretary Granholm. Uh-huh.
    Mr. Guest. I want to talk specifically about, one, what I 
believe is an important component to our national energy 
production strategy that the administration is asking for 
decreased funding, and that is going to be in the field of 
nuclear energy.
    I see in some of the documents that were prepared for us 
that the administration is asking for decreased funding in 
nuclear energy and also asking for decreased funding in Naval 
Reactors.
    And, first of all, do you agree that nuclear energy is both 
a clean and a green energy?
    Secretary Granholm. A hundred percent.
    Mr. Guest. There was a report that was issued back in 2021 
from the Office of Nuclear Energy, and it said that nuclear 
energy protects air quality. And it goes on to say, nuclear 
energy is a zero-emission clean-energy source and that, 
according to the Nuclear Energy Institute, the NEI, the United 
States avoided more than 471 metric tons of carbon dioxide 
emissions in 2020.
    It also goes on to point out that nuclear energy's land 
footprint is small. And it says that a typical 1,000-megawatt 
nuclear facility in the United States needs little more than 1 
square mile to operate, while a wind farm of the same 
equivalent requires 336 times more land. And then the report 
goes on to talk about that you would need 3 million solar 
panels to generate the same production capacity of that one 
plant and need 430 wind turbines.
    And as we look at Naval Reactors, very concerned. And I 
know there has been some discussion earlier about China and 
China's growing threat to our national security and that, if we 
are going to combat China, our first line of defense is going 
to be our men and women who serve, our sailors who serve, and 
the need for America to invest in a more modern Navy, a larger 
Navy, to combat China and the things that we are seeing. 
Because if we do end up in any sort of armed conflict with 
China, particularly over in the Taiwanese Strait, our Navy is 
going to be that first line of defense.
    And so my question to you is, in light of the fact that 
nuclear is an important part of our energy production strategy 
nationally, that it is a clean, green energy, something that 
this administration is pushing, what was the rationale in 
asking that, in a budget that is increasing by 13.5 percent, 
that nuclear, actually, we are asking for a decrease, 
particularly in the areas that I have mentioned?
    Secretary Granholm. Yeah. Thank you for asking this.
    We are in total agreement on the importance of nuclear 
energy. And the budget decrease was only related to the two 
advanced reactor demonstration projects that were, in fact, 
funded by the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law. So those reactors 
are still happening, but they are over in the Office of Clean 
Energy Demonstrations.
    And so that is still happening, nuclear support of this 
budget; it is just going to a different place in the budget.
    Mr. Guest. Okay. So, overall, is there an increase or a 
decrease in nuclear?
    Secretary Granholm. Well, there is a decrease just because 
of those two projects moving to a different part of the budget, 
but there is an enthusiastic increase in the overall budget for 
nuclear if you include that IIJA amount--excuse me, the 
Bipartisan Infrastructure Law amount.
    Mr. Guest. And let me ask you about critical minerals.
    Secretary Granholm. Yeah.
    Mr. Guest. We understand that in the world that we live in 
that those minerals are vitally important in the production of 
things such as high-capacity batteries that we are seeing so 
many of our domestic producers moving toward.
    We know that there was an actual report that was put out by 
the Department of Commerce talking about this. It was entitled 
``A Federal Strategy to Ensure Secure and Reliable Supply of 
Critical Minerals,'' and it said that the United States imports 
most critical-mineral commodities.
    Specifically, the United States is import-reliant for 31 of 
35 minerals designated as critical by the Department of the 
Interior. The United States does not have any production 
capacity and relies completely on imports to supply us demand 
for 14 critical minerals.
    And so my question to you, as it relates to this budget 
request: What specifically in the budget goes to address our 
reliance on these critical minerals?
    I will let you answer, and then I will yield back.
    Secretary Granholm. Great.
    So, across programs, there is an increase in investment in 
critical minerals for the reasons that you say. We want to get 
that full supply chain here, from extraction to processing, to 
then perhaps installation in batteries for electric vehicles, 
which is where much of the demand is in.
    There is a $404 million increase across the board: $40 
million for FECM, $41 million for our Fossil Energy and Carbon 
Management Office; in Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy, 
it is about $206 million, because that relates to the 
batteries. It is about--overall, if you include the funding 
that comes from the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, it is about 
a 280-percent increase in the investment in critical minerals.
    And then, on top of that, the amount that the Loan Programs 
Office is investing in extraction and processing of critical 
minerals as well. Several projects: two in Nevada; one in New 
York; one in Georgia, Vidalia, Syrah, extraction for graphite.
    So there is a whole across-the-board effort inside of the 
Department of Energy to invest in extracting processing and 
ensuring we have those critical supply chains here at home.
    Mr. Guest. I yield back, Mr. Chairman.
    Mr. Fleischmann. Thank you, Mr. Guest.
    At this time, I would like a special recognition of the 
gentleman from Idaho, Mr. Simpson, before I yield to him for 5 
minutes of questioning. Mr. Simpson has served this 
subcommittee as chair, as ranking member, and done an exemplary 
job in years, and really has been a role model and represents 
the very great Idaho reservation, which I actually have visited 
before.
    So, with that, Mr. Chairman, I yield to you for 5 minutes 
for questions.
    Mr. Simpson. I thank you, Mr. Chairman. And I started off 
actually sitting over there where Mrs. Bice sits. I sat all 
around this table over the 20 years that I served on this 
committee.
    Thank you, Secretary Granholm, for being here today----
    Secretary Granholm. Of course.
    Mr. Simpson [continuing]. To answer our questions and talk 
about your budget and the recommendations within your budget.
    Before I say that, I have to say, I enjoyed the Yucca 
Mountain conversation. I will tell you, as I have told many 
Secretaries, do not fill in that cave, that $14 billion cave.
    Secretary Granholm. It is gone now. You are safe.
    Mr. Simpson. We are going to need a place to store the 53 
National Academy of Sciences' studies on Yucca Mountain that 
have been done. That is the most studied piece of earth on this 
Earth.
    But that is neither here nor there. That is a decision that 
will--you know.
    Secretary Granholm. I know.
    Mr. Simpson. It is something we have to deal with in the 
future somehow.
    Secretary Granholm. Uh-huh.
    Mr. Simpson. Let me ask you a couple of questions.
    Mr. Guest asked about nuclear energy and the reduction in 
the nuclear energy budget, which I found rather stunning 
because I know you support nuclear energy, and it is the way 
you are going to get to a carbon-free environment, if that is 
your goal. We both agree with that.
    And before I forget, thank you for coming to Idaho and our 
trip there. I enjoyed that very much.
    You said that the reason there is a decrease is because a 
couple of the demonstration projects went over to another 
account.
    The SMR NuScale, small modular reactor, which is the one 
that is furthest along--it has been licensed by the NRC--so it 
is the one that we ought to keep pushing, or at least one of 
the ones we ought to keep--I think we need to keep pushing them 
all--it was reduced substantially in this budget.
    Can you tell me why and how we expect to keep that moving 
forward?
    Secretary Granholm. Well, we did keep a $10 million 
placeholder in there. And I know this is something that has 
been a priority of yours and of mine. We also want to balance 
other equities in the budget. It has been a long time. It has 
been there--the effort to build it has been a long time in 
coming, as they are with all nuclear reactors.
    Mr. Simpson. Yeah.
    Secretary Granholm. The good news is, it is the first to be 
certified by the NRC, which is a great milestone. And I fully 
expect that it will continue apace. And I look forward to 
working with you on making sure that it is funded into the 
future in a way that is commensurate with its importance, which 
is a lot.
    Mr. Simpson. Well, I appreciate that. It is funded in 
request at $40 million, and that is a $140 million reduction, 
which is a substantial reduction in that. I want to work with 
you and with this committee to make sure that we continue 
moving this and the other advanced reactor designs forward.
    You know, we had a concern on this committee, when we 
adopted the other advanced reactors at the time, that we 
wouldn't have the money to do all of these at the time and that 
we would get started on one and all of a sudden there would 
be--you know, we don't have the money to continue that.
    The history of the DOE, frankly, is starting programs and 
then either stopping them or changing directions, such as a $14 
billion, or whatever it is, Yucca Mountain, you know?
    Secretary Granholm. Uh-huh.
    Mr. Simpson. We spent a lot of money and change directions 
before we get to the finish line. So we need to make sure we 
keep these demonstration reactors moving forward, because they 
are the future.
    Secretary Granholm. I agree with you.
    Mr. Simpson. And if we are going to actually decarbonize 
the atmosphere, you are not going to do it with wind and solar. 
That is a part of it, but the major part of it is going to be 
nuclear energy.
    Secretary Granholm. A big part, for sure.
    Mr. Simpson. So I appreciate that.
    One of the other questions is, all of these reactors are 
going to require a new type of fuel, HALEU fuel. Can you be 
more specific on what ``billed inventory'' means and clarify 
the timeline for the RFP to be released on this HALEU fuel? I 
have had numerous calls asking me, when is the Department going 
to release the RFP on this?
    Secretary Granholm. Yeah. So we received $700 million under 
the IRA. It is in interagency review right now. We hope that it 
is going to be released very soon.
    Mr. Simpson. Okay. Very soon?
    Secretary Granholm. Yeah.
    Mr. Simpson. ``Very soon'' being, like, 6 months? A year?
    Secretary Granholm. Oh, yeah----
    Mr. Simpson. Five years?
    Secretary Granholm [continuing]. Definitely within--
within--I mean, I am hopeful that it is released very soon, 
like, tomorrow. But I am not guaranteeing that----
    Mr. Simpson. Yeah.
    Secretary Granholm [continuing]. Because it is not in my 
agency at the moment----
    Mr. Simpson. Yeah.
    Secretary Granholm [continuing]. For interagency review.
    So it is a priority we are pushing. It is, obviously, 
complicated. It requires a whole new strategy. So it is in 
review, and I expect that it will be released soon.
    Mr. Simpson. Thank you very much.
    Secretary Granholm. Yeah.
    Mr. Simpson. And thank you for being here today. And any 
other questions that we have I will submit for the record, and 
I know you will answer those.
    And let me just say that, having served on this committee 
for, as I said, 20 years and been chairman and so forth, I 
can't think of a better person to have handed this committee 
off to than the gentleman from Tennessee. He is more engaged in 
these issues than I ever was, I believe, and he will do a great 
job there.
    So I look forward to working with you and rest of the 
members of this committee. Thank you.
    Mr. Fleischmann. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for those fine 
words and your questions.
    At this time, I would like to recognize the gentlelady from 
Oklahoma, Mrs. Bice, for 5 minutes.
    Mrs. Bice. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Appreciate it.
    And thank you, Secretary Granholm, for being here today.
    I want to circle back. In your response to Rep. Guest, you 
mentioned that there is a focus on investment in critical 
minerals across the country.
    Can you talk a little bit about how you are planning to 
address the issue with permitting and opposition or delays to 
permitting for new mining facilities?
    This seems to be a big topic of conversation. And if you, 
in fact, want to ensure that we have access to these critical 
minerals, the permitting process seems very antiquated and 
delayed. And I don't know how we get past that and move forward 
quickly.
    Secretary Granholm. Well, I hope that Congress can help us 
on this as well. Because you are right; it should not take 5 
years, 10 years to----
    Mrs. Bice. How is Congress going to help? Because, 
typically, these permitting processes are----
    Secretary Granholm. Oh, yeah, it----
    Mrs. Bice [continuing]. Going through agencies.
    Secretary Granholm. And it does. It does come through 
agencies. But the permitting bill, or a version of a permitting 
bill that is being considered, I am hopeful, will help us to 
address the slowness of how permitting--because, often, there 
are conflicting agencies weighing in on their equities. It 
takes all sorts of understandable input to make this happen. I 
think that there are ways, as I say, to make sure that the 
input is garnered, that the environment is protected, but for 
us also to move with alacrity. I mean, we should be able to do 
this.
    And, therefore, it is going to require some additional 
help, I think, from Congress. Although, I will say, with the 
equities that are happening on the executive-branch side, 
people are trying to move more quickly. But nobody can deny 
that it takes too long to get stuff permitted.
    Mrs. Bice. And would you agree that, also, that applies to 
things like LNG facilities that we are trying to get launched 
and move forward as well? This permitting process across the 
board is broken, correct?
    Secretary Granholm. Well, I will say, I mean, LNG 
terminals, there are--I was mentioning before--I am not sure if 
you were here on that--that we have permitted 49 BCFs' worth of 
export terminals, and we were right now at record levels of 
export at about 13 BCFs. Under construction, up to about 20 
BCFs. So we have a huge amount already permitted.
    So LNG is a little bit less of an issue----
    Mrs. Bice. Sure.
    Secretary Granholm [continuing]. Than these other projects 
that might be happening, for example, on public lands. Whether 
it is clean energy or extraction for mines, et cetera, there is 
just--or transmission--we have a permitting problem.
    Mrs. Bice. I want to pivot to one of the line items in the 
budget, and that is the establishment of a new National 
Laboratory. It is a $35 million request for the Office of 
Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy.
    One of the things that Congress has is power of the purse. 
And as a committee that is overseeing your organization, can 
you tell me how we are to be sure that this new laboratory that 
you are requesting funding for is not duplicative?
    Secretary Granholm. Yeah. Our goal on this laboratory is to 
really help to expand our pipeline of people who are interested 
in working in STEM, in the STEM fields. And so to be able to 
have a lab that draws from minority-serving institutions, from 
HBCUs, et cetera--that was what the President promised when he 
ran for office, and this is a way to make that real.
    The workforce issues in all of our labs are very real. We 
have a lot of work to do on getting a full pipeline of workers, 
and especially diverse workers and women workers as well.
    So we want to be able to use this as a mechanism, create a 
lab to get people in on understanding the technologies 
associated with renewable energy, with energy efficiency, et 
cetera, and have to be able to draw them for a permanent 
workforce.
    Mrs. Bice. Aren't there already programs through the 
Department of Education that are focused on STEAM and STEM 
education, particularly for minority and/or diversity groups 
across the country, particularly with higher ed?
    Secretary Granholm. Yes, there are programs.
    Mrs. Bice. So how can we be sure that this is not an 
additional ask of----
    Secretary Granholm. Because this is in the context of a 
National Lab setting, which, for the folks who have been 
associated with National Labs and the internships associated 
with them, see the amazing access they have to the tools, et 
cetera, that only a National Lab can provide.
    So it is very specific to this set of workforce needs. We 
need nuclear engineers. We need nuclear scientists. We need 
researchers in very advanced basic research fields. So it is 
very high-level----
    Mrs. Bice. I don't disagree with anything that you are 
saying, but my concern is that you have so much research going 
on--as a matter of fact, I came to this hearing from a Science, 
Space, and Technology hearing, where there is a huge amount of 
research across the country happening at our higher ed 
institutions, and particularly, as you mentioned, HBCUs, 
particularly focused on STEAM and STEM.
    So I have concerns that another entity, another agency 
funding that is doing something very similar to other entities 
across the country may not be the best use of taxpayer dollars.
    With that, Mr. Chairman, I yield back.
    Mr. Fleischmann. Thank you, Mrs. Bice.
    At this time, I would like to recognize another new member 
to the full committee and to this distinguished subcommittee, 
the gentleman from New York, Mr. Morelle.
    You are recognized for 5 minutes, sir.
    Mr. Morelle. Thank you so much, Mr. Chairman, and to 
Ranking Member Kaptur for holding this important hearing.
    And thank you, Madam Secretary, not only for being here 
today but for your service to the country.
    Last month, the Department of Energy's Loan Programs Office 
Director, Jigar Shah, joined me in Rochester to announce a $375 
million loan from DOE to help finance the expansion of a 
cutting-edge lithium ion battery resource recovery facility.
    The facility being built by a company called Li-Cycle made 
the decision to base the facility in Rochester, New York, where 
I am privileged to represent, due to the area's skilled labor 
force and number of university research centers.
    Once the facility is completed, Li-Cycle is projected to 
become the largest supplier of lithium carbonate in the United 
States, with the Rochester facility generating around 90,000 
tons or 203,000 lithium ion electric vehicle batteries 
annually.
    Can you just talk for a moment about the role the LPO will 
continue to play in helping to commercialize more clean-energy 
technologies and creating more jobs in communities like mine 
and why it is important that we keep the office funded to help 
ensure they continue to work efficiently and effectively?
    Secretary Granholm. You bet. Thanks for the question. And 
congratulations that it happened in your district.
    The Loan Programs Office, as a general rule, of course, is 
considered a bridge to bankability for technologies that are 
proven but are new. And so what we need to do is to be able to 
give them the opportunity to get in the ground and to be able 
to not just--they don't have to prove it out. It is not about 
proving the technology. It is about proving the business 
process. And these are new.
    So, for example, recycling of batteries and then turning 
that supply back to a supply-chain, you know, off-take is new 
for the United States. There has to be a whole infrastructure 
around recycling in order to make a go of it.
    However, in cases like this--this is just a slight 
offshoot--but in cases like this, when you can get lithium from 
a battery, you know, whether it is a battery from your laptop 
or a battery from your car, the purity that comes out of it is 
even more pure than the first time it went through the system. 
And so it makes it irresistible. So it is very exciting.
    LPO does all of the supply-chain analyses of where we are 
at and what we need to invest in in order to create a full 
industry in the United States--batteries as well as other 
clean-energy products. And this particular focus of a circular 
economy and the recycling of batteries is a key component of 
it.
    Mr. Morelle. Thank you.
    I would also note, not only lithium but will be able to 
produce high-quality, great nickel and cobalt.
    And this helps address what in the entrepreneurial 
innovation world they call the ``valley of death,'' where you 
have a product proven but you don't get enough funding to be 
able to get to a----
    Secretary Granholm. Right.
    Mr. Morelle [continuing]. Revenue-based levels. So I am 
really grateful for it.
    Just to switch gears for a second, like so many, I am 
encouraged by the recent ignition breakthrough at the National 
Ignition Facility and what it could mean both for our national 
and energy security.
    The Omega Laser Facility at the University of Rochester's 
Laboratory for Laser Energetics in my district is the largest 
DOE-funded, university-based program in the Nation and a 
primary partner of NIF as part of the Inertial Confinement 
Fusion Program. And, you know, I continue to support and to 
champion ICF Program funding and thank the Department for its 
support.
    What does fusion ignition mean for stockpile stewardship? 
And how do we leverage it for inertial fusion energy?
    Secretary Granholm. Great. I mean, as I know you are aware, 
the President has a bold decadal vision to see our first 
commercial fusion plant within a decade. What NIF did was to 
basically telegraph that it can be done, that we can achieve 
ignition.
    It is done in a lab that is really focused on weapons, 
because they have to replicate the force of an explosion in 
that lab in order to make sure that our stockpile is safe, 
secure, and effective and that we don't have to do underground 
testing. But the fact that it could be done in that context 
means it can be done in other contexts.
    That was a laser. Your program is a laser one as well, 
which got a $3 million increase also in the budget. But there 
is laser fusion; there is magnetic fusion. The commercial world 
has looked, from a commercial point of view, more at magnetic, 
but there is a lot going on in laser as well.
