Obama requests US$ 711.0 million fossil energy fund

President Obama’s FY 2015 budget is seeking US$ 711.0 million for the Office of Fossil Energy (FE) to advance technologies related to the reliable, efficient, affordable and environmentally sound use of fossil fuels, as well as manage the Strategic Petroleum Reserve and Northeast Home Heating Oil Reserve to provide strategic and economic security against disruptions in US oil supplies. The request includes US$ 475.5 million for fossil energy R&D, US$ 205.0 million for the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, US$ 1.6 million for the Northeast Home Heating Oil Reserve and US$ 19.95 million for the Naval Petroleum Reserves.

The budget request will allow the FE to fulfill its mission: to provide the nation with the best opportunity to tap the full potential of its abundant fossil energy resources in an environmentally sound and affordable manner and to ensure America’s readiness to respond to short term energy supply disruptions.

Fossil energy R&D

Below are some of the R&D projects that will be funded if the FY 2015 budget request is granted.

• Carbon capture and Storage (CCS) demonstrations. This includes the management of the Clean Coal Power Initiative program and two American Recovery and Reinvestment Act CCS demonstration programs.
• CCS and power systems program conducts research to reduce carbon emissions by improving the performance and efficiency of fossil energy systems and CCS technologies.
• Carbon capture activity will focus on the development of post combustion and pre combustion CO₂ capture and compression technologies for new and existing fossil fuel fired power plants and industrial sources.
• Carbon storage program will develop and validate technologies to ensure sage and permanent geologic storage of captured CO₂.
• Advanced Energy Systems (AES) will increase the available and efficiency of fossil energy systems integrated with CO₂ caption, while maintaining the highest environmental standards at the lowest costs.
• Cost cutting research programs will bridge the gap between basic and applied research by targeting concepts that offer the potential for transformational breakthroughs and step change benefits in the way energy systems are designed, constructed and operated.
• The Natural Gas Program will support the Department of Energy’s (DOE) missions in energy, environment and national security.

Petroleum reserves

The Office of Petroleum Reserves manages programs that provide the US with strategic and economic protection against disruptions in oil supplies and include the following:

• Strategic Petroleum Reserve. Protects the US from disruptions in critical petroleum supplies and meets the US obligations under the International Energy Agency (IEA).
• Northeast Home Heating Oil Reserve. Provides a short term supplement to the Northeast systems’ commercial supply of heating oil in the event of a supply interruption.
• Naval Petroleum and Oil Shale Reserves. Manages a number of legal agreements that were executed as part of the 1998 sale of NPR-1 in California. 

Adapted from a press release by Claira Lloyd.

Read the article online at: https://www.oilfieldtechnology.com/exploration/05032014/fy_2015_fossil_energy_budget_request229/