    So the bottom line is, we can learn a lot from the 
stockpile efforts in order to make sure that this abundant, 
clean resource is made available on a commercial level in a 
decade or more.
    Mr. Morelle. Yeah. And this having nothing to do with the 
fact that I represent the university, I am partial to laser, 
but we will take that up for a different time.
    I just wanted to just quickly, Mr. Chair, also say I want 
to continue to work for increased funding for the NNSA ICF 
program. It is below prior-year appropriations, and I would 
like to work together with you and colleagues to see if we 
can't get a request closer with congressional appropriations.
    And, with that, Mr. Chair, I yield back. Thank you.
    Mr. Fleischmann. Thank you, Mr. Morelle. And welcome to the 
committee.
    Mr. Morelle. Thank you, sir.
    Mr. Fleischmann. At this time, I would like to recognize 
the gentleman from California, a great former Navy fighter 
pilot and actually a better baseball player than me--true 
story--Mr. Garcia from California, for 5 minutes.
    Mr. Garcia. Well, thank you, Mr. Chairman. And I would say 
a mediocre fighter pilot at best, but thank you for the 
flattery and the honor of being on the subcommittee. I am 
looking forward to it.
    Madam Secretary, thank you for being here today. I 
apologize for not being here during your opening comments, but 
we have----
    Secretary Granholm. It is a busy day, I know.
    Mr. Garcia [continuing]. Four hearings concurrently right 
now.
    I did read your testimony, though. And one of the things 
that I have been most excited about--I sit on the Science, 
Space, Technology Committee as well, and we have been talking 
small modular reactors and the future of, you know, next-
generation, smaller-scale, higher-efficiency nuclear 
capabilities.
    One of the long poles in the tent with all of these 
developments nuclear-related is the waste side, and what do we 
do with the waste? Is there a way to not just store but maybe 
harness some of that and get a product of that waste that we 
can actually recycle in some form or capacity?
    I have seen a lot of briefs, actually, from new 
technologies that are what look to be very promising in terms 
of options for recycling nuclear waste. What is the Department 
doing right now to not just look at the feasibility but the 
practicality and then the implementation of some of these 
nuclear recycling capabilities that do seem to be very real 
options for us?
    Secretary Granholm. Yeah. I share your interest in this 
area.
    We know that other countries, like France, for example, 
reprocess nuclear fuel. In fact, at Idaho National Lab, there 
is--obviously, this is the lab that does so much work in next-
generation nuclear, and we have been investing there in looking 
at and investing in companies that are using their facilities 
to be able to see whether we can get to a point where something 
like this could be affordable.
    You know, in France, for example, it is hugely subsidized. 
So it----
    Mr. Garcia. Right.
    Secretary Granholm [continuing]. Is not commercially at a 
point where it can be successful at this point.
    You know, I know that there are nonproliferation concerns. 
We would have to, obviously, build a whole structure around 
that. We all agree on that.
    But we will continue to invest in this particular area, 
because I think it could be a--not the, but a--solution to some 
of the issues of waste.
    Mr. Garcia. Yeah. And I think, to your point on the cost, 
just like any leading technology, obviously, as we get further 
down the development, burn down risk, characterize things, we 
see the cost curves come down dramatically as well.
    And so I would just encourage us all to keep looking at 
this----
    Secretary Granholm. Yep.
    Mr. Garcia [continuing]. As these are green shoots and, I 
think, very important options for us. It would solve a lot of 
our problems, not just the waste side but providing fuels as 
well, and there is a demand for that as well.
    The second question I have is around the Strategic 
Petroleum Reserve. As you know, the President, over the last 
year, has effectively sold over 150 million barrels of oil from 
our Strategic Petroleum Reserve, and, to date, we really 
haven't seen a plan to refill that.
    Are you aware of the plan to refill our reserves? What does 
that plan look like? And if there is no plan, what could we 
expect for timing of a plan, at least, so that Congress is 
aware of how we are protecting our energy assets?
    Secretary Granholm. No, there is definitely a plan. We want 
to get it back to where it would have been were it not for 
those sales.
    Number one is thank you. Congress has agreed to cancel 
future congressional sales, about a 140 million barrels' worth. 
That is one piece of it.
    The second is the exchanges that we do on a regular basis, 
we will be accelerating those.
    And the third is, of course, to buy back. We have $4.5 
billion left in the account after the congressionally mandated 
sales were taken care and funded--$4.5 billion. And we want to 
buy. And the goal is to buy back at a--obviously, we sold it, 
on average, at about $94 a barrel. We want to buy it back at 
below $72 a barrel. And so we will be doing that, and that will 
happen over the course of the next few years.
    Mr. Garcia. What is preventing--I mean, we are at $70, I 
think, today.
    Secretary Granholm. Right.
    Mr. Garcia. What does the timing look like.
    Secretary Granholm. Well, it is----
    Mr. Garcia. When are we getting back to healthy.
    Secretary Granholm. Part of the challenge is that there is 
another piece of congressionally mandated sales that we are 
required to do this year, so another 26 million barrels. And we 
have two sites that are down for maintenance.
    So, this year, it will be difficult for us to take 
advantage of this low price. But we will continue to look for 
that low price into the future, because we intend to be able to 
save the taxpayer dollars.
    Mr. Garcia. When do you anticipate we get back to sort of 
2021, 2022 reserve levels, before the sell-off?
    Secretary Granholm. We will get back to it in the next--it 
will take a few years, because it takes a while to--it takes 
longer, you are probably aware of this, to refill than it does 
to extract.
    Mr. Garcia. Sure. Sure.
    Secretary Granholm. Kind of a strange thing, but that is 
just true. And these sales that we are doing this year will 
take this year----
    Mr. Garcia. If I can with the 5 seconds, is there a high-
fidelity plan that you can share with us----
    Secretary Granholm. Yes. Oh, for sure.
    Mr. Garcia [continuing]. That shows that plan in detail.
    Secretary Granholm. I will make sure I send it to your 
office. Yes, absolutely.
    Mr. Garcia. Okay. Thank you, Madam Secretary.
    Secretary Granholm. Yep.
    Mr. Garcia. Appreciate it.
    I yield back, Mr. Chair.
    Mr. Fleischmann. Thank you, Mr. Garcia.
    Madam Secretary, at this time, we will launch into a second 
round of questions, if time--and I think time permits.
    Because of the time constraints, I am going to go through a 
few topics for rather quick answers, please, so we cover 
everything.
    Plutonium pit production. Madam Secretary, according to 
NNSA documents, reaching the 80-pits-per-year production level 
will not be achievable until 2036. What is your confidence 
level that we can get it done in that timeframe?
    Secretary Granholm. We feel very comfortable we can get it 
done in that timeframe.
    Mr. Fleischmann. Thank you.
    I did want to talk about exascale computing. As you know, 
Madam Secretary, there has been tremendous bipartisan, 
bicameral, administration support for supercomputing. The 
fastest, smartest supercomputer, the Frontier, is at Oak Ridge. 
We are in an international competition with our adversaries. We 
are doing well.
    If I may, Frontier, of course, was an exascale computer. 
What is the next stage in supercomputing? And how do we balance 
new computing capabilities versus fully utilizing the machines 
we have today?
    Secretary Granholm. Yeah. We are very much supportive of 
all types of next-generation computing--exascale computing, 
quantum computing. We want to make sure that we are in the 
lead, and we are not going to forfeit that position.
    We have in this budget $699 million that we are asking to 
fund the advanced scientific computing research effort, which 
is a $14 million increase. We know that some of the capital 
investments from a couple of the exascale computers are coming 
offline because they have been installed, but we want to make 
sure that we still have the funding to be able to invest in 
next generation. So we support it.
    Mr. Fleischmann. Thank you, Madam Secretary.
    I do just want to mention, one of my colleagues did talk 
about the proposed funding cuts to the NE budget, nuclear 
energy budget. I just wanted to weigh in very strongly that we 
fully support a robust funding for nuclear energy and all that 
it entails in that department, and I have enjoyed working with 
the Under Secretary--Assistant Secretary in that regard.
    Let's see. Naval Reactors, Madam Secretary, and that 
budget, I believe that was also touched on. But what is the 
status of the Columbia-class reactors and S8G prototype 
programs? Are they adequately funded and on schedule?
    Secretary Granholm. Yes. The request is going to keep 
support for the Columbia-class ballistic missile submarine.
    And the request, which is a bit below what was enacted, is 
reflective of the funding profile for the spent-fuel handling 
recapitalization project. This was approved by Naval Reactors. 
This is not anything that they didn't work with us on. It is 
just, they are recalibrating how much they are spending on 
that.
    Mr. Fleischmann. Despite the decreases in the budget 
request, Naval Reactors' R&D budget has increased significantly 
in each of the past 3 fiscal years. What is driving this 
increase, please?
    Secretary Granholm. Well, a lot of it is similar to the 
things that we have been talking about in other construction 
areas, which is personnel, supply--supply-chain issues across 
the board are affecting all construction projects.
    Mr. Fleischmann. Thank you.
    And, lastly, Madam Secretary, my distinguished colleague 
from California inquired about reprocessing and recycling. This 
is something, I believe, the Department put actually out an 
RFP. And I do appreciate that the fact that the Department came 
out and basically said to everybody, what do we need to do?
    Obviously, Yucca has its challenges. We have these large 
amounts of nuclear waste out there. Actually, I will call it 
spent nuclear fuel, to be more precise. And as we move nuclear 
forward, what are your thoughts? Where is the administration on 
this?
    I was with Senator Sheldon Whitehouse from Rhode Island 
last night at a dinner, and he was very positive in his support 
for reprocessing. This doesn't seem to be a partisan issue. It 
is more of a--I have friends on both sides, one who is a former 
Secretary of Energy from the other side of the aisle who 
opposes me on this.
    Where are we?
    Secretary Granholm. You know, this is why we want to 
continue to invest in it, because the promise of it, if we 
could achieve it at a cost that is effective, is, you know, 
very exciting, potentially.
    But we have to continue to invest in the research and 
development, because they haven't cracked the code on how to do 
it in a cost-effective way in other places. And that is why we 
want to--we have the resources. We have the labs, we have the 
know-how to be able to do these kinds of things. So I am very 
supportive of continuing to invest.
    Mr. Fleischmann. Thank you.
    And one last thing. I am the Republican co-chair on Fusion. 
Thank you for the invite to the Lawrence Livermore event. That 
is something we can all be proud of. We finally got more energy 
out than was put in.
    I would also just like to note that the ITER funding level 
was lower. We continue to support--I continue to support ITER. 
ORNL does a tremendous amount of work in that endeavor. The 
United States owns about 9 percent of that.
    So I would just encourage supporting fusion in the future.
    Secretary Granholm. For sure. And I neglected to say when 
Congressman Morelle raised this issue that that is a historic 
investment in fusion in this budget, a billion dollars for 
fusion energy, which is very exciting in the furtherance of our 
mutual goal.
    Mr. Fleischmann. Thank you, Madam Secretary.
    At this time, I now recognize the ranking member, Ms. 
Kaptur, for 5 minutes.
    Ms. Kaptur. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    I apologize for having to leave. Our other committee, 
Defense, is meeting across the hall.
    Secretary Granholm. You gotta do what you gotta do.
    Ms. Kaptur. Madam Secretary, I have two questions.
    One, can you explain how the cost declines in solar energy 
have helped save consumers money and driven job growth in our 
country?
    We know that, currently, about 20 percent of solar modules 
deployed in our country are domestically made. But how do we 
continue to capture more of that market domestically? And, you 
know, what are your thoughts on that?
    And then the second question I will ask--and it will be my 
last one. DOE is under and the country is under a major 
ambitious nuclear modernization program. And previous NNSA 
Administrators and even the current head of STRATCOM have said 
that NNSA can only absorb so much work at one time. I am 
concerned that NNSA is on an unsustainable path, driven by DOD 
decisionmakers that don't fully understand limitations.
    What can the Department of Energy do within the interagency 
process to rebalance risky nuclear modernization plans while 
meeting defense needs?
    So one on solar energy: How do we capture--and, really, any 
new innovative energy technology, including solar, how do we 
capture more of that domestic benefit, rather than just 
continually importing the future?
    Secretary Granholm. Yeah. This is a little bit of what I 
was trying to get at earlier, is that, you know, right now 
about 80 percent of solar panels are manufactured in China. And 
they had a strategic plan to be able to do that. China had an 
industrial policy to go and to buy out solar companies in the 
United States and to bring them to China and to build them 
there and to have that area of expertise.
    We are saying, ``No. We want to build out that expertise in 
the United States.'' And that is why the investments made from 
the Inflation Reduction Act to incentivize manufacturing of 
solar panels, components, and to incentivize the production of 
solar energy are doing exactly that, meaning building up a U.S. 
supply chain of solar in this country, starting with the 
companies who are already here, like First Solar and Toledo 
Solar in your district, giving them the opportunity to really 
make significant growth opportunities for the United States.
    We know that the amount of solar--the cost of solar has 
dropped about 83 percent over the past decade. That translates 
into lower costs for families. So, if you give a family a 30-
percent tax credit to be able to install solar, now it becomes 
more affordable for them to put solar on their roofs, the 
amount that they have to pay for that solar drops because the 
technology has advanced, and we have taken it to scale.
    So the scaling, the technology, and the tax credits 
combined make for job opportunities, U.S. businesses, and, of 
course, a significant contribution to combating climate change.
    Ms. Kaptur. You have been an extraordinary leader, I can 
definitely say that, in this arena.
    And I am very worried about Great Lakes communities that 
have fallen behind, academically, business-wise, because of 
what we have been through. And I can guarantee you that many 
communities lack the legal and financial expertise to link what 
you are attempting to do on behalf of the country with the tax 
credit benefits as well as the infrastructure, simply because 
that talent is not there.
    Secretary Granholm. Hmm.
    Ms. Kaptur. And so I would urge your department to identify 
places in America that have fallen behind and to work extra 
hard to help us find the kind of expertise that can help places 
tool-up to apply in a manner where they can yield the benefit.
    Secretary Granholm. Uh-huh.
    Ms. Kaptur. Because what I see happening right now is, the 
places that have expertise in accounting, in rather complicated 
investment planning do not exist. Flint, Michigan, and Toledo, 
Ohio, are different than New York City. And I am not against 
New York, but the level of--well, sometimes I am, actually, 
when they make a mess on banking, for instance, Signature Bank 
and all that.
    But there is a problem. And the grant programs are one 
issue, but when you have to integrate across departments, 
including taxes, we do run into significant challenges. So I am 
just making you aware of that.
    Secretary Granholm. I didn't answer your question about 
the----
    Ms. Kaptur. Yes. I was going to say that and now a second 
question.
    Secretary Granholm. I am so sorry about that.
    Just quickly, I just want you to know that there has--I am 
told that we have never had as good a relationship between the 
Department of Energy, NNSA, and DOD as what exists right now. 
We are in full lockstep coordination, making sure we prioritize 
the right spending, what is the most immediate weapon system, 
et cetera.
    So feel confident that there is full coordination 
happening, and it is happening in a very positive way.
    Ms. Kaptur. Glad to hear that, and thank you. Thank you so 
much for your testimony.
    Mr. Fleischmann. Thank you, Ranking Member Kaptur.
    And I now recognize the distinguished gentleman and the 
chairman from Idaho, Mr. Simpson, for 5 minutes.
    Mr. Simpson. Thank you.
    Let me just ask, do you think--I mean, what NNSA does--and, 
in fact, I want to come down and have a classified briefing 
with you on some of the stuff that is going on with the NNSA. 
And so I will set that up.
    But what they do is weapons modernization, which is always 
necessary; Naval Reactors and the work there that they have 
done, from the first Trident submarine--or, the first submarine 
that they put out where the fuels lasted for 18 months and had 
to be refueled and now it is the life of the ship sort of 
stuff----
    Secretary Granholm. Uh-huh.
    Mr. Simpson [continuing]. Naval Reactors; and 
nonproliferation.
    Do you really think our adversaries, Russia and China, care 
what the Department of Defense and whether our NNSA can handle 
what they are requesting? I mean, doesn't the Department of 
Defense need that stuff that they are asking for?
    Secretary Granholm. Oh, absolutely, they do.
    Mr. Simpson. Yeah. That is my only question. I mean, it is 
frustrating for us on this committee, because we sometimes--in 
fact, Secretary Moniz wanted to take NNSA and put it somewhere 
else, because it was always a challenge in our budget. But it 
is an important part of our budget.
    Secretary Granholm. It is.
    Mr. Simpson. And we don't do this stuff lightly. It is 
something that is necessary.
    Let me ask a couple other questions that I just--I always 
like to stay for the whole hearing, because these are not 
questions I was going to ask but they came up as I was 
listening to other members.
    When you are talking about a new laboratory for these 
purposes and stuff, I am sitting there going, well, you have 
NREL. Wouldn't that be a place to educate some of these people 
that you are talking about?
    Even in Idaho, you have a case out there that is a State 
and university building and laboratory right next to the 
buildings at the INL that does just exactly what you are 
talking about.
    Can't you do the same thing using the laboratories that we 
currently have, without building a new laboratory?
    Secretary Granholm. Well, I think that the discussion about 
what the form of this lab is is a ripe discussion, but I do 
think that it would be more challenging for Idaho or for NREL 
to really fully diversify or to get that full opportunity to 
get the access to the talent that are at the HBCUs, the MSIs, 
because they are not physically located.
    So we want to have this discussion, we want to do it right, 
but we also want to make sure we tap into the talent that is 
out there. And right now we are missing it.
    Mr. Simpson. And we do have--and I agree, we are going to 
need nuclear reactors--or, nuclear----
    Secretary Granholm. Engineers.
    Mr. Simpson [continuing]. Engineers and those type of 
people in the future. In fact, if you look at the age of those 
people right now, they are going to be retiring, and we are 
going to have a gap in there.
    Secretary Granholm. Yeah.
    Mr. Simpson. So we need to do that. But that is why we have 
the University Program that we have funded through--I don't 
know. It has been kicked back and forth. Where is it now?
    Staff. In the NRC.
    Mr. Simpson. Yeah. Both in the NRC--we have kicked it back 
and forth. But the NRC has the University Program to help 
educate these people and bring them into the field and stuff.
    Secretary Granholm. Yeah.
    Mr. Simpson. So this is a conversation we ought to have. 
How is the best way to do it and stuff?
    And, lastly, I don't want to--I shouldn't bring this up, 
but I will.
    Secretary Granholm. Uh-oh.
    Mr. Simpson. And I am not--when I walked in, there was kind 
of a heated conversation going on here between the gentleman 
from Pennsylvania, who is a friend of mine, and yourself. And I 
will be the first to admit, I heard the comment on TV and my 
first reaction was, ``That has to be a clip.''
    And I got the impression, listening to you, that you had 
something you wanted to say but were kind of cut off from 
saying that. Do you want to say anything about that?
    Secretary Granholm. I would like to say----
    Mr. Simpson. Go ahead.
    Secretary Granholm [continuing]. That China has been 
horrible on emissions, on human rights, and they have also 
invested enormously in clean energy. Both can be true.
    What we want to learn is that they have taken the clean-
energy side and created monopolies, almost, on supply chains by 
those investments. They have made themselves, strategically, 
the whole supply chain for batteries, for example. And we need 
to not stand by any longer and let that happen.
    I mean, you know, Ranking Member Kaptur and I come from the 
Midwest, and we saw all of these manufacturing facilities leave 
to China for decades, and we did nothing about it. Now is our 
moment to say, ``Enough. We want the supply chains here, and we 
are going to have our own strategy to be able to make us the 
indispensable, irresistible nation to invest in.''
    And that is what I meant, is that we need to learn from 
what they did and take it back.
    Mr. Simpson. Thank you. I thought there must be more to 
that comment than what I saw in the news. But thank you for----
    Ms. Kaptur. Will the gentleman yield at some point.
    Mr. Simpson. Sure.
    Ms. Kaptur. I just wanted to say, in the steel industry, we 
know what China did. We have the pattern. It is out there.
    Mr. Simpson. Yup.
    Ms. Kaptur. They produced four times as much as the world 
consumed and then strategically dumped.
    Come to Lorain, Ohio, come to Cleveland, where we have just 
finally, through Cleveland-Cliffs, begun to restore the steel 
industry of this country, and see the devastation that people 
have had to endure.
    So I just wanted to put that on the record. And now it is 
going to happen. And they have learned from that what the 
Chinese----
    Mr. Simpson. Yup.
    Ms. Kaptur. They have learned what to do. And it is 
hurtful. It is very hurtful. So----
    Mr. Simpson. As was mentioned earlier----
    Ms. Kaptur. Predatory.
    Mr. Simpson [continuing]. Solar panels aren't made in the 
United States.
    Ms. Kaptur. Exactly.
    Mr. Simpson. And they should be made----
    Ms. Kaptur. Well, some are, but----
    Mr. Simpson [continuing]. In this country.
    Ms. Kaptur [continuing]. Yes, you are right.
    Mr. Simpson. Yeah, but, I mean, they should be made in this 
country.
    Ms. Kaptur. They should be made here. That is exactly 
right.
    Mr. Simpson. And you could go through the list of things 
that are that way.
    Ms. Kaptur. Right.
    Mr. Simpson. The whole supply chain, all the way down to 
critical minerals and so forth.
    Ms. Kaptur. Uh-huh. Exactly.
    Mr. Simpson. So, anyway----
    Ms. Kaptur. Thank you for the opportunity.
    Mr. Simpson. You bet. Thank you. And I look forward to 
working with you on this.
    Ms. Kaptur. Likewise.
    Mr. Simpson. Thank you.
    Mr. Fleischmann. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and Ranking Member 
Kaptur.
    At this time, I would like to recognize Ms. Wasserman 
Schultz for 5 minutes.
    Ms. Wasserman Schultz. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    And, Chairman Simpson, you know, what you did just now 
proved yet again what we all know, that you are a class act.
    Mr. Simpson. Thank you.
    Ms. Wasserman Schultz. So thank you for that indulgence and 
for not having me have to ask the Secretary a question to 
essentially have her clean up the same thing since she wasn't 
allowed to talk. So we appreciate it very much.
    Secretary Granholm, the electric grid faces thousands of 
natural, manmade, and cybersecurity threats every day. Can you 
discuss the biggest threats that the electric grid faces, how 
the Department responds to them, and then what investments we 
need to harden the grid against future threats?
    Secretary Granholm. Yeah.
    First of all, I think cyber is a huge threat, clearly; 
extreme weather events are a huge threat; and the size of the 
grid, meaning it is too small for what we need to do to get to 
the goal of 100 percent clean electricity by 2035. All three 
need to be addressed.
    On resiliency, true, the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, 
there was some money, $20 billion, for the grid, which is 
important. It is being run through our Grid Deployment Office, 
and they have put out requests for proposals on those 
particular components. But it is not enough. The undergrounding 
of key infrastructure in high hurricane areas or high fire 
areas, there is just not enough to be able to do that in 
addition to just the capacity that is needed.
    Cyber-wise, our CESER office is really focused on making 
sure that we have built in the United States the transformers 
and the pieces of the supply chain that, again, have been built 
in other countries. And so that piece of things, while we got 
some funding for that, it is still not going to be enough.
    These are things for the committee to consider going 
forward, in terms of what we really need to fund to shore up 
our own security--our own energy security and energy 
independence. And those three things are the most important 
pieces for the grid.
    Ms. Wasserman Schultz. That is really helpful. And, 
obviously, capacity is an issue. We have to ramp up 
significantly.
    And so that is what surprised me, really shocked me, when 
the Governor of my State, Ron DeSantis, actually turned down 
Federal cybersecurity dollars to help our local governments 
harden their infrastructure. Florida was the only State, other 
than South Dakota, to not have applied for these funds for 
their local governments.
    Communities like Broward County, Hallandale Beach, Fort 
Lauderdale that I represent got nothing, because he just left 
money on the table. You have counties and cities across my 
State that need access to those dollars that have to expand 
capacity, that have to harden--I mean, we are in Florida. We 
have a lot of hardening needs.
    But, you know, obviously, Governor DeSantis is running for 
President, so he chooses to play politics instead of leveraging 
the resources that President Biden's popular infrastructure law 
was able to help provide our local communities. I mean, he 
actually refused to apply for the funding. It is mind-blowing.
    So he is failing Floridians. I think it is important to 
underscore that, since it was two States in the whole country. 
You know, we are getting some foreshadowing on what the whole 
country can expect. So, just wanted to put that on the table.
    And, then, we had a tremendously successful 117th Congress. 
Democrats passed the Inflation Reduction Act. You referenced 
some of the benefits of it. We came together to pass President 
Biden's Bipartisan Infrastructure Law. And some of the funding 
from these bills is going to the Department of Energy and then 
eventually down to our local governments.
    So can you share how your department provides local 
communities with the resources to lower their energy bills and 
pay for energy-efficient home upgrades?
    Secretary Granholm. Let me just--I will just focus on two 
things.
    One is the tax credits--the tax credits that are associated 
with allowing people 30 percent off for installing solar 
panels, 30 percent off for installing charging equipment, a 
$7,500 tax credit for the purchase of an electric vehicle, or a 
$4,000 tax credit for the purchase of a used electric vehicle. 
All of these pieces obviously lower people's bills.
    But in addition to that, you all--thank you very much--
supported rebates. Those rebates will be made available before 
the heating season. But that will give people the ability, 
especially low- and moderate-income people, the ability to have 
heat pumps, to take significant amount of funding off of that 
if they have to change out their HVAC system.
    In fact, if you combine all of the rebates and the tax 
credits into one bucket for a low- or moderate-income family, 
it could be $17,000 off of the equipment----
    Ms. Wasserman Schultz. That is great.
    Secretary Granholm [continuing]. That will ensure that they 
will pay a lower bill going forward.
    So there is a huge amount of help in these bills for 
citizens all across the country.
    Ms. Wasserman Schultz. Thank you so much.
    Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I yield back.
    Mr. Fleischmann. Thank you, Ms. Wasserman Schultz.
    At this time, I would like to recognize the gentleman from 
California, Mr. Garcia, for 5 minutes.
    Mr. Garcia. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Madam Secretary, in the fiscal year 2023 bill, we had about 
$163 million in emergency supplemental funding for 
nonproliferation efforts in Ukraine.
    First of all, can you explain, what exactly are we doing? I 
mean, that comes out to, like, $13 million a month, half-a-
million a day. What does that scope entail?
    And then what is in the fiscal year 2024 budget? I haven't 
seen that.
    Secretary Granholm. So I just want to make sure I am--I 
want to say what I can in open session.
    Mr. Garcia. Sure. And we can answer this in another setting 
if you would prefer to do that.
    Secretary Granholm. Let me just give you a general answer, 
is that there has been a lot of focus on detection of whether 
there is an event and the equipment that is necessary for that; 
training of Ukrainian personnel to be able to operate those 
pieces and be able to do that detection; work with the IAEA on 
the presence at facilities that are there, including the 
Zaporizhzhia and the other nuclear facilities.
    So it is those kinds of things that they have been working 
on. And I must say, the team that has been working on this has 
been up--I mean, they are just on this 24/7 to make sure that 
the Ukrainians are safe and are not exposed.
    Mr. Garcia. Is the budget footprint in 2024 similar to what 
we saw in 2023, and then the scope similar, same-same?
    Secretary Granholm. I think--I believe so, but I just want 
to confirm.
    Mr. Garcia. Okay.
    Secretary Granholm. I am getting nods. Yes.
    Mr. Garcia. Okay. If possible, I would love to get a deep-
dive brief on that in the right location.
    Secretary Granholm. Yeah. We will follow up.
    Mr. Garcia. So we talked about the recycling side of this. 
Last year, we had--well, actually, the President's budget has 
about a billion dollars set aside for fusion activities. But we 
don't have the HALEU sources; is that right?
    So how do we do fusion and support fusion with no tritium? 
What are we doing with this money?
    Secretary Granholm. So the HALEU, of course, is for the 
advanced fission reactors. And there is a $700 million plug 
there from the--is it from the bipartisan?--it was from IRA, so 
the Inflation Reduction Act. That is one component. There was 
another $132 million for uranium in the nuclear budget.
    So, you know, you are starting to see a good slug. We are 
going to be putting out a request--a funding opportunity 
announcement related to those pieces very soon. It is currently 
in interagency review.
    So that is one piece.
    Mr. Garcia. Okay.
    Secretary Granholm. It is not the only piece, though. I 
mean, we have to shore up--we have to have an overall uranium 
strategy. HALEU is one piece, but LEU is another piece--low-
enriched uranium.
    So we have to have a more comprehensive view as a Nation so 
that we are not reliant upon Russia. Russia right now is the 
supplier of HALEU. It is not acceptable.
    Mr. Garcia. Right. Okay.
    Secretary Granholm. And so we have to build up our own 
supply here. We are doing some of the down-blending of high-
enriched uranium through our NNSA facilities, but it is not 
going to be enough. We need to do a full-on strategy on 
uranium.
    Mr. Garcia. Agreed.
    Okay. Thank you, Madam Secretary.
    I yield the balance. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
    Mr. Fleischmann. Thank you, Mr. Garcia.
    At this time, I would like to recognize Ms. Lee for 5 
minutes.
    Ms. Lee of Nevada. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
    As you know, the EPSCoR, the Established Program to 
Stimulate Competitive Research, is an absolutely critical 
program for research institutions in Nevada and across the 
country. In fact, institutions across 25 EPSCoR States rely on 
this funding to expand their contributions to critical energy 
research and innovation.
    The CHIPS and Science Act, which I was proud to vote for 
last summer, authorized increasing the Department's EPSCoR 
funding from an estimated $150 million in fiscal year 2023 to 
about $1 billion in 2027.
    However, I have heard from research institutions in Nevada 
concerns that the fiscal 2024 budget request for EPSCoR is not 
on track with the plan that Congress laid out in the CHIPS and 
Science Act. Specifically, the Department requested $35 million 
in EPSCoR for fiscal year 2023, but in 2024 the request is 
heading in the wrong direction, to $25 million.
    So could you take a minute to explain why the Department is 
calling for decreased EPSCoR funding in 2024?
    Secretary Granholm. I am just double-checking on this. My 
information was that the EPSCoR amount for 2024 was the same as 
2023.
    Ms. Lee of Nevada. The same.
    Secretary Granholm. Enacted. Of the enacted amount.
    Ms. Lee of Nevada. Okay. Yeah, that is--boosting EPSCoR 
funding is incredibly important for Nevada institutions and a 
top priority for me, so----
    Secretary Granholm. Great.
    Ms. Lee of Nevada [continuing]. I would like to continue to 
advocate for that.
    Secretary Granholm. I would like to work with you on that.
    Ms. Lee of Nevada. Thank you.
    And that is it. I will yield.
    Mr. Fleischmann. Thank you, Ms. Lee.
    At this time, I would like to recognize Mr. Morelle of New 
York for 5 minutes.
    Mr. Morelle. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
    I want to come back--I feel a little bit like a dog with a 
bone--on ICF facilities. And I apologize, I wasn't here to hear 
your testimony, but I read what you submitted yesterday. You 
talked in your testimony about the aging and evolving nuclear 
stockpile, evolving threats to our nuclear deterrence, and 
expanding interest for fundamental discovery in high-density 
science.
    Despite the demand that I think is going to continue to be 
placed on these facilities, including, again, the one, OMEGA, 
that I represent in Rochester, I think there has been, or there 
is an estimate--because there hasn't been major infrastructure 
improvements, I think, for a couple of decades in these 
facilities, and I note they have identified somewhere in the 
region of $650 million in sustainment needs for the next 5 to 
10 years from an infrastructure point of view.
    I know that the Department recently submitted the 10-year 
facility and infrastructure plan required by Congress. Can you 
just comment a little bit on the needs and the necessity for 
ensuring we continue to have these capabilities in the future?
    Secretary Granholm. Yeah. I mean, across the board----
    Mr. Morelle. Yeah.
    Secretary Granholm [continuing]. We have an aging 
infrastructure. And across the board, if we want to have, for 
example, a nuclear stockpile that is safe, secure, and 
effective, we have to upgrade these facilities.
    We have to upgrade them for just purely pragmatic reasons, 
because many of them are falling apart, and we have to upgrade 
them if we want to attract the talent to be able to ensure that 
we have a workforce capable of the high level of knowledge that 
is necessary to be able to sustain, you know, modernization 
activities.
    So, critical to be able to invest in this infrastructure.
    Mr. Morelle. And does the spending plan now and do you 
anticipate in the future at least address some of these 
concerns?
    Secretary Granholm. It does address some of them. Clearly, 
we need to continue to improve on the investments. But we and 
the Department of Defense are comfortable that we are working 
at the right pace both on the life extension programs as well 
as the facilities that are under NNSA.
    Mr. Morelle. Well, and I would love to offer my help to you 
and the Department as we move along to try to secure the 
necessary resources to do this, so thank you.
    Secretary Granholm. Thank you.
    Mr. Morelle. Just to quickly change, and then I am happy to 
yield back--and I thank you, Mr. Chairman, for allowing me a 
second bite at the apple here--I wanted to talk about clean 
hydrogen production. I have heard you speak on it. I know you 
are someone who supports it.
    In my district as well as across upstate New York, my 
friend Paul Tonko, who represents the Albany area, represents a 
company in both of our districts, Plug Power, and they are 
operating a clean hydrogen and fuel cell gigafactory. They 
employ nearly 300 New Yorkers in manufacturing key components 
for fuel cell engines, electrolyzers, which produce clean 
hydrogen.
    I note that a number of States, including my own, with over 
100 partners, have come together to form the Northeast Clean 
Hydrogen Hub. And we do plan to apply to receive funding 
through the new regional clean hydrogen hub program created in 
the infrastructure law. And we, I think, want to work to build 
a robust market for clean hydrogen. It creates new economic 
opportunities, obviously helps address the climate goals.
    I am just--I know the application period, I think, runs 
through April 7. What can we expect in terms of what the 
process will look like post-April 7? And how can we support 
local advocates who are pushing for that hub? Any tips?
    Secretary Granholm. Well, as you know, it is a competitive 
process, so----
    Mr. Morelle. Yes. Yes, of course.
    Secretary Granholm [continuing]. Generically, what I will 
say is that the review of these might take a little bit longer 
than your average funding opportunity announcement because of 
the complexity and the partnerships that are in, I know, a lot 
of the applicants.
    We will also do a whole vetting of everybody, as well, to 
make sure that we are creating an American opportunity and that 
there is not----
    Mr. Morelle. Do you have a sense just in terms of, is this 
a 6-month, an 8-month--do you have any--have you given any 
thought to that?
    Secretary Granholm. I think that by the fall there will be 
the beginnings of negotiation with the selectees, but I don't 
want to----
    Mr. Morelle. Yeah.
    Secretary Granholm [continuing]. I don't want to say for 
sure.
    Mr. Morelle. No.
    Secretary Granholm. It will definitely happen this year.
    Mr. Morelle. Gotcha.
    Secretary Granholm. It is just a question of how many 
months out, because they will take their time to do it right.
    Mr. Morelle. Yeah.
    And aside from my flippant remark about ``any tips,'' but, 
like, from your perspective, what are the priority elements 
that you are looking for in terms of applications?
    Secretary Granholm. Well, first of all, I think it is 
important that everybody--everybody has been very excited about 
hydrogen hubs, and that is great. We want to create a whole 
hydrogen economy.
    This opportunity through the bipartisan infrastructure law 
is really on the supply side, right? We need to create a 
hydrogen economy on the demand side as well. And so what we are 
saying to all applicants is, make sure you have off-take in 
your hub so that we can ensure that this is not just being 
built without customers.
    Mr. Morelle. Thank you.
    And, Mr. Chairman, thank you for your indulgence. I yield 
back.
    Mr. Fleischmann. Thank you, Mr. Morelle.
    With that, Madam Secretary, I want to thank you again for 
appearing before us today and for a substantive hearing. We 
look forward to working with you, and please feel free to reach 
out to us at any time.
    And I thank you. You have a very difficult job, but the 
Department of Energy is so critically important to our great 
Nation and to our future. Thank you.
    Secretary Granholm. Thank you so much.
    Mr. Fleischmann. With that, we stand adjourned.
    [Questions and answers submitted for the record follow:]
    
    
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                                           Tuesday, March 28, 2023.

                              MEMBER'S DAY

    Mr. Fleischmann. The Energy and Water Subcommittee of 
Appropriations is now open. This is Member Day.
    For the record, I am the chairman.
    The distinguish ranking member, Ms. Kaptur, is here as well 
and present.
    It appearing that all of the Members who were going to show 
have decided not to show up, but we will note for the record 
that everyone's testimony that they have sent in will be placed 
in the record.
    With that, I would like to yield to the distinguished 
ranking member, if she has any comments.
    Ms. Kaptur. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, for calling 
this meeting to order.
    And I would like to ask unanimous consent, along with those 
who will submit materials to the record, to submit my opening 
statement.
    Mr. Fleischmann. So agreed.
    And, with that, I believe we can adjourn. Thank you.
    [Statements submitted for the record follow:]
    
    
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                                         Wednesday, March 29, 2023.

FISCAL YEAR 2024 REQUEST FOR THE ARMY CORPS OF ENGINEERS AND BUREAU OF 
                              RECLAMATION

                               WITNESSES

MICHAEL L. CONNOR, ASSISTANT SECRETARY, ARMY (CIVIL WORKS)
SCOTT A. SPELLMON, CHIEF OF ENGINEERS AND COMMANDING GENERAL, U.S. ARMY 
    CORPS OF ENGINEERS
CAMILLE CALIMLIM TOUTON, COMMISSIONER, BUREAU OF RECLAMATION
    Mr. Fleischmann. The hearing will come to order. Good 
morning, everyone. I am Congressman Chuck Fleischmann. I am 
privileged to be the chair of the Energy and Water Subcommittee 
on Appropriations. And it's my pleasure to welcome Assistant 
Secretary of the Army for Civil Works, Michael Connor, and the 
commanding general and chief of engineers, Lieutenant General 
Scott Spellmon. General, great to be with you today and thank 
you. I know you have been to the District and we've met several 
times--good to see you--to discuss the fiscal year 2024 budget 
for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and Commissioner Camille 
Touton. Did I say that right, ma'am? Good. Touton. To discuss 
the request for the Bureau of Reclamation. Thank you for being 
with us today.
    This subcommittee has a long history of strong support for 
the infrastructure needed to manage our nation's water 
resources, promote public safety, and ensure America maintains 
its competitive advantage in transporting goods to market. And 
as a longtime representative of Eastern Tennessee, I have a 
keen interest in construction and maintenance of our nation's 
inland waterway system. These locks and dams make possible the 
movement of waterborne commerce throughout the interior of the 
country and are essential for America's agriculture, aggregates 
industry and energy security.
    I was disappointed the budget request included no funds for 
inland waterways construction projects. These projects, like 
many corps projects, have faced delays and cost escalations, 
including the Chickamauga Lock in my home district. Execution 
of the Chick Lock project seems to be on a better path now. But 
we need to continue working to improve project delivery of 
these critical water resources and infrastructure projects.
    Overall, I'm concerned this budget does not sufficiently 
invest in the Corps or reclamation infrastructure. While not 
unusual for the budget request to propose reductions for these 
programs, it is still disappointing. The $7.4 billion request 
would reduce funding for the Corps of Engineers by more than 14 
percent below the fiscal 2023 enacted level. The budget 
proposes the largest cuts for the Corps' civil works mission in 
the Mississippi Rivers and tributaries, investigations and 
operation and maintenance accounts.
    Further, the request for Harbor Maintenance Trust Fund 
activities is over $1 billion below the maximum offset allowed 
by law. I note that the subcommittee has not yet received 
justification sheets for the operation and maintenance account. 
These budget materials are essential for the subcommittee to 
conduct its work. And I hope we can expect that information 
soon.
    The 1.9 billion-dollar request for the Bureau of 
Reclamation represents a 25 percent cut below the fiscal 2023 
enacted level, including a 27 percent reduction to the water 
and related resources account. This account funds drought 
mitigation and planning, new and existing water supply 
infrastructure and operation of water projects across the West.
    Assistant Secretary Connor, General Spellmon, and 
Commissioner Touton, I appreciate your being here today to 
explain your budget requests. I look forward to working 
together with you and will--and with my colleagues on both 
sides of the aisle and dais to move forward a bill that will 
enhance public safety and maximize the economic benefit of 
America's water resources. Please ensure that the hearing 
record, questions for the record and any supporting information 
requested by the subcommittee are delivered in final form to us 
no later than four weeks from the time that you receive them.
    Members who have additional questions for the record will 
have until the close of business Monday to provide them to the 
subcommittee office. With that, I will respectfully turn to my 
ranking member, Ms. Kaptur of Ohio, for her opening statement. 
Madam Ranking Member.
    Ms. Kaptur. Thank you very much, Chairman Fleischmann. 
Welcome. We are here today to discuss the fiscal year 2024 
budget request for the Army Corps of Engineers and the Bureau 
of Reclamation. Your agencies play a critical role in 
strengthening our economy, sustaining life in our country and 
on this continent and ensuring public safety against the now 
constant onslaught of natural disasters across our country. 
Thank you for your fortitude, and thank you for joining us 
today.
    Let us begin with fresh water. It is fundamental. 
Investments in the critical freshwater infrastructure of our 
nation give people a secure source of vital sustenance while 
supporting a family's ability to work in good-paying jobs and 
to spur economic growth. The lack of freshwater means 
annihilation and dislocation. The essential investments in our 
annual appropriation bills combined with historic 
infrastructure investment and Jobs Act and Inflation Reduction 
Act are beginning to address our nation's crumbling 
infrastructure to build back a better and more secure America.
    This last year and just this last weekend mark yet another 
extraordinary period for extreme weather across our country. 
California just faced the 12th atmospheric river event since 
late December. Wow. These events are now too commonplace. The 
massive amounts--massive amounts of rain and snow they deposit 
and the widespread flooding and hurricane-like winds that 
accompany them take a particularly heavy toll on town after 
town and have especially harmed farmworkers and their 
communities who live in the most vulnerable places.
    For the first time in modern history, California, according 
to our Census Bureau, is witnessing an outmigration of its 
population. Across the Southwest, the severe drought has 
resulted in the Colorado River crisis. This river is a 
lifeline, as you well know, for millions of our fellow 
citizens. Experts are now saying that Lake Mead and Lake Powell 
are unlikely to refill for another 50 years.
    In the Southeast, Hurricane Ian devastated Florida, South 
Carolina and North Carolina, causing more than $100 billion in 
damage and at least 150 fatalities. Last summer, there was 
devastating flooding across Kentucky and Missouri, which 
damaged thousands of homes, businesses and infrastructure. And 
deadly flooding hit Kentucky again just last month.
    In my region, ice typically covers 70 percent of the Great 
Lakes. But this year, it covered just 6 percent, the smallest 
amount ever recorded in history. Lack of ice cover and 
increased evaporation have implications for expanding algal 
blooms in our freshwater lakes. And that impacts, as well, 
native species for our region for the coming spring and summer 
seasons.
    The United States had 18 different billion-dollar weather 
disasters last year, 2022. And last year is building on an 
increasing trend. A recent report found that 90 percent of the 
counties in the United States--90 percent--suffered weather 
disasters in the last decade, impacting 93 percent of our 
country's population, more than 300 million people. It is 
undeniable that we are witnessing growing weather events 
stemming from climate change occurring in real time before our 
very eyes.
    We have entered an age of the new normal. Thus, it is 
critical for agencies that are project-based like the Corps and 
reclamation to think more broadly and adapt to planning 
regionally to implement solutions on a watershed and 
subwatershed basis to make our communities more resilient. This 
is an imperative. Close to home in our Great Lakes region, 
projects like assuring passage through the Soo Locks are a 
prime example of investments that will turbocharge the 
resiliency and efficiency of our maritime transportation 
system.
    Similarly, the Brandon Road Project is addressing the 
economic and environmental damage unleashed by invasive Asian 
species, carp. Those creatures will destroy all the native fish 
populations in the Great Lakes if not stopped. And I hope we 
can continue to work together to maintain support for Ohio's 
ports that not only play a vital role to support continued 
economic development but also serve as a massive source of 
dredge material that can be used to increase shoreline 
resilience to the impacts of climate change. As we begin our 
discussion on this Fiscal 2024 bill, I must say I am again 
disappointed by the proposed reductions of $1.3 billion for the 
Corps of Engineers and $485 million for reclamation.
    Somebody over there in the executive branch must have 
thought Congress will save them from this ridiculous idea. And 
while historic investments were made through the Infrastructure 
Investment and Jobs Act and Inflation Reduction Act in both of 
your agencies, we have significant work to do to better protect 
Americans against severe drought, flooding and storms and make 
sure everyone has fresh water.
    There is bipartisan support in Congress for the work that 
your agencies undertake on behalf of the American people. Your 
work is not just necessary. It is critical. Thank you for being 
here, and we look forward to your testimony. With that, I'll 
close my remarks, and I'll look forward to discussing your 
request. Thank you, and thank you, Mr. Chairman and members. I 
yield back.
    Mr. Fleischmann. Thank you, Ranking Member Kaptur. And 
again, I want to thank each and every one of our witnesses here 
today. Really look forward to your testimony. Without 
objection, your full written testimonies will be entered into 
the record. With that in mind, we would respectfully ask that 
you please summarize your opening statements in five minutes.
    Secretary Connor, you are now recognized for your opening 
statement, sir.
    Mr. Connor. Thank you, Chair Fleischmann, Ranking Member 
Kaptur, distinguished members of the subcommittee. Thank you 
for the opportunity to discuss the President's budget request 
for the Army Civil Works Program. I'll quickly summarize. The 
fiscal year 2024 budget request includes over $7.4 billion for 
the Army Civil Works Program. Notwithstanding a reduction from 
the generous levels that Congress provided, it is the largest 
request in history, complemented by an additional $1.05 billion 
from the investment--Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act. 
These investments demonstrate President Biden's ongoing 
commitment to funding critical infrastructure projects that 
will strengthen our economy, protect people and property, and 
restore key ecosystems.
    It's important to note that the water resources challenges 
of today and tomorrow are not like yesterday's. Extreme weather 
events, whether precipitation, drought or hurricane-driven 
storm surges are increasingly the norm, creating risks to 
communities, the economy and natural systems. As a result, 
understanding vulnerabilities and increasing our preparedness 
is paramount. For that reason, the budget provides $86 million, 
the largest request in course history, for research and 
development. The focus of this work will be on innovative 
solutions that achieve cost savings in the civil works program 
and addressing the emerging water resources challenges of the 
21st Century, including climate change.
    The budget focuses on the highest-performing work within 
the three main missions of the Army Civil Works program, 
commercial navigation, flood and storm-damaged reduction and 
aquatic ecosystem restoration. In developing the budget, 
consideration was also given to advancing three key objectives 
that reflect administration priorities, decreasing climate 
risks for communities and the environment, promoting 
environmental justice in underserved communities and tribal 
nations, and strengthening the supply chain.
    With respect to climate, the Corps has always been in the 
resilience business, and the proposed investments include more 
than $1.4 billion for construction of flood and storm damage 
reduction and aquatic ecosystem restoration projects and over 
$64 million to improve climate resiliency and/or sustainability 
at existing Corps-owned facilities. For the second priority, 
the budget supports the Administration's Justice 40 initiative 
through investments in 23 studies and in construction of 33 
projects to help disadvantaged communities. Supply chains 
remain a priority, which the Civil Works Program supports 
through its commercial navigation efforts. The budget 
facilitates safe, reliable and sustainable commercial 
navigation to support U.S. competitiveness and improve 
resilience of our nation's manufacturing supply chain.
    In support of the Administration's commitment to our 
nation's coastal ports and inland waterways, the FY 2024 budget 
includes over $3.4 billion for the study, design, construction 
and operation and maintenance of inland and coastal navigation 
projects. Of this amount, over $1.7 billion is derived from the 
Harbor Maintenance Trust Fund. Equally important is--to 
building community resilience is the work of the aquatic 
ecosystem restoration mission.
    The budget includes $653 million for AER, including $450 
million for the South Florida Ecosystem Restoration Program, 
which will enable significant progress in restoring America's 
Everglades. The budget also includes $93 million to support 
salmon recovery efforts in the Columbia River Basin. Other 
significant investments include $655 million for the 
construction of a critical dam safety project at Prado Dam and 
$350 million for the replacement of the Cape Cod Canal Bridges.
    Importantly, the budget includes $235 million to continue 
construction of the Soo Locks Project. In total, FY 2024 
construction program is funded at more than $2 billion. I want 
to acknowledge that there is no funding proposed for the inland 
waterways trust fund in this year's budget and view a $2.5 
billion made available in the Infrastructure and Investment 
Jobs Act for inland waterway projects.
    Nonetheless, we view the IWTF as a very valuable funding 
source. And I anticipate there will be significant use in the 
future. Of course, the budget also focuses on maintaining the 
key features of the vast water resources infrastructure that 
the Corps owns and manages. Specifically, the 2024 budget funds 
O&M at over $4.4 billion. For the investigations program, the 
2024 budget provides $139 million, including $35.5 million for 
technical and planning assistance programs.
    Wrapping up the budget summary, it's significant that the 
2024 regulatory program is funded at $221 million to protect 
the nation's waters and wetlands and provide efficiency in 
permit-processing, which is a very high priority for the 
administration. Recreation is funded at $270 million to ensure 
the Corps, one of the nation's leading providers of recreation 
facilities--so that they continue to effectively serve the 
public's desire to experience the great outdoors.
    To summarize, the Civil Works budget makes critical 
investments in water resources that will benefit the American 
people and promote greater prosperity and economic growth for 
decades to come. Thank you for the opportunity. I look forward 
to the questions.
    [The information follows:]
    
    
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    General Spellmon. Good morning, everyone. And Chairman 
Fleischmann, Ranking Member Kaptur and distinguished members of 
the subcommittee, I am honored to testify before you this 
morning and thank you for the opportunity to discuss the Fiscal 
Year 2024 budget of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, another 
record investment in our nation's civil works program.
    Today, I look forward to discussing the status of important 
Corps projects and programs as well as answer any questions the 
committee may have regarding our 2024 budget. Most importantly, 
I look forward to continuing to work with this committee, with 
Congress and certainly the administration to address the 
nation's critical water resource infrastructure needs.
    We greatly appreciate the committee's continued support of 
the Corps' program. With recent record-high appropriations, 
including the $1.4 billion of additional funding provided late 
last year as part of the Disaster Relief Supplemental 
Appropriations Act of 2023. The Corps Civil Works program has 
experienced significant growth over the past several years. 
This substantial level investment enables critical water 
resource projects to be studied and constructed. It allows us 
to further develop innovative approaches that address some of 
our nation's most pressing challenges through focused research 
and development.
    The Fiscal Year 2024 budget reflects a targeted approach to 
continue investing in our water resource programs that promote 
climate resiliency, which will benefit the nation's economy, 
environment and public safety now and into the future. The 
budget also supports the Assistant Secretary's priorities for 
the Corps by upgrading our nation's waterways, protecting 
communities and ecosystems, better serving disadvantaged 
communities, investing in science and R&D, and finally, 
sustaining and improving our communications and relationships 
with our many partners. The 2024 budget taken with other recent 
funding provides the Corps with what the secretary calls a 
transformational opportunity to deliver water resource 
infrastructure projects that will positively impact communities 
across our great nation.
    We are also taking advantage of this opportunity to do two 
things, first, to transform our organization and decision-
making process to more consistently safely deliver quality 
projects on time and within budget. And second, identifying 
risk to how we are delivering our program. Our teams are hard 
at work seeking out new and better ways to mitigate or 
eliminate these risks so we can further strengthen the safety 
and security of communities across our country and our 
territories.
    By evolving our policies, programs and operations and 
placing an increased focus on research and development, we are 
working to overcome impacts of challenges such as sea-level 
rise or changes in precipitation patterns and hydrology that we 
see across the country and other effects of climate change, 
including improvement to the resilience of Corps-owned and 
operated infrastructure. I will conclude by saying the Corps 
does not accomplish anything on its own. Delivering successful 
civil works project is a shared responsibility. It's a team 
sport.
    And we draw from our engineering expertise and build upon 
our relationships with our nonfederal partners, project 
stakeholders and Congress to enable us to succeed. I look 
forward to continuing our great collaboration as we continue to 
pursue our vision that is engineering solutions for our 
nation's toughest challenges. Thank you again, Chairman 
Fleischmann, Ranking Member Kaptur and members of the 
committee. I look forward to answering any questions you may 
have.
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    Mr. Fleischmann. Thank you, General Spellmon.
    At this time I would like to recognize Commissioner Touton. 
You are now recognized for five minutes for your opening 
statement. Thank you.
    Ms. Touton. Good morning. My name is Camille Calimlim 
Touton and I'm the Commissioner of the Bureau of Reclamation.
    Thank you, Chair Fleischmann, Ranking Member Kaptur, and 
members of the Subcommittee for the opportunity to discuss the 
President's Fiscal Year 2024 request for the Bureau of 
Reclamation.
    We are grateful for our working relationship with the 
members and staff of this subcommittee and it's good to be here 
in person.
    The Bureau of Reclamation is the largest water supplier and 
manager of water in the nation and the second largest producer 
of hydropower. We have 189 projects across the American West 
and help to feed our nation through 10 million acres of 
irrigated agriculture, water to millions of Americans, and 
support ecosystems across the western landscape.
    Our mission supports $66.5 billion in economic activity and 
472,000 jobs. Meeting our mission means addressing drought 
resilience, water security, climate change adaptation, 
ecosystem health, and issues of equity.
    The need to secure, maintain, and modernize our nation's 
water infrastructure is an Administration priority and we have 
a once in a generation opportunity to utilize our Fiscal Year 
$1.4 billion budget request with that of the bipartisan 
Infrastructure Law and the Inflation Reduction Act.
    The issues we face today are unprecedented as we experience 
the worst drought in the 120-year of this organization. Record 
snowfall and rain across parts of the West this year, and 
particularly in California, have brought some relief, but are 
not a resolution to our years, if not, decades-long drought.
    Snow-pack is 154 percent of average in the Colorado River 
Basin, but the reservoirs are collectively at 26 percent of 
capacity and at their lowest level since being filled after 
construction.
    In California, as has already been mentioned, we 
experienced the three driest consecutive years on record only 
to be followed with nine atmospheric rivers last December and 
January alone.
    The cyclical nature of western hydrology highlights the 
need for immediate actions, as well as thoughtful planning and 
on the groundwork to make both our infrastructure and 
operational decisions more resilient to withstand future water 
resource scarcity and variability.
    And Reclamation's FY 2024 budget priorities reflect a 
commitment to drought planning and response activities to 
promote water security.
    Appropriately, this budget request acknowledges the need to 
continue to develop and deploy science-based drought and 
climate change adaptation strategies. Our WaterSMART and 
Science Technology programs directly contribute to 
Administration priorities, including $22.5 million for R&D 
science and tech.
    Reclamation must also plan for the future of its 
infrastructure in our dams and reservoirs, water conveyance 
systems, and power generating facilities, which serve as the 
water and power infrastructure backbone for the American West.
    However, as with all infrastructure, the features are aging 
and in need of critical maintenance. Our FY 2024 budget 
includes $105.3 million in extraordinary maintenance combined 
with our BIL investments of $825 million in FY 2022 and 2023 
for aging infrastructure.
    We are constructing our largest dam safety modification 
project ever at the B.F. Sisk Dam in California. This is 
supported by our Fiscal Year 2024 Dam Safety Program request of 
$210 million, which includes $182.6 million for the 
implementation of dam safety modification actions.
    This funding not only address B.F. Sisk Dam, but also 11 
additional projects across the West and we're able to leverage 
this funding more effectively to address West-wide needs in an 
accelerated manner due to the $500 million in Bipartisan 
Infrastructure Law funding.
    We must address our aging infrastructure needs and consider 
economic inequities in the needs of rural and underserved 
communities. And Reclamation is establishing and rebuilding 
water infrastructure for underserved populations by ensuring 
that clean drinking water is provided to communities, including 
through our rural water investments.
    Our FY 2024 requests includes $57.8 million and, as with 
our Dam Safety Program, our Rural Water Program leverages $1 
billion in Bipartisan Infrastructure Law funding to accelerate 
the completion of these long-needed projects, of which we've 
allocated $698 million.
    Our budget also includes $35.5 million for Reclamation's 
Native American Affairs Program to enhance our technical 
assistance to tribes, and lastly, Reclamation's budget request 
supports the Administration's legislative proposals for Indian 
water right's settlement implementation efforts.
    Reclamation will continue to manage the drought in real 
time and plan for the future with a focus on people, 
partnerships, and investments. And Reclamation is committed to 
working with Congress, and our partners, and stakeholders in 
carrying out our mission. And our Fiscal Year 2024 budget 
supports these actions.
    I again thank the Subcommittee; I am happy to answer any 
questions.
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    Mr. Fleischmann. Thank you, Commissioner Touton.
    At this time, we are going to begin our first round of 
questions and I will begin with General Spellmon.
    First and foremost, sir, I want to thank you. You have 
visited the District. You have been with us in our office. When 
I have reached out to you with phone calls, at times of 
urgency. I appreciate everything that you have done and your 
responsiveness. Much appreciated. As well as your--as well as 
the entire Nashville Corp. They have done a really good job in 
communicating with us on a very regular basis.
    I wanted to talk with you today about the Chickamauga Lock 
Project. Obviously, this is in my district and this has been 
one of my highest priorities since I have been in Congress. And 
I was elected in 2010 and began serving in 2011.
    This project is a high priority not only for me, but within 
the inland waterway system and I would like to ask if you could 
provide an update on the progress of ongoing work, but before I 
ask you to do that, to stress that construction on that Lock 
has not ceased, will not cease, and continues at a robust pace 
so that this Committee and my constituents would know exactly 
where things are.
    In that regard, what is your assessment of the path 
forward, sir, and when do we now expect that that project can 
be completed? Thank you, sir.
    General Spellmon. Yes, sir. First of all I want to thank 
you for your leadership and I've enjoyed our walks on this 
project extensively.
    As Secretary Connor said, a lot of these projects are about 
strengthening the supply chain across our country, and this is 
a great example. When this lock is completed, we'll go from 
passing one barge at a time to nine barges at a time.
    So great for industry. So sir, since the last time you and 
I visited this project we have gained a lot of momentum. We are 
now hitting our concrete placement rates that we set out for.
    Just as important, our workforce, our contractor workforce 
is now at 425, that's where we want to be. And I think, most 
importantly for all of us, the sticky safety issues that we had 
early on in the project have been resolved.
    And so that is helping recruiting the right workforce there 
as well. So as a result of that momentum, when I submitted my 
budget request back to Secretary Connor six months ago, we have 
since developed an additional capability for work that we can 
accomplish in 2024, and this would be the final contract that 
would get the new locks ready for service and it's also the 
final site restoration and will decommission the old lock.
    And then, sir, with that additional work in 2024, we can 
have an operational lock in 2026.
    Mr. Fleischmann. Thank you, General. I appreciate that 
response.
    Commissioner Touton, on March 17th Secretary Haaland sent a 
letter to the full committee ranking member outlining how a 
return to Fiscal 2022 spending levels would impact the 
Department's mission.
    The letter suggested returning to Fiscal 2022 spending 
levels would result in reductions between four and 22 percent, 
depending on how cuts are allocated between defense and non-
defense activities.
    The letter states that these reductions would quote, 
irresponsibly undermine ongoing efforts to increase water 
supply and reliability projects, drought preparedness, and 
response, and limit funding needed to maintain and operate 
ongoing western water and power deliveries, end quote.
    Reclamation's 2024 budget proposes cutting funding for the 
agency by 25 percent overall and more than 27 percent for water 
and related resources. Can you help me please understand the 
difference between the results suggested in the Secretary's 
letter and the impacts of your budget request?
    And in that regard, do you agree that it is possible to 
craft a bill that spends taxpayer's funds responsibly and 
appropriately prioritizes our nation's water infrastructure 
while reducing funding for lower priority items? Thank you.
    Ms. Touton. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Reclamation's FY 2024 
President's budget request allows us to prioritize our actions 
in meeting our mission of delivering water and power in the 
American West.
    Additional cuts to our 2024 budget would have real impacts 
to the way we are able to operate in the West. So I look 
forward to working with you, but we can meet our mission with 
our FY 2024 budget request.
    Mr. Fleischmann. In the interest of time, thank you. In the 
interest of time, I'm going to yield now to Ranking Member 
Kaptur for questions for five minutes.
    Ms. Kaptur. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and thank you all for 
your testimony today.
    General Spellmon, I am going to address you first. In terms 
of Corps staffing, and you can submit this for the record, but 
give me a general sense, give us a general sense.
    In view of the significant weather-related challenges that 
we are facing as a nation, in terms of Corps staffing, could 
you generally comment on your professional staffing levels and 
the percentage of those who are, I would term, civil engineers 
versus environmental engineers, land and regional planners, and 
earth and climate specialists? Earth science and climate 
specialists.
    If you were to categorize those differently. I think when I 
asked for these figures a couple years ago, I think there were 
eight environmental engineers on the--I couldn't believe the 
number when they sent it over. I am wondering if you could give 
us a general sense of your staffing capabilities in order to 
meet the needs of a new day?
    General Spellmon. Yes, ma'am. Thank you for the question.
    All combined, all the work that we do in our Civil Works 
Program, our military program, the work that we do 
internationally, the Corps Program today is above $90 billion.
    And so as you know, ma'am, we are project funded, and so we 
hire the types of engineers for the work that we need at hand. 
So specifically for environmental engineers and biologists, 
that represents about 8 to 9 percent of that $91 billion today.
    And so that particular specialty represents today about 11 
percent of our workforce. So ma'am, the numbers you have, I'm 
sorry, we have about 4,000 environmental engineers and 
biologists on our staff today out of about a workforce of just 
over 37,000.
    Ms. Kaptur. Okay. Repeat those numbers? How many?
    General Spellmon. 4,000, ma'am.
    Ms. Kaptur. 4,000 out of?
    General Spellmon. Out of 37,000.
    Ms. Kaptur. 37,000. Okay. Well, I think that's a serious 
impediment to progress. I really do. And so I just wanted to 
ask your staff, we'll submit more questions for the record, but 
to pay attention to these, I call them professions of the 20th 
and 21st centuries, that give us a broader view of how to 
address some of the challenges that we face, especially in 
terms of climate change.
    I wanted to ask Assistant Secretary Connor, there are some 
who are proposing in the Congress, generally on the other side 
of the aisle, to cut about third or 30 percent from non-Defense 
funding overall, which is what supports programs such as the 
Corps of Engineers and the Bureau of Reclamation.
    Could you give us a sense of what that would do to you as 
an agency in view of the challenges that we face?
    Mr. Connor. Thank you, Congresswoman Kaptur. As a threshold 
matter, I would just say we very much appreciate in the Civil 
Works Program the bipartisan strong support that we've gotten 
for appropriations level.
    But the kind of cuts that you've just referenced, if they 
were to occur in the Civil Works Program would be devastating. 
And they're not devastating to the Corps, they're devastating 
to the communities who rely on the work that we are authorized 
and directed to do.
    And I'll just give you an example. Obviously everybody 
probably understands the significant backlog of existing 
authorizations that we have, given prior WRDAs. On top of that, 
in the last Water Resources Development Act, we have about $65 
billion of new project authorizations that we are directed to 
carry out, as well as 94 new authorizations for studies.
    And we have a program right now that is carrying out about 
69 study activities right now. So that's a significant ramp up 
and it's indicative of what you've described, which is the 
challenges, the risk, the changing nature of our climate that 
is creating these risks. And the communities need assistance. 
They are looking for the assistance and they're looking for the 
expertise of the Corps.
    So I think it'd be devastating. The last thing I'll just 
add to General Spellmon's point that he just made, in 2011, the 
Corps was executing about, what was the number, $35 billion. 
Today the Corps is executing about $91 billion of work with 
basically the same workforce.
    So the fact that we're keeping up is amazing and a 
testament to the leadership within the Corps, but we're at our 
end and we need to ramp up and we need to ramp up from 
appropriations a workforce to meet the demands that currently 
exist.
    Ms. Kaptur. Thank you. Are you finding yourself having to 
take a multi-watershed approach as opposed to, you know, I hear 
you say project, project, project, but it exists in a broader 
framework. How do you see your work on resilience addressing 
climate change issues across this country? What's changing?
    Maybe General, you want to take a crack at that?
    General Spellmon. Yes, ma'am. So I would tell you that we 
learned a lot from our North Atlantic Comprehensive Coastal 
Study, similar with our South Atlantic Comprehensive Coastal 
Study and we want to take everything that we learned there and 
bring it to the Great Lakes Coastal Resiliency Study.
    I think these are very powerful watershed studies that 
we'll learn a lot from and it will drive the right investments 
in construction.
    Ms. Kaptur. Thank you very much. Time has expired. Thank 
you very much, Mr. Chairman.
    Mr. Fleischmann. Thank you, Ranking Member Kaptur.
    At this time I recognize the gentleman from Idaho, Mr. 
Simpson for five minutes for questions.
    Mr. Simpson. Thank you. And thank you all for being here 
today. And I don't want to be a stick in the mud, but as we 
talk about the impacts of what reducing spending would have on 
programs and stuff, that is something that we need to examine, 
we need to take into consideration.
    But we should also take a look at inflation and what it is 
doing to the American people and the cause of inflation. If you 
talk to most economists, they will tell you a large part of the 
reason we have inflation is because of the excessive, and I 
mean, excessive spending that we have done over the last 
several years.
    We actually have hundreds of billions of dollars sitting 
out there in COVID relief funds that have not been spent. 
That's just amazing to me.
    And today I actually heard from Mr. Connor that they didn't 
ask for any money from the Inland Waterway Trust Fund because 
they got it in one of these bills that passed, whether it was 
the Build Back Better, or Infrastructure, whatever it was. 
Sounds to me like you didn't need it if you could have got it 
from the Inland Waterway Trust Fund?
    Do you want to respond?
    Mr. Connor. Absolutely, sir.
    At the time the budget was prepared, we did not have any 
capabilities identified in the Inland Waterway's Trust Fund 
because we had a substantial amount of work, well over $2 
billion of work that we were executing on.
    As General Spellmon relayed in one of the prior questions, 
we've identified another $400 million in that time, based on 
cost increases as well as new activities that we could 
undertake at about five different projects.
    So this ebbs and flows, but we do have additional 
capability, as articulated by the General just a few moments 
ago.
    Mr. Simpson. But your budget doesn't request any money from 
the Inland Waterway Trust Fund?
    Mr. Connor. When the budget was prepared, no, we did not 
have that capability. We did not request that funding. You are 
correct.
    Mr. Simpson. Thank you.
    Okay. So many questions, so little time. Since I've been in 
Congress I have been working on a project and I am sure that 
you probably anticipated this question, on the Gooding Wall in 
Gooding, Idaho.
    It was constructed in 1941, I won't go through what we have 
been through before, but the existing channel is a flood risk 
for public infrastructure and private property and 
rehabilitation was authorized in 2007.
    2020 the Corps notified the city of Gooding that a large 
portion of the project would have to removed because the cost 
of the project now exceeded the authorization. Last year I was 
able to increase that authorization through WRDA and funded the 
planning and design through community project financing.
    I understand that the Corps needs to complete the federal 
cost share agreement amendment, finish the study project, and 
execute the project partnership agreement before construction 
can start.
    Assistant Secretary Connor, if the funding is provided for 
construction in FY 2024 for the remainder of the project, can 
you commit to making sure that these steps are completed so the 
contract can be awarded in 2024?
    Mr. Connor. Absolutely. I can turn it over to General 
Spellmon for more details, but if the funding is provided, we 
will execute.
    General Spellmon. Yes, sir. Thank you for the increase in 
authorization. So with the $2.3 million that we received in 
2023 appropriations, we'll finish our letter report and we'll 
initiate the design, as we discussed last time. The five 
bridges associated with this project will be included in that 
report and we're going to work--the lava rock that is currently 
stabilizing that channel will be replaced with a more suitable 
material.
    And yes, sir, we'll be ready to award a contract in 2024.
    Mr. Simpson. I appreciate that. Thank you.
    Let me talk about another issue. Assistant Secretary 
Connor, I am aware of an initiative near the Salton Sea in 
California, which seeks to develop geothermal energy and 
critical minerals from brine under the surface of the Imperial 
Valley.
    Not only is this location one of the largest sources of 
Lithium in the United States, which is essential to the 
production of Lithium-Ion batteries for electric vehicles, but 
it is also believed to be one of the most promising domestic 
sources for critical minerals.
    Imagine what this effort means for the U.S., as we strive 
to lessen our dependance on China for these materials. I know 
of this initiative because the party involved is working 
closely with the Idaho National Laboratory to evaluate and 
understand which critical minerals exist in economically 
recoverable quantities.
    My understanding is that initial permit applications for 
this initiative are presently pending before the Army Corps and 
additional permit applications are expected in the future. I 
also understand that you recently had discussions with the 
project sponsor.
    Can you give us an update on the status of the Army Corps 
review of this project and a potential timeline for the 
permitting process, and what specifically is the Corps doing to 
ensure that this valuable domestic supply of Lithium and other 
critical minerals, and rare earth elements can be permitted and 
in production in a timely fashion?
    Mr. Connor. Yes, sir, Congressman. I appreciate the 
question. This is a complicated one, but I'll try and be 
succinct. I did recently meet with the organization, the 
company moving forward with the permitting processes.
    So we have been working on permits on a phase-by-phase 
basis. That's the nature of the discussion so far between the 
company and the Los Angeles district.
    We think there are some issues that they're working through 
resolution on, but I think that will create a foundation to a 
different approach. And what we have been talking about, is 
there a programmatic approach we can take? This is an eight-
phase project and it has all the benefits that you just 
articulated.
    Can we take a programmatic effect look at the permitting, 
think about compensatory actions that the company could take 
that would not only facilitate the overall permitting and 
expedite our approach to that, but also feeds into the issues 
that the Bureau of Reclamation is doing with the Salton Sea, 
the conservation and restoration, or at least the alleviation 
of the impacts of the receding Salton Sea.
    So we think this has the potential to be a win, win, win 
from an economic standpoint, environmental standpoint, and 
hopefully we can demonstrate permitting efficiency.
    So those conversations are at the nascent stage, but I look 
forward to jumping in and helping to facilitate that.
    Mr. Simpson. Thank you.
    Mr. Fleischmann. Thank you, Mr. Simpson.
    At this time I recognize the gentleman from Illinois, Mr. 
Quigley, for 5 minutes for questions.
    Mr. Quigley. Thank you, Chair. Thank you all for your 
service and for being here. The ranking member brought up the 
issue of invasive carp and the threat to the Great Lakes--are 
just source of fresh water for our country and the world.
    And obviously, I guess speaking on behalf of all the 
members who represent alongside and our constituents those 
Great Lakes, they have the following concerns obviously 
supporting the Brandon Road Lock and Dam Aquatic Nuisance 
Species Barrier Project, which needs a shorter name, as well as 
Chicago Sanitary and Ship Canal dispersal barriers, which work 
to address this issue.
    Where are we? What do we still have to do in terms of the 
projects themselves, and the appropriations that have to come 
with it?
    General Spellmon. Sir, I'll just start out by saying we 
appreciate the generous appropriations, both in 2022 and 2023 
of 273 million toward the Brandon Road Project. The challenge 
we are having here is getting to a project partnership 
agreement with the state of Illinois. We certainly understand 
your concerns on cost, the concerns on the safety of the 
electric barrier, the concerns with operation and maintenance 
responsibilities into the future, and some concerns on state 
water quality. So without the project partnership agreement we 
don't have access to the additional 225 million that was 
provided by the bipartisan infrastructure law.
    So, sir, in short, we are moving out on the design with the 
funds that we have, and we are hoping that as we get further 
into designs that we can allay some of the concerns from our 
Illinois partners.
    Mr. Quigley. And what would the timeframe be from that 
point on? In other words, if you had a partnership, you've got 
the design work done.
    General Spellmon. Yeah.
    Mr. Quigley. How long is construction going to be?
    General Spellmon. Sir, right, sir. So with efficient 
funding, we believe this is an eight-year build.
    Mr. Quigley. And in the meantime, is there sufficient 
barrier out there to keep the seemingly inevitable from 
happening and the species to get into the Great Lakes?
    General Spellmon. Yes, sir. So I mean, not at Brandon Road, 
but you mentioned our other project, the Chicago Sanitary Ship 
Canal.
    Mr. Quigley. Right.
    General Spellmon. So that, the first barrier there has been 
complete and that has been in operation now for over a year. 
The second barrier was funded to completion, and that will be 
complete in June of this year, just to add additional 
redundancy to that system.
    Mr. Quigley. Did you want to add to that at all? Okay, very 
good.
    I just have a question out of curiosity about boom and bust 
drought. It seems there are areas, and I say this from a 
distance, where there are droughts, and we have all these 
systems in place to worry about stormwater and getting water 
the heck out of there as quickly as possible to avoid flooding. 
But there doesn't seem to be as much infrastructure out there 
in terms of retention, right? You had a drought for such a long 
period of time, and then all of a sudden you are just 
inundated.
    What might be put in place in the future to address both 
needs?
    Ms. Touton. Thank you for that question. The past is no 
longer indicative of the hydrology we see in the future, as you 
mentioned. And so what we are doing now with our budget 
request, but also with the funds that we have been given, is 
investing in infrastructure in a different way.
    B.F. Sisk I mentioned as a dam safety project. We are also 
looking at building capacity there so those events that you see 
in California we are able to capture in that storage once that 
is raised. And we are also partnering with the Corps on type of 
activities, including forecast-informed reservoir operations, 
how can you maximize when you see an atmospheric storm coming 
and be able to gain flood control, but also water supply 
benefits from that?
    And finally, we are making water available in the Central 
Valley. People are being put on the ground to be able to 
recharge the aquifer systems so that we can manage not just 
surface water, but our ground water resources as well.
    Mr. Quigley. I appreciate that.
    Ms. Touton. Thank you.
    Mr. Quigley. And I yield back, Mr. Chairman.
    Mr. Fleischmann. Thank you, Mr. Quigley.
    At this time I now recognize the gentleman from the state 
of Washington, Mr. Newhouse, for 5 minutes. Thank you, sir.
    Mr. Newhouse. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. Good 
morning to our panel. Certainly your reclamation and the Army 
Corps, or, gosh, what could I say, a significant presence and 
responsibility in Central Washington, so I'm delighted that you 
are all here this morning.
    Commissioner Touton, it has been a pleasure I might say 
just working with you, certainly in the Yakima Basin. Looking 
forward to you coming out to Central Washington and seeing the 
great progress we are making in the Columbia Basin and all the 
projects there as well.
    So Mr. Connor, I would like to talk about something that 
several of us up here on the dais are interested in, the Lower 
Snake River dams. Certainly, as you know, there is ongoing 
mediation and litigations surrounding salmon and the four Lower 
Snake River dams.
    Question about the legal standard, if I may. Within the 
ESA, the Endangered Species Act, its actions must not 
jeopardize the continued existence of the species. But it seems 
that through the mediation the objective has changed to healthy 
and harvestable runs, which are quite different standards. And 
I don't see that term in code or in law.
    Just like my friend from Idaho, Mr. Simpson, very 
interested in seeing healthy populations of salmon. I think 
with all the money that has been invested we are seeing returns 
on that, that not only in these four dams, but other dams 
around the area and in the country. I just want you to help me 
understand the changing standards and the objective. If the 
mediation stops or fails and the case returned to court, my 
guess is we would return to the ESA standards.
    So could you talk a little bit about that?
    Mr. Connor. Sure, Congressman. Thank you for the question. 
I think you really just articulated my answer, which is going 
to be what do we have to do and what should we be doing?
    Mr. Newhouse. I hate to do that, give you the answer.
    Mr. Connor. Yeah. Thanks very much. I'll take it. Any 
lifelines are appreciated.
    Certainly, the Endangered Species Act, you know, it is the 
non-jeopardy standard. Do not take federal actions that create 
jeopardy to endangered species or endangered threatened 
species. That is currently the responsibilities and the 
obligation, and if we don't operate to that standard, then 
obviously we can be stopped in our actions.
    But that standard as our goals through the programs that 
Congress has authorized and many other actions that we take, we 
look to make affirmative investments to get to that healthy and 
harvestable levels. It's not just from an Endangered Species 
Act. We have treaty responsibilities to tribes. And we as 
federal agencies and in this administration take that very, 
very seriously, as I know many members of Congress do.
    So we have an objective through our discussions and our 
actions to ensure that we maintain what we are required to do 
under the Endangered Species Act, but also, how can we look at 
Lower Snake River restoration overall through habitat actions, 
through flow actions through--you know, we committed to taking 
a look at the breaching of those dams. That is not within our 
authority to breach those dams.
    We understand that is Congress's responsibility, but it 
should be looked at as we look at the whole suite of actions we 
need to be taking to get to that healthy and harvestable 
standards, as well at the same time what do our energy systems 
require? What do the transportation needs of the agricultural 
sector require?
    So it is, it is part--healthy and harvestable is a goal. It 
is not a requirement of the ESA. But I hope that kind of 
explains the differences from my perspective.
    Mr. Newhouse. Okay. Thank you. My answer was shorter, by 
the way. And so given that we--the salmon returns we have seen 
are higher in the recent years, could you talk a little bit 
about the work the Corps is doing, engaged in to improve the 
existing hydropower assets, like the four dams in question as 
you work to improve salmon passage?
    Mr. Connor. Sure this budget request includes $93 million 
for salmon restoration efforts. A lot of that is required by 
the biological opinions on the Willamette system, but we 
haven't just focused on the Willamette, which has been the 
priority based on the litigation to date. We have included 
another 20 plus million dollars for Columbia River fish passage 
improvements, repairs, hatchery improvements overall.
    So we are looking at the fish passage facilities as well as 
hatchery, making infrastructure improvements, because we are--
even as we talk about Lower Snake, there are a lot of things we 
can be doing in other places right now to improve passage, and 
we are trying to make that investment through this budget.
    Mr. Newhouse. Yeah, appreciate that.
    And sorry, Mr. Chairman. I have gone over my time, but I 
yield back. Thank you.
    Mr. Fleischmann. No problem. Thank you so much, Mr. 
Newhouse.
    At this time I recognize Ms. Letlow, from the state of 
Louisiana.
    Ms. Letlow. Thank you.
    Mr. Fleischmann. The great state of Louisiana, for 5 
minutes for questions. Thank you.
    Ms. Letlow. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you for 
being here, and please bear with me as I get through my story, 
but it is--I wanted to share it with you.
    General Spellmon, as you may know, the L.C. Boggs Lock and 
Dam is one of five locks and dams on the Red River within the 
J. Bennett Johnston Waterway, which extends 236 miles from the 
Mississippi River through the Old River and the Red River to 
Shreveport, Louisiana.
    It was recently discovered that 11 of the dam Tainter gates 
were severely corroded in critical condition and in danger of 
failing at any time. The state of the dam was declared an 
emergency by the Vicksburg District's dam safety officer.
    Now, it is my understanding that the original cost estimate 
to repair all 11 gates was $74 million. And earlier this year, 
the Vicksburg District entered into a contract with a local 
fabricator to repair the first five gates at a much lower cost 
than the estimate.
    The local contract had an option to extend within 60 days 
to complete the remaining gates with no economic price 
increase. This extension would have repaired all 11 gates at 
nearly half the original price. Unfortunately, the 60-day 
contract extension window has recently closed, and now we have 
lost the opportunity to resolve this problem at a lower cost.
    I brought this up, this time sensitive issue, with the head 
of the Mississippi Valley Division and our office flagged the 
issue for Corps headquarters. In our discussions with division 
and headquarters there seemed to be no rush in efficiently 
resolving this issue so we could have lowered the estimate. We 
all know these gates will have to be repaired, so why not do it 
in a timely manner and at a less cost to our taxpayers?
    My question is this. Were you aware of this time sensitive 
contract situation, and was there any communication and action 
regarding this situation between the Vicksburg District, the 
Mississippi Valley Division, and headquarters?
    General Spellmon. Yes, ma'am. Thank you for the question. 
This is my understanding. You are correct. We did get a much 
better bid on this work. It was $28 million that we received in 
2023 appropriations. That allowed us to move out on the first 
five of the eleven gates.
    Ma'am, the capability--we needed an additional 21 to 
exercise that option that you are referring to, so we are going 
to report that if offered a work plan for 2024 as a capability 
to get that work done.
    We will stay in close communications with our great 
contractor down there to get us the best benefit. But this 
district simply didn't have the cashflow to move out on that 
option at the time.
    Ms. Letlow. Okay. What can this subcommittee and the Army 
Corps of Engineers do in the future to be better stewards of 
our taxpayer dollars and ensure efficiency in a time sensitive 
manner such as this one?
    General Spellmon. Yes, ma'am. So I would say we are doing a 
number of things to get after the cost problem. I will just 
give you the top three. First, we are meeting regularly with 
Associated General Contractors. They help us understand cost 
and labor implications, not only nationwide, but in certain 
pockets of the country.
    I am working hard on cost engineers. A year ago, I had 350 
cost engineers in USACE for a $90 billion program. People would 
tell you you need about 500. We are at 422 this morning, so we 
hired additional 72 and we are going to work on the remaining 
78.
    And the other thing we are working on is just alternate 
suppliers. So we will run into problems at some of those old 
lock and dams where a piece of machinery will have a long lead 
time, and so we are working with Defense Logistic Agency where 
we can get maybe not the same model, but the same 
specifications, and cut that time in half or in third.
    But we are committed to it, ma'am, and thank you for 
raising these.
    Ms. Letlow. Thank you. I want to follow up on Mr. Simpson's 
concerns about the Inland Waterways Trust. You know, I am 
afraid that the budget you are advocating for today picks 
winners and losers. Communities throughout this country are 
struggling and large scale inland waterway construction 
projects provide an opportunity for regions to achieve economic 
stability.
    I don't think this was the Corps intent, but unfortunately 
this budget request overlooks the needs of river communities 
like mine and others on the committee. And while I understand 
your concerns, but as we have seen with the L.C. Boggs Lock and 
Dam situation, the longer we wait to fund these projects, the 
more expensive they will be for the taxpayers.
    And additionally, the inland industry has continued to 
support this program through the diesel fuel tax, and as we 
move support with fiscal year 2024 Appropriations bill, I 
strongly encourage the Corps to take a hard look at the inland 
portfolio to determine how we can allocate financial risk to 
ensure that we finish lock construction projects with trust 
fund dollars.
    General Spellmon. Yes, ma'am. And I will just highlight 
again, since I turned my budget request into the Secretary last 
September we have identified over $400 million in capability 
for our inland waterways. From that, the Inland Water Trust 
Fund has a balance of about $180 million, and this would draw 
about $140 million from that balance for their part of the cost 
share.
    Ms. Letlow. Okay. Thank you.
    Mr. Connor. Can I just add the inland waterways are a 
jewel----
    Ms. Letlow. Yeah.
    Mr. Connor [continuing]. Of our system----
    Ms. Letlow. Right.
    Mr. Connor [continuing]. Of water infrastructure in this 
country. And so I knew this would be an issue in the budget 
as--roll it out. I will face the music with the Inland 
Waterways User Board in a month, but we are strongly committed 
to, one, reporting capability as we are aware of it to this 
subcommittee, as well as to continue to look long in the future 
to ensure that we are making investments that we need to make 
to build resiliency in that system and then build capability in 
that system with the expanded locks.
    Ms. Letlow. Thank you for your commitment. I yield back.
    Mr. Fleischmann. Thank you, Ms. Letlow.
    At this time I would like to recognize Mr. Morelle from the 
state of New York for 5 minutes. Mr. Morelle.
    Mr. Morelle. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and Ranking Member 
Kaptur for holding this important hearing, and certainly thank 
you to our witnesses for joining us to discuss the budget 
request for the Army Corps and Bureau of Reclamation.
    I am proud to represent Rochester, New York and the 
southern shore of Lake Ontario. The Great Lakes are true and 
natural treasures, having both tremendous environmental and 
economic importance. Ensuring the Great Lakes are prioritized 
and protected is utmost importance, and the Great Lakes support 
jobs, tourism, agriculture, transportation, and much, much 
more.
    The climate crisis continues. We have dramatically negative 
impacts on our planet and environment, and the need to respond 
to more frequent and damaging storms has never been more 
important, and that has been particularly the case in my area. 
In my district I have witnessed the devastation of these 
storms, particularly over the last several years. So adjusting 
our thinking and creating a strategy that gives us the ability 
to withstand, recover, and adapt to these weather-related 
events is paramount in my mind.
    My district also includes Rochester, Irondequoit, and Oak 
Orchard Harbors along the southern shore, and they generate 
about $27 million in local revenue and support nearly 350 jobs. 
I recently visited the Oak Orchard Harbor in Orleans County 
where I saw firsthand how beneficial recreational harbors are, 
particularly to smaller rural communities. And ensuring those 
harbors are dredged and maintained for both public and 
commercial use is of critical importance.
    So let me ask, and I guess you can decide who should 
respond. Probably, General, you, but--and maybe the Secretary, 
how Congress can support your efforts to ensure smaller 
communities in particular around recreational harbors like Oak 
Orchard are routinely dredged and maintained?
    General Spellmon. Sir, I would say Congress is already 
helping with the--as Secretary Connor mentioned, the generous 
appropriations that we have received. But as you highlighted 
for these three recreational harbors it is never enough.
    So today I am responsible for 577 federal navigation 
channels across the country; 440 of them are associated with 
harbors that you have described. We will continue to make our 
best technical argument for this.
    But I would just also say in addition to the funding, it is 
also the increased targets that Congress gave us in WRDA 2020 
on increasing the level of investment that goes to these 440 
low-use harbors.
    Mr. Morelle. Very good. Thank you.
    Did you have something to add, sir?
    Mr. Connor. I was just going to mention we respect the 
prioritization that Congress gives to some of these smaller 
harbors, because we don't always see it in our overarching 
programs, so we respect that role totally.
    Mr. Morelle. Thank you. As I mentioned, my community has 
dealt with historic flooding in recent years and communities 
along the shoreline are becoming increasingly vulnerable due to 
a series of factors, so ensuring there is a plan to both 
prevent and respond to flooding is of vital interest to the 
residents along the lakeshore.
    So tell me a little bit in the time we have remaining what 
steps the Army Corps is taking to ensure communities are 
prepared for lakeshore flooding and what mitigation efforts are 
taking place.
    General Spellmon. Sir, I will start, just two things. 
First, I mentioned earlier the Great Lakes Coastal Resiliency 
study. Sir, in that study we are looking at 4,500 miles of 
Great Lakes coastline, so compare that with the Atlantic Coast 
of 2,100 miles. And so that watershed approach is going to 
allow us to focus on the most acute issues that are out there.
    And I will just tag onto that a big part of that study is 
the generous research and development budget that the president 
proposed for us, because we think there is a number of things 
that we can do to combine with structural solutions and nature-
based solutions to get after some of these specific challenges 
in your communities.
    Mr. Morelle. I'm sorry. Did you have something, Secretary?
    Mr. Connor. I would just add on the R&D initiative we have 
to better assess risk and vulnerabilities and predictive 
modeling and understand climate-related science and its impacts 
on shorelines, whether they are lakes or on coasts, is an 
incredibly--part of the work that we are--we anticipate doing 
for all the risks as you just described.
    Mr. Morelle. And when I first came to Congress, 2018, this 
was a critical priority for me and I appreciate the ranking 
member's continued support of this as well, because the Great 
Lakes are critical.
    Can you just give me an update on the status of that study?
    General Spellmon. Yes, sir. Last September we signed a 
cost-sharing agreement with all eight Great Lakes states, so 
now we are developing the project management plan and we are 
scoping this effort with the eight states' involvement.
    Mr. Morelle. Very good. With that, Mr. Chairman, I yield 
back. Thank you, sir.
    Mr. Fleischmann. Thank you, Mr. Morelle.
    At this time I would like to recognize Ms. Lee from the 
state of Nevada for 5 minutes. Thank you.
    Ms. Lee. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you to all the 
witnesses today. Commissioner Touton, I wanted to touch on you 
being from Nevada obviously dealing with the impact of the 
drought. I just wanted to, one, clarify some things that 
despite the fact that we are seeing an incredible amount of 
precipitation especially in California that the situation we 
are dealing with on the Colorado River obviously is exacerbated 
by this drought, but also to a certain extent the river is 
simply oversubscribed. Is that correct? Is that a good 
assessment of that?
    Ms. Touton. I think the hydrology that we're seeing shows 
less into the reservoirs.
    Ms. Lee. Okay. I just wanted to clarify that. Mr. Quigley 
referred to it as a boom and bust type of situation, but I 
think we are sort of on a bust trajectory based on, like you 
said, the hydrology. But given the historic nature and the 
urgency of this shortage you called on the seven Colorado River 
states to come together and develop a plan to reduce their 
water by 2- to 4 million acre feet each year, and this January 
six of the seven of them including Nevada successfully 
coalesced around an approach to do so.
    This is one that I urge the Administration to move with all 
possible speed. I know that you and your team are actively 
engaged in this difficult work preparing updates by the way of 
the Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement to federal 
operating guidelines to safeline the river including the Glen 
Canyon and the Hoover Dams. Can you update us today on the 
status of what is going on in next steps of the SEIS process?
    Ms. Touton. Thank you for that question, Congresswoman. Not 
only is this my home district, but it is also my home basin. 
And so what we have been able to do on the Colorado River Basin 
is work with the seven basin states and start putting those 
conversations on a path forward. It is not just with the seven 
states. It is also with the country of Mexico, and there are 
also 30 tribes in the basin that call this home. We are moving 
forward on the Supplemental EIS process. We anticipate a draft 
EIS will be available later this spring. And part of that, the 
expedited process, was the hydrology that we were seeing when 
we started this didn't anticipate the snow that we would get 
this year. But it doesn't change, as you mentioned, the 
trajectory of needing those tools should we need them in the 
future to protect the system. So I am confident both in our 
conversations with our partners and the history of 
collaboration in this basin but also the investments that 
Congress has made in the Colorado River Basin that we can move 
on a sustainable path forward.
    Ms. Lee. Thank you. And can you also confirm your fiscal 
2024 budget request ensures that you have everything you need 
to address the crisis with the resources and speed that this 
requires?
    Ms. Touton. Yes, Congresswoman. First, thank you to 
Congress for the additional plus-Up in fiscal year 2023, 
specifically with the drought contingency plan. Along with 
Bipartisan Infrastructure Law funding as well as Inflation 
Reduction Act funding, we are able to allocate those funds 
expeditiously both in the short-term investments but also as 
you will see later the spring long-term, sustainable 
infrastructure in the basin.
    Ms. Lee. And some members of Congress are proposing that we 
refer back to fiscal year 2022 funding levels. Can you tell us 
what this reduction would do to--what it would mean for those 
of us who are on the Colorado River who are counting you all to 
help us secure a sustainable future? What would that funding 
cut mean to your ability to help?
    Ms. Touton. Our Fiscal Year 2024 budget request allows us 
to continue the work we are doing along with our additional 
funding with the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law and Inflation 
Reduction Act. Any reductions to that are cuts that we have not 
taken into account as we are tracking the work on the Colorado 
River Basin of new infrastructure, of new efficiencies, of 
being able to bring consensus solutions together.
    Ms. Lee. And one issue that we are looking at as recently 
as December water managers were predicting that Lake Powell 
could hit the so-called minimal power pool as soon as this 
summer. Can you explain what a reduction would do and help you 
being able to manage that?
    Ms. Touton. The--we did not anticipate a reduction in that 
funding to be able to continue the ongoing work we have with 
securing voluntary water conservation measures along with being 
able to try to forge a path forward with new infrastructure 
projects.
    Ms. Lee. Thank you. I yield.
    Mr. Fleischmann. Thank you, Congresswoman Lee. At this time 
I think we are going to have a second round of questions, so I 
am going to begin with that.
    In May of 2022, the administration released its permitting 
action plan, and in the past several weeks the directors of 
OMB, CEQ and the Federal Permitting Improvement Steering 
Council issued a memorandum on implementation of this action 
plan. For all witnesses, and I will ask you to please be brief 
because I have several questions left, can you please provide 
some examples of actions that your agency has taken to 
accelerate permitting? And Secretary Connor, I will begin with 
you.
    Mr. Connor. Absolutely. Permitting efficiency is a priority 
as I mentioned before. Interagency coordination is key. Working 
with other agencies to use categorical exclusions, those type 
of processes are one example. We are also trying to work 
technical assistance and support to the applicants themselves. 
So we have a new regulatory response system that allows for 
upfront ensuring that we get all the information we need, that 
applicants know precisely what we need so we don't have a back 
and forth that delays the permitting process.
    And lastly, I would say that adequate resourcing is key, 
and the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law gave us the opportunity 
to increase. We are looking at 200 FTEs in our regulatory 
program as well as to put in place a regulatory viewer that 
allows us to consolidate a lot of the information that is 
critical to permitting across the nation for Corps offices. So 
those are three examples.
    Mr. Fleischmann. Thank you. General Spellmon.
    General Spellmon. I would just add we have hired 155 of 
those regulators. Much needed. We sent out a draft 
implementation plan last August. A lot of great feedback from 
the public, and we will turn in our final plan to Mr. Connor 
next week.
    Mr. Fleischmann. Thank you, sir. Commissioner Touton.
    Ms. Touton. Similar to the Corps, we are looking at our own 
practices incorporating the CEQ guidance but there are 
categorical exclusions as well as implementation of our 
programmatic agreements like under the National Historic 
Preservation Act.
    Mr. Fleischmann. Thank you so much. General Spellmon, I am 
going to talk a little bit about Asian carp. I do want to thank 
the Ranking Member. She has been a steadfast supporter of 
dealing with this issue and the criticality. And I also heard 
from my dear friend, Mr. Quigley as well in that regard.
    Tennessee is dealing with this. As you are aware, General 
Spellmon, WRDA 2022 authorized the Corps to carry out projects 
to prevent the spread of Asian carp further into Tennessee 
watersheds. The Energy and Water bill has provided funding, 
rather robust funding to begin implementation of this program. 
Can you please provide a status update of the implementation of 
this program, sir? And if you can, what is the current range of 
Asian carp with respect to Tennessee waterways. I think this 
will help all of us gauge where we are.
    General Spellmon. Yes, sir. First of all, we sent out the 
scoping notice for this effort last year. We received over 300 
letters with a lot of great feedback from the public. So sir, 
we are working with Kentucky, Tennessee, Alabama and 
Mississippi now to identify nonfederal sponsors for this 
effort. We are looking at the types of barriers that could be 
used and where specifically on Tennessee and the other three 
states where they would best be implemented.
    Currently, we are working on a programmatic environmental 
assessment for that effort. And sir, we are going to schedule 
public meetings in the fall of this year to walk everyone 
through where we are in our analysis to date.
    Mr. Fleischmann. Okay. But anything specific as to 
Tennessee, where Asian carp is in Tennessee?
    General Spellmon. Sir, I will take that as a due out. I 
will follow up with you.
    Mr. Fleischmann. Yes, sir.
    Ms. Kaptur. Will the Chairman yield just for ten seconds?
    Mr. Fleischmann. Yes.
    Ms. Kaptur. I would just like to say to the general and for 
the record I am not sure we have the proper administrative 
structure dealing with this issue. General, do you feel 
comfortable with the interagency cooperation on trying to get 
timely data on where this creature is and how well we are doing 
on pushing it back?
    Because I can guarantee you the solutions that currently 
exist will not solve the problem, and I am very worried about--
I mean, we have invested so much in research for acoustic 
barriers and for all these different--but we don't see the kind 
of mapping that shows us how far this fish has proceeded 
upstream, whether we have been able to push it back.
    I fault all of the agencies for not working together 
because Congress does not have a complete picture of this, and 
it is very, very serious. My lake, Lake Erie, has a $7 billion 
fishery that is at risk, and if those things get in that is 
over. The whole ecosystem is going to change Tennessee. I have 
had members run up to me on the floor frantic because they 
never knew what I was talking about, and then when it happened 
to them, well, yeah. Welcome. Welcome to the crowd.
    So I want to thank the Chairman for referencing this. And 
it isn't your fault. I think it is the structure of the federal 
government being so stovepiped that we cannot get all the data 
organized in a responsible manner to enlighten all of us on 
what more we can do to prevent this spread.
    General Spellmon. Yes, ma'am. Just as a general comment I 
will tell you I think we have great relationships at the state 
level and certainly at the project level where we are working 
on this challenge. I will follow up with the Committee on our 
best site picture by watershed where we currently see this 
problem. But Ma'am, you are exactly right. Our research and 
development continues on the acoustic barriers, the 
CO2 curtains and some of the other things that we 
are trying to build into the Brandon Road project. Certainly we 
appreciate the investment in R&D because it is going to help us 
advance those types of barriers in addition to the electrical.
    Ms. Kaptur. General, how far is the barrier--from the 
barrier currently in Illinois, the imperfect barrier, how far 
are the fish now?
    General Spellmon. Ma'am, they go right up to that barrier 
as you know.
    Mr. Fleischmann. Again I want to thank the Ranking Member 
for supplementing my comments. And I think, General, this shows 
the great concern over several states in a very nonpartisan way 
about the Asian carp incursion. So I do thank you, and we look 
forward to your responses.
    Very briefly, the U.S. Corps of Engineers, Army Corps of 
Engineers, is supposed to be a permitting agency. I have a 
question. Why will it take possibly six years for the agency to 
permit Line 5 Great Lakes Tunnel project, a four and a half 
mile tunnel, which by design will have no impacts to navigable 
waters and will disturb less than one half acre of wetland?
    And as a follow-up, General, in the interest of time I will 
ask you to be brief, why is the Army Corps not able to meet the 
Biden administration's own NEPA guidelines of two years for 
completing an EIS? The EIS for the Great Lakes Tunnel project 
now may take more than four years to get to a final, and the 
project is only four and a half miles long, sir.
    General Spellmon. Yes, sir. And it is a very complicated 
four and a half miles. Sir, to be brief, I have walked this 
project site, the communities in the Upper Peninsula of 
Michigan certainly and Mackinaw City on the Lower Peninsula. 
The yard signs that you see out in those communities for the 
project, against the project, sir, they just reflect the 17,000 
comments we received on the Notice of Intent.
    We have a lot of material to plow through from the public, 
from the 18 federally recognized tribes to get after this work. 
Sir, at the end of the day that permit has got to stand up to 
the engineering and legal scrutiny that we expect. I would just 
share with you I have also been briefed by the company on the 
construction method that they intend to employ in tunnelling 
underneath the Mackinaw Straight. Sir, there is a bit of 
complexity here, and I would be happy to brief you in more 
detail on this.
    Mr. Fleischmann. Thank you. And General, I would ask you to 
please get with Congressman Bergman on that from Michigan. At 
this time, I would like to recognize Mr. Kilmer from the state 
of Washington for five minutes. Mr. Kilmer.
    Mr. Kilmer. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I am going to try to 
get to two somewhat parochial topics. Mr. Assistant Secretary, 
a project with significant importance in my region is the 
Skokomish River Ecosystem Restoration Project. It is aimed to 
revitalize the health of Hood Canal. It represents a really 
amazing partnership between tribal, local, state and federal 
government folks to improve ecosystem conditions. That area is 
home to a range of wildlife and fish species. Unfortunately, 
there are four fish species that have been listed under the 
ESA.
    Making sure this project moves forward is really vital. In 
2019, a project partnership agreement was signed by the Corps, 
the Skokomish Tribe, the Mason County and the Washington 
Department of Natural Resources. That was a major first step 
forward in terms of bringing this project toward the 
construction phase. In the time since, the project has 
continued to progress including the real estate acquisition 
phase led by Mason County, assisted by the Mason County 
Conservation District, Hood Canal, Salmon Enhancement Group, 
the Great Peninsula Land Conservancy.
    Negotiations are still underway to complete that real 
estate acquisition process with positive updates from the folks 
who are spearheading this effort and a hope to get to 
completion by fall of 2023.
    So Assistant Secretary Connor, one, I just want you to hear 
that this is an important project for me and for my region. I 
would be interested in learning more about how the Corps is 
engaging with that restoration project.
    Mr. Connor. Absolutely. Thank you, Congressman. I think we 
got a report on this from the Seattle District yesterday. They 
are working hand-in-hand with the county through the real 
estate acquisition process. I think that really is given the 
partnership agreement and the active support from state, local 
as well as at the federal level. We need to complete those real 
estate actions.
    So we are going to continue to be at the county's side as 
we can do that to get to the construction because the bottom 
line is Puget Sound, incredibly important watershed for salmon 
restoration and probably the best ability that we have if we 
take actions throughout the watershed.
    Mr. Kilmer. Well, I am pleased to hear you say that. We are 
similarly rooting the county and that whole team on in terms of 
moving forward. Let me stick with the theme of salmon recovery 
and habitat restoration. Another project in our region is the 
Duckabush Estuary Project. That is a big deal for our region. 
We actually secured funding for Mason PUD 1 to relocate its 
power line in conjunction with that restoration project. It is 
a big project that includes modifying some of the local roads 
and elevating Highway 101 right where the Duckabush River and 
its freshwater meets the saltwater of Hood Canal.
    It also reconnects the Duckabush River to local 
floodplains, and it reroutes some utilities, another big 
project for fish, for Orca, for our whole region. So to support 
this in the 2022 WRDA bill I secured a provision entitled 
Section 8371 Puget Sound Nearshore Ecosystem Restoration 
Washington. The provision was intended to address some 
longstanding issues pertaining to the determination of 
construction project features and the applicability of standard 
ecosystem restoration cost sharing provisions to project 
features.
    I know we sent you a letter to raise awareness of that 
provision, to provide some additional background on 
congressional intent and to share some additional information 
on its impact to that Duckabush Estuary Restoration Project.
    So I guess this one I will send Lieutenant General 
Spellmon's way. Could you just provide an update on the 
implementation of that 2022 WRDA provision, that specific 
provision? And any sense of timeline that we can share with 
folks back in the region would be appreciated.
    General Spellmon. Yes, sir. Last week we completed the 
public comment period for all 199 provisions of WRDA, and then 
Secretary Connor will make a decision which one of those need 
further implementation guidance. I think the direction from 
Congress, sir, is very clear on this one and what you want us 
to do. So we have the $6 million from fiscal year 2023 
congressional funding. That will allow us to advance the design 
on that. Sir, the Washington Department of Transportation will 
complete that work for us, and we will seek the additional 
funds given the cost share change from the Section 8371 that 
you mentioned to seek additional funds to continue that work.
    Mr. Kilmer. I see my time is closing. I am going to submit 
for the record a question related to the Howard Hanson Dam, 
another big project for our region, important for water and for 
fish passage. Eager to hear how the Corps intends to meet the 
BiOp requirement of completion by 2030. So I will submit that 
for the record. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Mr. Fleischmann. Thank you. Mr. Kilmer, if the gentleman 
has a brief response for you, you would gladly yield you some 
additional time to respond.
    General Spellmon. Yes, sir. We appreciate the funding we 
have received to date. We are well off on the design. I would 
just quickly state that we received from Seattle District a 
number of different funding scenarios and timelines. I have got 
that analysis. I have not had a chance to bring this to Mr. 
Connor yet but meets the requirement to get us to 2030.
    Mr. Kilmer. Thanks. I would love to follow up with you on 
that. Thank you, Chairman. I appreciate the extra time.
    Mr. Fleischmann. Thank you, Mr. Kilmer. At this time, I 
would like to recognize Mr. Simpson of Idaho for five minutes 
for questioning.
    Mr. Simpson. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I wasn't going to 
bring this up, but since it has been talked about by my good 
friend to the left of me I do have to say, and this doesn't 
require a response or anything, if you look at the trend line 
of salmon--Idaho has four salmon runs that are on the 
endangered list--it is downward. SARs rate is .7 percent. That 
is headed toward extinction. It is not just the dams. Some 
people say you have 98 efficient fish passage at the dams. 
Maybe so. I don't know. Other people say no, that is 
impossible.
    I glad you put $96 million, I think it was you said, 
requested for salmon recovery--93, and you are going to look at 
improving salmon habitat and all of those types of things. And 
I have got to admit there is a lot of places that you could do 
that. Idaho has the best habitat in the Lower 48 on the salmon 
river drainage. It is high altitude cool waters. It is not just 
the dams though. It is the warm pools behind the dams.
    It now takes three times as long for a smolt to get from 
its breeding ground to the ocean, where it is susceptible to 
more predators. Everything else in the warm water. And Idaho 
sends 487,000 acre feet of water down the river out of our 
irrigation districts in order to wash salmon over these four 
dams. Hasn't worked.
    So, I don't know what you're going to do to help recover 
salmon. I don't know what we haven't tried. I started off on 
this investigation that I've been doing for the last couple 
years saying there's got to be a way to save salmon and keep 
these dams here. There has to be. Then I looked at everything 
that we'd done. Twenty-five studies that have been done by 
groups working together, collaborative groups trying to find a 
solution.
    And they always come down to ah, let's do some habitat 
restoration and that kind of stuff. And you take water out of 
Dworshak Dam to cool the pools. That's water out of Idaho. It 
is a perplexing problem. But before I die, I'm going to save 
Idaho's salmon runs. I hope you'll help us do that. Okay, now 
the questions. And I'm not--before I say any of this and forget 
to in the end, I got to tell you, I love the Army Corps of 
Engineers and the work they do across this country. You guys do 
fantastic work.
    Same with the Bureau of Reclamation. You guys do great 
work. And while we are sometimes frustrated by things like the 
Gooding Wall, I think you do great work across this country, 
and I thank you for that and your service to this country. Let 
me ask you, either one of you. I'm not sure which one. How 
involved were you in writing the WOTUS rule or did you pretty 
much leave that up to the EPA because it is a joint rule of the 
Army Corps and the EPA?
    Mr. Connor. It was a joint rule and we participated very 
heavily in the effort.
    Mr. Simpson. Really?
    Mr. Connor. Yes.
    Mr. Simpson. If I was you, I would have said I didn't, that 
was the EPA. I'd have blamed them because----
    Mr. Connor. I sense the opening.
    Mr. Simpson. Yeah. I have some real problems with the WOTUS 
rule. And as you know, there's--and we had the director of the 
EPA yesterday and we talked about this. Why we would release a 
rule when there's a major case pending in the Supreme Court, 
the Sackett case that might affect that rule. Why we wouldn't 
put it on hold until we found out what the Supreme Court was 
going to rule because it might affect that, and you might have 
to change it going forward.
    But I can tell you in the West, I haven't talked to many 
people that support this rule. Farmers are fearful of their 
practices and what they're going to be able to do and so forth. 
And we've either got to do a lot better selling job to both me 
and westerners or we're going to run into some problems. I have 
been frustrated for 20 years now that when the Court said we 
got to define navigable waters better, that seems like it's not 
that hard a project.
    But we have a rule, new administration comes in, throw out 
that rule, write a new rule, a new administration comes in, 
throw out that rule, write a new rule. We ought to be able to 
come up with a rule that makes sense. And I'm not sure we've 
done that so far. Anyway, one other, I guess a couple things 
that I wanted to talk about for just a second or not talk about 
but get an answer to. Commissioner Touton, Indian water rights 
settlements.
    Congress enacted several mandatory funding provisions for 
Indian water rights. The completion fund provided $2.5 billion 
to complete the ongoing settlements, but Reclamation does not 
expect existing funding sources to be sufficient to satisfy 
federal obligations. The 2024 request proposes $2.5 billion 
over ten years in new mandatory funding to support Indian water 
rights settlements implementation for both existing and future 
settlements and $340 million over ten years for the new 
mandatory funding to address the ongoing operation, 
maintenance, and repair requirements funded by the Bureau of 
Reclamation for four enacted settlements with federal O&M 
obligations. Could you explain all that to me?
    Ms. Touton. Thank you for that question, Congressman. We 
support Indian water rights settlements. As part of the request 
this year is this administrative proposal for funding of the 
Indian water rights settlements. We take our trust 
responsibility seriously and our ability to be able to have 
this funding mechanism helps us to ensure to move those 
settlements forward.
    Mr. Simpson. So, are you going to--if you've required--if 
you've requested two and a half billion over ten years, are we 
going to see a request every year for $250 million to meet 
those obligations? Is that--because I'm trying to look at what 
this committee is going to be looking forward to in next year 
and the year after that and the year after that.
    Ms. Touton. What we'll be able to do is we'll work with 
you, Congressman, as we work through this process including the 
legislative proposal that is part of this administration 
request. But part of that is our ability to be able to continue 
to fund these settlements because as you've mentioned, it 
provides certainty and stability to these communities who have 
entered into these agreements.
    Mr. Simpson. Plus that it's a trust responsibility we have.
    Ms. Touton. It is absolutely a trust responsibility.
    Mr. Simpson. I support it. I support it fully. So, thank 
you for doing that.
    Ms. Touton. Thank you very much.
    Mr. Simpson. And we look forward to working with you on 
that, and thank you, Mr. Chairman, for the extra time that you 
gave me.
    Mr. Fleischmann. My pleasure, Mr. Simpson. And thank you 
for your questions. At this time, I'd like to recognize Ms. 
Wasserman Schultz from the State of Florida for five minutes 
for questions.
    Ms. Wasserman Schultz. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. General, 
it's good to see you again. I want to--you won't be surprised 
that I want to zero in on some of the challenges that we 
continue to face in South Florida and in making progress on a 
lot of the issues that we're facing. The one I want to touch 
base on today is the Central and South Florida Flood Control 
Project, the CNSF Restudy, which provides flood protection for 
the 11 million people who live within its boundaries.
    The populations of Broward, Palm Beach, and Miami Dade 
Counties all depend on a functioning flood control system, 
which I think you're very aware of, and it faces substantial 
stress due to changes in the physical environment, especially 
increased rainfall intensity and rising sea levels caused by 
climate change. In fact, a 2009 study by the South Florida 
Water Management District identified 18 water control 
structures in Miami Dade and Broward that are within six inches 
of failure. Experts predict that we will have another three 
inches of sea level rise just in the next decade in South 
Florida.
    Our communities across Central and South Florida have been 
sounding the alarm bell, and thankfully to some degree we've 
been able to respond by authorizing the Corps to conduct a 
comprehensive restudy of the flood resiliency needs of the 
region in last year's Water Bill, the Water Resources 
legislation. But to actually get the study started, Congress 
needs to provide the Corps with the funding you need in Fiscal 
Year 2024. And I have every intention of making sure that that 
happens.
    So, later this week I'm going to submit a community project 
funding request to secure the funds in our annual 
appropriations bill. The problem though is that your folks are 
telling us--from the Army Corps are telling us that the Army 
Corps doesn't have the capacity to start the restudy in Fiscal 
Year 2024, even if we provide you with the needed funds. And 
the stated reason is--and I'm quoting--you have so much other 
stuff going on right now. Frankly, that's not your--
prioritization is not your job. It's ours.
    And if we provide you with the resources, that's just not 
an acceptable answer for my constituents, for the entire 
Central and South Florida region when we're facing such a 
dangerous situation. We have to start this yesterday. You know, 
being six inches from failure is very, very serious. We can't 
wait until Fiscal Year 2025. So, I'd love you to share with me 
what your response will be when the Committee asks if you can 
execute this in Fiscal Year 2024 after I submit this request.
    General Spellmon. Yes, ma'am. So, in this case, it's much 
more than just funding the study. It's about--it's about people 
and the right people. So, today I have 69 feasibility 
investigations ongoing across the country. WRDA 2022 just 
authorized 94 more. And so, it is--it's balancing the people to 
get across and as you know, there's a lot going on in South 
Florida and that's why Jacksonville told you that they don't 
have a capability. It's not about--it's about getting the right 
people on this project. Very complex across 23 counties. Got to 
make sure we have the right talent to do this, to do this work 
right.
    Ms. Wasserman Schultz. When would you be prepared, if not 
in Fiscal Year 2024 if we give you the--because we're giving 
you the resources to do it. That's usually the problem is you 
don't have the resources. So, if we gave you the resources to 
do it, when would you be prepared to be able to execute it?
    General Spellmon. Yes, ma'am. I'm going to have to follow 
up. This is about hiring. This is--this is----
    Ms. Wasserman Schultz. Yeah, I know. I'm clear on that.
    General Spellmon. Right. Okay.
    Ms. Wasserman Schultz. So, what's the obstacle to your 
being able to hire people?
    General Spellmon. Right. So, we will--we will deep dive 
this with the Jacksonville District to make sure we put the 
right people and the right talents on the--these are--you just 
can't hire folks out of college to work on these complex 
studies.
    Ms. Wasserman Schultz. I get it. I've been on this 
subcommittee a long time.
    General Spellmon. Yes, ma'am.
    Ms. Wasserman Schultz. And I live in the community. So, I 
understand that we don't want, you know, kids off the street 
who have no expertise. But this is a dangerous situation. The 
window is closing on the decade in which we're going to be 
three inches from failure. So, I mean, the Corps needs to 
prioritize this. And so, I get that it's hiring. But you should 
also be prioritizing hiring the people to make sure a project 
that affects 23 out of 67 counties in the third largest state 
in the country is able to be prioritized.
    General Spellmon. Yes, ma'am. And many other places across 
the country.
    Ms. Wasserman Schultz. Right. But this one is fairly 
urgent, which is why I'm raising it and hope that we can get it 
executed sooner than you would anticipate at the moment. And 
I'm also glad that we can have a good news conversation about 
Everglades restoration. We've had overwhelming positive 
progress thanks to the historic funding that's been dedicated 
to Everglades restoration. Last year, President Biden set a 
record providing $1.1 billion for Everglades restoration 
through the bipartisan infrastructure law.
    Just a few weeks ago we were down in South Florida with you 
to celebrate the groundbreaking of the embankment of the EAA 
Reservoir. So, it's not--no longer just a platitude that we're, 
you know, to say that we're making restoration progress, but 
that progress is in serious jeopardy. The proposed--the 
proposal from Republican leadership to cut funding back to 
Fiscal Year 2022 levels across the board means cutting funding 
for things like Everglades restoration. Can you tell us how 
cutting your funding would impact ongoing operations, 
specifically Everglades restoration, and how that would affect 
the completion of the EAA Reservoir, if that would further 
delay construction?
    General Spellmon. Yes, ma'am. I'll give you just a general 
statement. I believe reductions of that measure, you run the 
risk of losing momentum on a number of big projects that we 
have ongoing across the country. The EAA Reservoir, for 
example, Chickamauga Lock, the Soo Lock. You could lose 
significant momentum on this ongoing work.
    Ms. Wasserman Schultz. And where, you know, every--with 
every step, Mr. Chairman, that we take, we've made significant 
progress here. I know there's a lot of water resources projects 
that are on line behind Everglades restoration, which we've 
talked about for years. And so, I would urge my colleagues on 
the other side of the aisle not to take this really 
counterproductive step and delay important projects like this 
further. Thank you. I yield back the balance of my time.
    Mr. Fleischmann. Thank you, Ms. Wasserman Schultz for your 
questions. At this time, I would like to recognize Mr. Newhouse 
from the State of Washington for five minutes.
    Mr. Newhouse. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Just one question 
off--just the comments that were made. You all here to come to 
support the president's proposed budget, correct? My 
understanding is that the president's budget includes a 22 
percent reduction in--over last fiscal year. Is that correct?
    Mr. Connor. I'm not aware of the specific number for the 
Corps.
    Mr. Newhouse. So if the previous comments were true, you're 
already looking at a devastating reduction that you're 
supporting. So, just wanted to put that out there, that--let's 
keep this in context. But my question going back to the 
mediation process for the lower state river dams, I wanted to 
know how the participants, the Corps participants in the 
mediation that are engaging with the federal agencies that are 
not involved in the mediation, if that makes sense, to make 
sure that the Corps' position is consistent--excuse me--with, 
for example, policies on decarbonization or of transportation, 
global food security, and national security.
    General Spellmon. Yes, sir. I would just say that the Corps 
workforce from our Portland and Walla Walla District, they are 
very aware of the eight purposes that those dams serve the 
region, and they come to work every day dedicated to make sure 
that we're serving those congressionally directed purposes.
    Mr. Newhouse. No, I understand that. But within that 
mediation process that you're working with other agencies to 
make sure that those Corps goals are included and represented, 
correct?
    General Spellmon. Yes, sir, that's correct.
    Mr. Newhouse. I appreciate that. So, I appreciate very much 
the challenge that we have in this country of doing both 
things, operating and getting the benefits derived from the 
dams and also the challenges of a strong and healthy salmon 
population. I just want to say thank you very much for the work 
that the Corps has been engaged in, improving the dams, 
bringing them up to date as efficient as possible, looking at 
ways to make them even safer for salmon runs.
    And I certainly want to see a healthy salmon population but 
I think that the benefits that derive from these very important 
pieces of infrastructure are very much worth the investment 
that we're making. I just want to applaud you for your 
continued work in that regard. So, thank very much to all of 
you for being here. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Mr. Fleischmann. Mr. Newhouse, thank you for your 
questions, sir. At this time, I'd like to recognize the ranking 
member, Ms. Kaptur for five minutes for questions.
    Ms. Kaptur. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I have to say that, 
you know, General Spellmon, I'm looking at you and thinking of 
your budget. The constraints in a way that the administration 
has placed on this submission than some of the prior funding 
that you received through the Infrastructure Act and so forth, 
and here you're trying to hire a staff and have a steady state 
of increase, it's very difficult.
    And so, I perceive that many of our colleagues up here do 
as well, and we're trying to help you help the country. So, I 
wanted to follow up quickly. Representative Quigley mentioned 
the invasive carp issue obviously is extraordinarily important. 
And for my own lake, as I've said, it's about a $7 billion 
fishery. While I appreciate the nearly $300 million that has 
been directed to this project so far, I'm concerned with the 
lack of funding in the budget request. The current submission 
for 2024 and recent news articles highlighting overall project 
costs and potential decreases to scope. So my question is, 
General Spellmon or Secretary Connor, can you please provide us 
with an update specifically on any changes to scope and 
concomitant increases in cost?
    I don't know if you're prepared to answer that today or 
not, but it would be very helpful to us to understand where 
this--where this stands. And I think what I've learned today 
from the hearing is that the environmental advance of this 
creature is not broadly mapped nor part of the presentation, 
your presentation, or anyone's presentation who could actually 
do something about this. So, I'm troubled by the lack of 
interagency cooperation and so members who have a deep interest 
in this can understand where we are as a country and make 
intelligent decisions.
    General Spellmon. Ma'am, I will follow up with you with a 
more complete response on the reductions in scope. We're 
learning things as we go through some of the research and 
development, say, on acoustic speakers, that we may not need 
the quantity and dispersion that we had initially planned. So, 
we're learning here as we go, but I would like to follow up 
with you and provide a more specific response. In short, why I 
didn't make a recommendation to the Secretary for this 
particular project, ma'am, we have funding in abundance to get 
after the initial construction contracts that we would need 
once we get to a project partnership agreement with the State 
of Illinois.
    Ms. Kaptur. All right. I would be very grateful for then 
specifically any changes to scope and increases in costs 
related to where you are in this project because we believe 
that we voted for sufficient funds, and perhaps we need to have 
a conversation with the Governor of Illinois. Maybe that's what 
we need to do. I'm not sure. But we'll talk with Congressman 
Quigley and others who have expressed an interest in this.
    Also, on Soo Locks, I wanted to ask there are time 
sensitive contracts that exist with a potential of $700 million 
over the next two years. Secretary Connor, what is the Corps' 
plan to ensure the project receives adequate funding so that 
necessary contracts can proceed and not result in further 
costs. And again, to both you and General Spellmon, a project 
with the complexity and scope of Soo Locks requires careful 
oversight by your offices. What steps are you taking to ensure 
the local district has the resources and expertise to implement 
the project effectively, deliver this critically important 
project without any additional surprises or cost delays?
    Mr. Connor. So, Soo Locks, obviously a very important 
project from a supply chain and economic perspective. And so, 
for that reason certainly the cost increase that was determined 
last year created significant hurdles for us to overcome to try 
and keep the project on task and to keep the base plus options 
contract, you know, able to be filled so that we wouldn't have 
further cost increases. So, we've used additional resources in 
addition to the $480 million that we initially allocated for 
the bipartisan infrastructure law. We allocated $214 million 
last October to cover an option.
    We allocated $67 million in the 2023 work plan to cover 
another option. We have $235 million in this budget to cover 
yet another option. But we have more capability, and there are 
other options that we are concerned that we will not be able to 
meet and we would have to rebid those and in this climate, 
there is the prospects of additional cost increases.
    So we are trying to throw every resource from every 
different pot that we can to keep this project moving forward. 
We will certainly continue with the high level of construction 
activity, but whether we will be able to meet all the options 
right now that is a question as we move into 2024.
    Ms. Kaptur. Would you provide us with some detail on what 
your plan is so that we don't fall behind on completion?
    Mr. Connor. Yes. We will do that. Absolutely. We will 
follow up with you.
    Ms. Kaptur. Thank you. Thank you very much. General 
Spellmon, quickly you might be able to answer this. I 
appreciate your goal set on dredge material. The Corps is 
currently in the process of preparing a dredge material 
management plan for Lake Erie harbors. Could you tell us how 
will these new plans embrace your goal of increased beneficial 
use and build that into base operations?
    General Spellmon. Yes, ma'am. Thank you for your leadership 
on this as well. We have learned a lot from the state of Ohio 
and the efforts they are taking on beneficial use of dredge 
material. We learned a lot from the Port of Baltimore on how 
they are going about this. And I set out on a goal. I wanted to 
flip my numbers from 70 percent disposing of dredge material in 
ocean disposal sites, and I just had 30 percent going into 
beneficial use.
    We are making some progress. Today we are 40 percent on 
beneficial use. We have the ten pilots ongoing that were 
authorized to us in WRDA 2020. Those have been helpful, but I 
would say what we are learning from your state and wetland 
creation and how they are marketing some of this material that 
is coming out of your harbors has got us thinking in different 
dimensions as well. So ma'am, we are going to keep the close 
relationship certainly with the state of Ohio and others who 
are leaders in this field.
    Ms. Kaptur. Thank you very much. Thank you, Mr. Chairman 
and members.
    Mr. Fleischmann. Thank you, Ranking Member Kaptur. At this 
time I would like to recognize Ms. Lee from the state of Nevada 
for five minutes.
    Ms. Lee. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. General Spellmon, as part 
of last year's Water Resource Development Act I helped secure 
language regarding the Managed Aquifer Recharge study and 
working group that would direct the Corps to conduct a national 
assessment of carrying out such projects. While Nevada 
currently does not have aquifer that would qualify or would be 
identified we benefited from this because of the regional 
drought resilience. And as you know reclamation states can and 
do participate in water banking where this excess water is 
transferred for storage and banked.
    Major water banks such as the Arizona Water Banking 
Authority has stored water on behalf of the Southern Nevada 
Water Authority. What is the implementation of the MAR section 
of WRDA?
    General Spellmon. Sorry, ma'am?
    Ms. Lee. Managed Aquifer----
    General Spellmon. Oh, yes, ma'am.
    Ms. Lee. What is the status?
    General Spellmon. Yes, ma'am. Thank you. So as I mentioned, 
we completed the public comment period for all 199 provisions 
of WRDA 2022 last week. Very clear this is a powerful tool that 
Congress gave us given the authority to conduct up to ten 
feasibility studies on Managed Aquifer Recharge. This is with 
Department of Defense right now. They are looking at this 
specific working group, ma'am, to see if there is any Federal 
Advisory Committee Act requirements, and that would certainly 
inform any budget recommendation if it is needed.
    I will tell you this is on the forefront of the research 
and development program for fiscal year 2024 that we want to 
get after. We are excited about this opportunity, and we 
appreciate the tools that Congress has given this year.
    Ms. Lee. Great.
    Mr. Connor. Can I just add something on this particular 
point?
    Ms. Lee. Yes.
    Mr. Connor. So as General Spellmon noted this is an 
incredibly important tool. Although the budget is a reduction 
from the Congress appropriated levels we have $800 million more 
from the budget, president's budget, and a lot of that is 
allocated toward R&D. So we are using that right now to move 
towards Managed Aquifer Recharge. We have a project now, Prado 
Dam, where we are doing forecast informed reservoir operations, 
and we will manage long-term to release floodwaters differently 
so that they can be picked up by the Orange County Water 
District so that they can manage aquifer recharge basically.
    That is subject to a deviation that was just done a few 
years ago that we now want to make permanent. We are doing the 
same thing in Arizona right now at Roosevelt Dam to look at 
releasing floodwaters differently so they can be picked up by 
the water users and stored in whatever capable system that they 
have. So spot on. This is an incredibly important program, but 
I just wanted to let you know we are already moving out where 
we can even before we get this particular provision 
implemented.
    Ms. Lee. Great. That is good to hear. Commissioner Touton, 
I just want to follow up. You mentioned earlier all the funding 
you received, the $4 billion that we secured in the Inflation 
Reduction Act specifically to combat the effects of extreme 
drought as well as the $8.3 billion investment in the 
Infrastructure Investment Act. I just wanted to hear from you 
are you confident that you are getting this assistance from 
both of these bills out in time to make a difference?
    Ms. Touton. Thank you very much for the support of 
Reclamation in those two laws. Within 45 days of the President 
signing the Inflation Reduction Act into law we had a Request 
For Proposals for short-term voluntary conservation measures 
that we closed in December, and we signed one of the first ones 
already this month. And so as we are looking at this we are 
going through our operational process. We are maximizing the 
money that we have and getting it out the door as soon as we 
can including our anticipation of what we are calling Bucket 2, 
long-term sustainability projects for the Colorado River Basin 
as early as this spring to be able to get Requests For 
Proposals to start funding those.
    So we know time is of the essence both for hydrology and 
the timing of the law, and we are committed to moving that 
funding expeditiously.
    Ms. Lee. Are there any obstacles you face in getting these 
funds out? Is there anything we can do to help?
    Ms. Touton. I think the challenges that we face are not 
unique to Reclamation. So, one of the first things that we were 
able to do is hire the hirers. As part of this we have been 
able to staff up 300 FTEs both in the implementation of the 
Bipartisan Infrastructure Law but also to help us with the 
Inflation Reduction Act. So we are moving forward with that 
using the flexibilities we can to push that money out where it 
is needed.
    Ms. Lee. Okay. Great. Thank you. I yield.
    Mr. Fleischmann. Thank you, Ms. Lee. There appears to be no 
other--Ms. Kaptur, do you want to be recognized?
    Ms. Kaptur. I do.
    Mr. Fleischmann. Absolutely. I recognize the Ranking 
Member, Ms. Kaptur, for five minutes.
    Ms. Kaptur. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, very much. I truly 
appreciate that. I wanted to ask Commissioner Touton you heard 
the general speak about 10 percent of his workforce are 
individuals who are specialists in land planning, ecosystem 
planning, a preponderance of civil engineers project by 
project. In the way that the Bureau hires you deal with a vast 
region. You look at the world differently. I am wondering if 
you look at your staff what capabilities, professional 
capabilities, do you have? Do you have as many civil 
engineering percentagewise in your staff, or are there also a 
larger number of ecosystem specialists, and so forth? Could you 
comment on that?
    Ms. Touton. Ranking Member, I would like to get you more 
specific details for the record on that as far as the structure 
of our workforce, but what we are looking at across the board 
as a workforce is we're 5,400 employees across 17 Western state 
projects. A third of our workforce are actually veterans, and a 
lot of that workforce is in our power plants and in our pumping 
facilities because that expertise they have from their service 
in the United States military actually aligns with our mission 
and what we need.
    We have twice as many civil engineers than the national 
average as far as women civil engineers, but we will get you a 
detailed assessment of not just our engineers but our 
environmental planners, we have economists, biologists who 
enable able the work of Reclamation across the West.
    Ms. Kaptur. All right. That is very interesting to me. My 
sense and maybe I am wrong is that the Army Corps of Engineers 
is more project focused, and we need them to do that, that you 
have a broader region that you serve. Your scope is wider, and 
I am trying to get that into the Corps, trying to get those 
talents in there to meet the needs of the new day and thinking 
about how to do that.
    I did want to ask you, Commissioner, your testimony states 
this sentence, ``Each year on average reclamation generates 
about 40 million megawatt hours of electricity and collects 
over $1 billion in gross power revenues for the federal 
government.'' My question is what about net? Does the $1 
billion in revenues--from the $1 billion in revenues, does the 
agency realize a ``profit'' on its balance sheet, or actually 
is it a net loss due to the offset of expenses that attend to 
that power production? Do you know?
    Ms. Touton. So we can follow up with you on that for the 
record. The part of the challenge we have we are the second 
largest producer of hydropower, second to the Army Corps of 
Engineers, but with the hydrology and water as our fuel there 
has been an impact to our ability to generate. But as a whole 
we have been able to reliably generate and provide power to our 
water users. And we will get you the numbers on the net versus 
gross. A lot of that is marketed by the Western Area Power 
Administration as relates to the Colorado River Basin, so we 
will coordinate with them to get those numbers for you.
    Ms. Kaptur. All right. It has been very interesting over 
the years that over a billion dollars added to the Bureau's 
budget as direct appropriation. I'm just curious as to where 
that goes. Does it attend to power revenue loss, or does it 
attend to other work that the Bureau does?
    My final question to General Spellmon is how is the Corps 
expanding its connections to other departments and agencies of 
our government as you attempt to meet the climate challenges of 
a new day? Are there interagency working groups project by 
project? Region by region? Do you work with NOAA? Do you work 
with other entities that might not naturally be in your scope? 
How do you work with other instrumentalities of our government 
and to be more effective in the work that you do?
    General Spellmon. Yes, ma'am. I would just say we work 
extensively with Department of Commerce, Department of the 
Interior and many, many others. We have been talking about 
today the Great Lakes Coastal Resiliency Study. By design that 
is going to incorporate a lot of other of our federal and state 
partners just as we did with the North Atlantic study and 
certainly the South Atlantic Coastal Comprehensive Study. In 
short, yes.
    Ms. Kaptur. That particular study just as an example 
whether water short or had water excess in the country in 
different places I have still to find the agency that can 
produce the map that actually topographically shows us what is 
occurring on the surface and with aquifers, and so forth, 
underneath. We have talked about recharging of aquifers. I have 
not found the map across the federal government that teaches 
people in a given region what they can do to help.
    It is amazing, and we have funded so many studies, so 
many--whether it is USGS I don't know where it is, but it is 
very hard to help mayors and county commissioners and county 
engineers and people who are trying to help when we have no 
regional mapping by watershed that helps us understand how we 
can mobilize people at the local level to be successful in 
meeting--rather, what we have is we have FEMA in the Great 
Lakes bailing out people whose homes are flooded because they 
live in a flood zone. They never should have had those homes 
there in the first place. This is the kind of thing that is 
going.
    We are picking up the pieces. We are not really looking 
ahead pooling best information that we have across the 
government of the United States. Maybe NASA has something. I 
don't know. But I have been just amazed that it has been so 
hard. The focus is generally too narrow, and it is not across 
agency in order to provide people with the best information 
that we can possibly obtain on how they can be more helpful. 
And I think part of the problem the Bureau is that, you know, 
we are talking about capturing water that is being lost because 
we don't have systems in place.
    Well, that shows a lack of rigor by the federal government 
as a whole in anticipating the future and thinking bigger than 
the 20th Century projects, thinking about earth science and 
blending those talents into the work that we do. At least that 
is my opinion. So we are glad where you are because you are 
capable of changing the trajectory as we move forward for the 
sake of the nation. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, for your 
patience in allowing me this time.
    Mr. Fleischmann. I wish to thank Ranking Member Kaptur for 
her questions. And as we conclude this hearing, Secretary 
Connor, General Spellmon, Commissioner Touton, I want to thank 
you for your responses today, for being present. Each and every 
one of you all have very arduous tasks. It is a very, very 
difficult job that you have got.
    Our job as appropriators are to ask sometimes difficult 
questions, but I think you can tell in a very bipartisan almost 
nonpartisan way many times very constructive questions as we 
come together on this Energy and Water appropriations bill.
    But my sincere thanks to each and every one of you all for 
your service to this nation.
    Thank you very much. With that we are adjourned.
    [Questions and answers submitted for the record follow:]
    
    
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